today I haven`t done that much on my building.
Just gave it a plasterlayer (thanks for the idea Plasticbattle) the plaster I used needs to dry for 24 hours so that was actually the last thing I did this evening.
Tommorow comes the sanding, more painting, giving the inside a nice wallpaper but that`s for tomorrow.
Today I give you all plaster!!







all the progress pictures on the house can be viewed in this link
House progress

Tell me what you think of it and questions?.... Always ask

Hi Faust. I have played about with stuff for a while now and have gotten some brilliant results. Instead of sanding it smooth, get a damp sponge.... the soft side of those kitchen thingys .... an dab it softly all over. This flatens it all down an still leaves a lovely texture. Let it dry for a few hours before scribing it as scribing when soft only pushes the soft spackel out.
I think you will find it quite hard to sand down, as it dries very hard and the base is not too strong. this is a great medium to use. I have tried some buildings out of thick cardboard and added this stuff direct to the cardboard and also over paper maché. When nearly hard I scribed damaged brick work and then painted. I was very happy about the results.
One thing I am really admiring is your brickwork. The colours of your bricks are amazing. What did you use and what colours. This is PERFECTION!!!

I missed the other ones I guess. What kind of plaster are you using? I need some for a project I am working on and am wondering if I can find the right kind in a Michael's craft store or something.

Nic

Wow, looking great! Cant wait to see the end results. :-)

Hi Folgore. I think its spackel. Usually quite common in D.I.Y. shops for mending holes in hardwall walls. It comes ready mixed in a long tube.... about 1 foot long. Usually white.
I swear by this stuff. You can build absoultly anything from cardboard, balsa, paper maché etc. and then cover it with this, shape it roughly, wait and touch up every hour as it hardens.
Graet results and it takes paint easily as well!

Thanks, plasticbattle. I will have to go out and try to find this. (Can you tell I don't do a whole lot of D.I.Y. stuff? )

Nic

Yoh folgore

Here in Holland we call the stuff I used Plamuur, Probably that will be wallspackle as plastic battle describes the tube and how the substance looks. normally it`s used to Fill holes in wood (like your windowframe where you just turned a screw in it) It sticks to almost everything. Let it dry for about 24 hours and you can sand it. I`m going to do this this evening. Than I give it directly a paintjob.

More pictures of my progress will be uploaded this evening

here is an updated costs list that I forgot to contain in the first post of this topic

Sniper:
I talked this over with Keith because my Sniper ia completely scratchbuilt and I had no idea what to raise for it. So Keith and I agreed to raise 25ct. for every part that came from the scratchbox I thought this was fair.
-Modeling Clay from the DAS brand "Stolen" from my little sister : 0.00ct
-The Sniper gun came from the scrapbox : 0.25ct
-The right(shooting) hand from the scrapbox: 0.25ct
-the complete leftarm came from the scrapbox: 0.25ct
-The head with helmet out of the scrapbox: 0.25ct
-The boots from the scrapbox: 0.25
-The shovel and the cannister (I believe): 0.25ct
Total Scratchbuilt Sniper: $ 1.50

The building and sidewalk
-Foam used for the building and sidewalk I got it from my father out of the hospital: 0.00ct
-Windowframe was made out of a couple of icelolly sticks wich I had laying around: 0.00ct
-Miliputt wich I had laying around for a long time: Oh heck I raise 0.25ct for that then my building got any value within
-one tube of wallspackle/plaster/ (plamuur in dutch) "stolen" from my fathers workshed: 0:00ct
Total scratchbuilt houseruin: $0.25ct

Overall cost: $1.75


Any questions?? Just ask

Just one question. What brand and colours did you use to paint your stone work? I really like this and would appreciate you tips for this. I think that turned out really well and with the plaster added, makes it look soooo good.

Also let us know what you think of the spackel, when more work id done on your dio.

Thanks
Frank

Robert,
LOL ! I wonder why there's all these jokes around about Dutch people and the scroogy way they deal with money when I see how liberally you throw your Euros around for this vignette !

(Als hierop een Belgenmop volgt als antwoord : I had it coming ! )

Yoh plasticbattle

All the paint I use is Enamel and Acrylics.
for the building I`ve only used enamels
first thing I did was taking profit of the qualities of the foam. With a pen I draw the bricks on the parts where I want them to be shown. when you are drawing on the foam just push a little bit harder jou dent the foam only on the place where the tip of the pen is funny thing with that is that the edges of the bricks get a rounder appearance.
after you`ve done that you paint the first layer. I did this in plain Humbrol khaki.
waited ten minutes then I took the white (also Humbrol) and I painted as much as I could the joints between the bricksThat it looks a bit messy when you do that is not something to worry about.
After the white I picked the (yes Humbrol again) "Brick red" and gave everything a sort of drybrush but with a bit more paint on it than usually when you drybrush.
If you`ve done that you take a darker version brown and again do this drybrush thing again.
Funny thing is that you can see the white coloured joints between the bricks
While not all the bricks have the same colour in reallife grab the Khaki and paint some single stones in that colour. You can do this with more brown/red/grey variations.
After all this painting work you do one thing give the whole brick area a light drybrush with black to give it a more burned surface.
That`s for the brickpainting so far quite easy isn`t it

He GF

THAT`S SOME NASTY STUFF YOU SAID THERE ABOUT THE DUTCH PEOPLE

YOU MADE ME VERY ANGRY!!!!!!!

Probably the whole world will think that the dutch people are realtime scrooges. well let them think For me it`s just the competition. when they said there is a money limit for the contest I thought by myself how far can I get under that moneylimit and that`s how my first experiment began on scratchbuilding on this scale. earlier I made a piece of an old French shed and I scratched some little diostuff but I never scratched a complete dio.
For me is this "cheapness" an experiment

Im sure G. Failure was only joking but I applaud those who scratchbuild their dios. I pay more attention to those than an ordinary bought kit and "placed" in the background. For me, a model is not complete without a vignette or dio. I get as much enjoyment out of building a dio and seeing it finished as I do when I buy a kit. I feel as if I have created something rather than just assembled and painted somebody elses work. Hopefully with work like this and competitions like this it will encourage more to scratchbuild. It was a great idea of Keiths to add in the $30 dollar rule!
Keep it up guys!!

Yoh plasticbattle

I know that GF was joking about me.
That`s something between the dutch and the belgian people to make jokes about each other. No anger was ment both parties can laugh about that

Yeah I agree on you that the 30 dollar restriction was a very good thing from Keith. Your`e almost forced to scratchbuilding and till this moment I`ve seen e few pretty good ideas and photo-updates. so yeah this contest will probably have a surprising end. And I`m looking forward to the end of it and see all the results

By the way have you read the thing about painting the bricks I posted in this topic. Hope it was of any use for you.

Yeah I read it and appreciate it. You can see in my pictures of the church diorama I have some bricks to paint as well and this is exactly what i wanted!!
See here: http://groups.msn.com/armorama/plasticbattle.msnw?albumlist=2

Scribing these foam trays etc. is a great and cheap method of buildings. The only thing with meat trays is that they have to be undercoated with acrylics first as enamels burn them.

Thanks once again for that info Faust!

The church looks damn good plasticbattle

You are using foamtrays??? Or meat trays??
never heard of that or probably I know it under another name

Just look in the hardwarestore at the isolation aisle for the foam (usually blue but also available in yellow) with the high density. That`s the same thing I use . Easy scribing in detail, you can just paint it with enamels, you can sand it easily cutting goes easily
It`s just easy stuff.

I never tried it, Robert. It looks like the same stuff that is used to wrap hamburgers, but in larger dimensions. How do you scribe that ? Something that produces heat or just with sawing and cutting tools ?

last message before I go to Germany... Yes yes I`m an ArmoramaJunky
To scribe in the detail I just use......................................................................An ordinairy PEN

Didn't see it in the costs list........ Looking at all those prices, the usage of the ink must have doubled the value of the dio

It is a pen that I had laying around for a while Eagle
But especially for you I`ll raise 25ct for that too