As I couldn't find any pre-made buildings in the size, shape and styly I wanted, I put the Werhmacht carpenters to work. I have a ton of wood left over from some large scale wooden ships I've built so lumber was the choice of material. The front of the railway stationis being constructed first followed by the sides. The second 'destroyed' floor will be added once I'm happy with the base section.
Now a question: As the building is cut off at the edge of the base board should I leave the back side open and populate the interior with furniture and people or blank it off?

Gday Kym
First off, that is a remarkable diorama you have underway! By it's very nature it would feature a lot of open space which traditionally is the bane of the diorama modeller, but you have things well placed here
As for the open or closed rear of the station house~
Well I would say open nearly every time, the only drawback that I can envision would be the extra time and materials to add inside... A diorama is great that can be viewed from all angles, and as such the only reason it should be blanked off is if there is a rear backdrop, for example...
I'm sure you have plenty of reference, but I have a couple of archive pics of railyards in France if interested?
Cheers
Brad

Looks like your progressing well. Personally I think if your already putting this much time and effort into such a large diorama, it would be well worth it to spend a bit more time to do a full interior.

Keep us updated.

Wow! This looks like it will become a great diorama!

What vehicles and figures are you going to use? The wide tracks are from a Karl Morser or?

I think you should go the whole way and do the interior as well.

Thanks for sharing

I did a bit more work on the railway station today. The lower level front is just about complete apart from windows. I divided the interior into a larger staff room and a kommondants office. I have some really nice wood strips I am going to use as wall panelling in the Kommandants office which is tommorows contract along with the windows.

One thing I forgot to ask, does anybody make and sell 1:35 scale German flags in linen or some such material. I want to have a flag used by the Werhmacht projecting from the front above the doorway. I'm not even sure what design they used but I don't think it was just a swasticka.

Hi Kym

there are a couple of companies that do linen flags, ill see if i can find the link to the one i use, also i would suggest picking up a copy of Models in action no2 Berlin 1945, its a Japanese book but has a really excellent diorama of a rail head, that may help you fill in any empty spaces you have

cheers

Keith Forsyth

Looking good. Lots of space that Will get filled (from the looks of it). Natural looking spacing, nice angles.

On the blanking of the building - will it be visible to viewers? If so, I would leave it open and fill it. It is too big and to 'important' to the diorama to be blanked. If it won't be seen because it's up against a wall or something then I would blank it off and maybe add some rough furniture or items that can be 'seen' or just made out through the windows.

Thanks Keith. There is not much chance of finding that book/magazine here, hard enough time trying to find Model Art (Aussie mag) or Fine Scale Modeller. As for empty spaces, hell, I'm starting to wonder if I'll have enough room! Pictures of some of the stuff is in a lower thread called "Savastopol Railhead"

I will definately be leaving the back open. I've already started doing some basic drawings of the furniture. Big desk and bookcases in the office, chart table ect. in the staff room.

OK here we go


http://www.modelflags.com

i knew i had it some where

the book i mentioned is this one



available from Accurate Armour

ISBN: - 4-499-22660-0

there are 5 book in total in the series all in Japanese but the picture tell you the whole story and they are such an inspiration for any budding diorama builder

look forward to seeing this progress

cheers

Keith Forsyth

Excellent work, i'm impressed with the quality of your scratchbuilt station house and i'm glad you decided to add that slight angle to the tracks on your base, makes it look a lot more 'natural'.

Good look with it, looks like its going to be an epic dio!

James

These photo's show the finished basic design. Weathing, more charred wood and debris to be added. I'm still waiting on the Ikea delivery truck to arrive with the furniture. I was going to build my own, spent a bit of time designing it but then spotted Verlindens Office furniture set. The pictures looked nice, so I ordered them. Also ordered was the Dragon MG42 heavy machine gun set for open area on the second floor. I think it will make a nice filler when surrounded by sandbags.
Oh!, and thanks to Keith's info, I now have my flags on their way.

Hi Kym,
Can't believe i've missed this thread cobber.This dio is going to be a huge one,plenty of space to fill!!I like your scratchwork of the station house,it looks superb,uncannily very similar to a small station out in the sticks here in my town.However one nitpick..if you are trying to depict a building that has taken the brunt from an explosion,you would expect that alot of the glass windows would be sharded,blown out or cracked.Don't take it the wrong way mate,but the building looks like it's had a fair knock,the glass should represent that too .
I'll be following this thread with great interest digger,can't wait to see this dio unfold !!
Cheers,Kiwi

Thanks Kiwi.
I suppose I should explain the scene. The building was damaged during the German occupation, months later the ground floor has been repaired for the officers leaving the second as an obsevation/ machine gun emplacment. Well thats my story and I'm sticking to it

nice second floor, something about the way you shaped it makes it really 'work'

Fantastic work on that building so far.

Nice destroyed railhead.

looks very cool so far, cant wait to see the updates mate !

Com'on

Herr

Looking good so far! Keep those updates coming!

Looking really good. I am really enjoying following your project.

Thanks for sharing

This lot of photos show the newly laid gravel ballast to the tracks. I had to raid the neighbours gravel heap then seive the stone down to a size I thought matched 1:35 scale. I've added a bit of wreckage to the top floor and will now go through it and burn the pieces.
I'm not finished with the groundwork colour yet. Every railyard I've ever seen has very dark, oil and tar covered ground, so basically thats what I'll end up doing. I've filled the deeper wheel ruts with PVA glue to simulate them filled with water. I'll add a cover of Future polish to gloss them up later. The inside of the groung floor is still pretty empty, still waiting for stuff to arrive. Whats taking up most of my time now is the 50 odd figures. When I've finished this lot, it's going to be a bloody long time before I do any more...... well at least until the next time.

That's looking really good, Kym. And that's coming from a model railroader.

The ballast on the shoulder of the tracks should be cleaner than the ballast in between the rails and that should go from fairly-clean closest to the rails to very grimey at the very center. Creosote builds up in the center and is shiney. It also is a petroleum product so it repels water
Water will bead up if the ties are wet.
I love the burned out station. It should be painted on the outside and a good way to simulate peeling paint is to dab rubber cement over the sealed bare wood. Then, after painting, use a wire brush to lightly scrape away some paint (after drying) from selected spots to reveal the bare wood underneath. Use some black weathering powders to simulate the burnt edges of the structure and Voila!

Hope I've helped.

Cuhail

Very impressive!! That will turn out to be one big cool diorama.

Thanks for sharing and keep us updated

Once agian its looking good. Man I didnt realize it would be that massive. ANyway keep it up.

Matt

For those that are interested, I've completed 30 of the figures and sort of assembled the scene to roughly where everything is going. I still havn't recieved the box railcar, staffcar, machine gun emplacement and a few other items yet but they should be here soon. Figures need more washes and mud added as do the machinery but I hope you get the idea of a wet, cold and generally miserable place to be. There some areas not in the photos as these are under construction and want them a bit more completed before showing.