First of all hello to you all. This is my first posting ever to a site. (I hope I am doing everything right.) I have been following the discussions in this site and I must thank to all members since I have benefited a lot from thier comments. Since I do not have a computer at home, and it is not practicle to post images or views from work, I was not able to involve actively before.

I have also uploaded images from a dio/vignette attempt that I was working on before I left Ankara/Turkey to come to Brussels. I do not think I will be able to go back to it any time soon but your comments will help me to start new projects.

The street in the dio was made from my nephew`s old `play-do`. It was almost dry so I bought him a new set and used the old one to cut tiny cubes. When cut to r'ght shape and dried, they are wonderful for making cobble stone streets. But it definitely requires patience to apply them all one by one on the base! :-)

Sidewalk was made from plastoc sheets. The wall behind is made of `balsa` wood. (maybe there is another name???) Poster on the wall and the map in the Schwimmwagen are downloaded from the net and printed with a color printer. The tarpaulin in the back of the vehicle is cleenex soaked in dilluted white glue.

The vehicle is the very old Tamiya Schwimmwagen. The panzer crew is from Tamiya and the two paras are from Dragon.

All were painted by Tamiya acryllics and oil paints of different kinds.

There are no aftermarket or photoetch parts used in the dio.

In Ankara there was only one modelling shop that I knew. IIn Istanbul though, we seem to have a bigger modelling community and more places to shop.) I would greatly appreciate if anybody could give me the addresses of a couple of modelling shops in Brussels and inform me of modelling shows that I can visit.

Thanks again for those who are keeping this site as my personal best for getting ideas and learning about modellers and modelling.

First of all - Welcome to the best modeling site around. WIth contribution from all its members (including you) it only gets better.

I checked out your diorama and it looks very good. The idea of using play dough is really good - another source of materials is always good.

The layout is nice, relaxed and preperatory (sp). There is a lot of attention to detail, maps, gear, grass in nooks, poster etc. Nice. The camo is very crisp. The figures are well done. The contstruction of the base is solid.
The overall appearance is a bit glossy, but that could be the photo (you judge).
The one thing that I see is that I would add a bit of weathering to the wall, both sides. The bright red is nice and a good contrast. Unless it was painted yesterday, I would add at least a bit of pastels or a thin brown wash to it. The back side should get a nice wash also, maybe two, one brown one dark brown or black.

Good job. I like it.

Overall, this looks very good. Interesting use of varied colors in the cobblestones. My only problem is the red fence. Extremely bright red. The damage implies it's been up for a while but the bright red makes it look freshly painted. Red paint fades very fast in the sun. Artistically, it also detracts from the rest of the colors in the scene.

Ditto on what has been stated already Yazal. I like the theme you have chosen. It is not too cluttered and it gives a relaxed image to the troops. Is the fence made of wood? If so you could distress it with a wire brush to let some of the natural color of the wood to show thru. Overall it is a very nice dio, One more thing, Welcome to Armorama

Looking good, keep up the good work

Selam Yazal
Glad to see another Turk here.Welcome to ARMORAMA. I read the critics and honestly there is not much to say more. They are Eagle eyes and criticize very good.
Matt cote overall and weathering with chalk pastels will make it better.
Lets keep contact
Mutlu Yıllar (:-)

Thanks for the encouraging comments. As I said it was not yet complete. The wall definitely needs weathering and I assume I needed to ad some junk behind the wall as well.

The brightness of the figures comes from the flash. They all had a matt coat and do not shine under nrormal light. I took the pictures with a normal SLR and then had the pictures scanned from the negatives.

For the weathering of the vehicle, I used a rather different method. I applied oil paint (burnt umber) directly and rather generously on the model and without waiting, wiped it off the model with q-tips. If done on accryllics before applying any gloss coat, it is not so easy to remove all the access paint from the crevices but it gives a realistic look I think.

yazal,
Welcome to Armorama. I am sure you will enjoy it here! I would agree with the earlier comments about your diorama. Nice job, sir! Hope to see more of your work.