I am impressed with all of that companies' products that I have used so far. You also seem to have figured out the best method here for this. Well done. Very effective.
J

Your foliage looks great...I would like to suggest to make the foliage somewat fuller, however. The branches of fallen trees look much denser than their upright brothers...

Had je die ff gekapt Erwin?

Ja, ter illustratie.. Alleen heb ik niet genoeg secondenlijm om hem terug te plakken :S

Hey guys, don't go all Double-Dutch on us - or the rest of us will miss the joke!

So:

Had je die ff gekapt = Did you cut that ff

And

Ja, ter illustratie.. Alleen heb ik niet genoeg secondenlijm om hem terug te plakken = Yes, for illustrative purposes. Only I don't have enough superglue to stick it back.

Sorry for using Google translate which has no doubt killed any humour...

Anyway, Erwin said:




I quite agree - the foliage on the fallen tree is only the start but I will add more when it is in situ.

Thanks Jerry. I wasn't sure at first, but yes, I think it works very well.

Thanks Floris!

Dan, yes indeed it's a fascinating saga - and a very dark period of history. I knew nothing about it until I started this project.

Hey, RobertJan started it!

And it wasn't a real joke. The translation left out one expression: ff, means effe, which is coloquial for even.
This means as much as just... Did you just fel this?

Oh! I thought 'ff' was something ruder than that!

Nope, in English, that would be right, but not in Dutch.

I can see why you went with the Silflor & great move to do the under-canopies in a darker shade, it really looks good. You’ve got 7 trees, in my Anthropoid dio I’ve got at least that many to do so I’m interested to know how it costs out i.e. what quantity did you buy, how many trees would one roll cover etc? And regarding the “bushing” effect, is it easy to tease it out with the point of a knife into strands or does it fall apart?

LOL

Get serious RJ
Your doing a great job on those trees, making notes.

So the next step was to add a bit of texture to the landscape. Most of this is going to be covered with plants and other foliage of various types, but I didn't want large patches of bare earth showing through.

I revisited the same 'old-school' technique that I used for some of the grass areas on my Italian diorama: hanging basket liner stuck down with PVA and then peeled off. I love this because it's so simple, quick and cheap - only £2 for a liner and I still had some left over!

It really is easy: cover the area where you want it in PVA (not to much, you only want the tips of the coconut fibres to stick), press the basket liner in place and then leave to dry overnight.



The next day you get to act like a maniac in a Brazilian waxing parlour - except that, as you peel it off, what is left behind is something looking more like Chewbacca's hairy hide.



Whilst this would be a good starting point if I was after a Kursk grassland look, this was not what I needed for my Mayalan setting. So, after attacking the fibres vigorously with a pair of small, sharp scissors, I then brushed on a dark green wash followed by a reddish brown for the exposed earth areas. What I ended up with was sort of mossy bank which I'm hoping will be a good background for all of the laser-cut paper and other plants which I will soon be adding.



The next step was to add the telegraph pole and marking posts along the road.

The telegraph pole can be clearly seen in the image at the top of this post just in front of the 2 pounder with a ladder leant against it.

There is a complete shot of one of these poles from another skirmish that happened just along the road from my scene.



Here you can see two other Ha-Gos (one is obscured by smoke) that were knocked out. The toppled armoured car, by the way, is an Allied Marmon-Herrington.

The telegraph poles on this stretch of road were quite distinctive - thicker at the base, quite thin overall and with three rows of insulators. The two missing from the bottom row were not the result of battle damage - there were only 10 lines on each pole. Like the verge markers, they were also painted white at their base, which should help add some brightness to the whole scene.

My pole was made using a wooden dowel, thickened at the base with a plastic paint brush sleeve, and the cross bars and insulators adapted from a MiniArt kit. The roadside poles are just pieces of square section wooden dowel.

Whether the ladder was being used to spot for any further attacks - or as a vantage point for the photographer - is unclear, but it's a nice unusual touch. Because the only ladders which I had in my spares box were of the rustic wodden type, I scratch built this extendable type, mostly from C-section plastic rod with a few bits of spare photoetch to add some details.




All of these details help to add interest to what would otherwise be just a road through the jungle...

Nice progress and interesting technique you used...

The scene with the toppled Marmon-Herrington in combination with the burned out Japanese tank(ettes?) is a tempting one too!!!

Very cool! I love the coconut solution for the tall grass. May have to investigate.
J

Impressive moral fibre/fiber there Tim, gotta get me a lovely bunch of coconuts too

Trees glorious trees!!





None are fixed in place yet - hence the slightly wonky appearance. They may be getting a little trimming in places and I have some loose leaves coming from Mininatur to cover any gaps - but to all intents and purposes they are done. Phew!

Thoroughly impressive !
J