What I´m involved very tightly at the moment, is the idea of a diorama as a representation of a bigger theme or situation, put in a scene that may tell another story, but somehow reflect a bigger picture...
My Spritztour dio with two drunken German officers somewhere in France was at first just a funny idea to proceed with...after finishing the dio I started to notice bigger themes behind it. Actually it was criticism against on the nazi "ubermensch" ideals, just by showing two guys in the most natural setting, having to take a pee after finishing a bottle of Moselwein...
And no doubt about that, these two guys are just two human beings with names and personal backgrounds, but at the same time they´re carrying uniforms and an uniform is a strong sign of a whole bunch of ideals...whether you share those thoughts or not.
I find myself searching for this kind of extensions beyond the scene that is shown.
In the next couple of projects this approach will hopefully be seen and I have a few big themes I want to show in a small dio.
Classic arts have had the ability to compress a spirit of an era, the political situation and the artist´s own statement in a single work of art.
I believe it can be achieved in modeling as well.

Toni

Envar,
What a great idea. Never really thought of the inner meaning of a small diorama with bigger meaning.

Can you post some pictures of your diorama???

Patton, here´s the link: Spritztour!
This dio wasn´t actually made with this idea in mind but it works here also and could lead to loooong analysis...
Going further from what can be seen will reveal deeper (more important?) things...or not. #:-)

Toni

Toni,
LOL !
Those two guys don't look half as drunk as some of the soldiers I saw crawling from the bar when I was in the army. Your story makes me remember the first scenes of "Das Boot", where the U-boat crew got quite p***ed in the officers' mess. If you want to show the "bigger idea", next time you can consider one of your figures being sick in the diorama. I'm sure it's not been done too often before ? Just a naughty idea...
Jan

Toni, I admire your work very much. You are very successful at capturing the essence of human nature. Your Hut Warming is another example of the "big picture" told through small snipits of human activity. BTW I am particularly drawn to the small detail of the ammo belt slung over the grab bar in the Schwimmwagen. It's the little touches that make the difference. Scott

I hate making judgments about things like this, but I'll give you a couple views.

First view: Hey, it's natural. This is something troops do all the time (though in today's U.S. Army, if you get caught doing something like drinking and driving, it can be a career-ending event. Drink and drive in a military vehicle, in or out of uniform, and you may well do hard time in prison). I might include this in a WWII diorama as a "side story," but I would not make it the primary focus of the dio.

Second view: Why do we have to have troops relieving themselves? It was cute the first time I saw it 10 years ago, but it is lame now. What about troops cleaning weapons, reading mail, eating chow, cleaning feet, shaving, cutting hair, sleeping, etc., ... ? Stuff that REAL troops do in the field.

Just some thoughts. No offense meant or taken.

I like the idea of showing the soldiers as people rather than uniforms. Speaking from experience no matter where you are in the world you always have photo's of your kids etc. maybe a scene in a trench with soldiers showing the photo's, perhaps scribbling down a last note before the "final push". One scene I'd like to do is of a train station with all the troops about to board a train with families on the platform,troops in full combats holding babies, cuddling children and kissing wives goodbye. I think this would capture the fact that uniforms are only clothes and the person inside is the soldier but also a father and husband. I think this would be a challenge and will probaly never be done but who knows?

Robbo

You have a point there Hollowpoint.
My point was just to put up a conversation about the themes we choose for our dioramas. It is very different when your main goal is the historical accuracy and showing exact models in their natural environment, than a scene where the main attention is not the technical side of it but rather the need to say something, to make a point where the model just happens to be the chosen medium to illustrate that.
When a clear idea meets professional building skills, we have a winner...

There are many questions to ask yourself when thinking about an idea for a dio. The result can differ a lot if you place one of the main questions (what, why, how) over the other. And I think this is the beauty of all this: we see so many different approaches from many standpoints, and there is something to be learned from each one of them!



Toni

BTW. The Schwimmwagen dio had a female figure to meet the driving German, but I accidentally ran into this relieving fella, so the whole story accidentally changed...
I didn´t have any of this analytical stuff thought up when building that, it just came across later on. Too much narrative analysis at school lately I guess...

Maybe you can say when nature calls (:-)