Cool! My first water and I'm excited about it. I think it came out pretty well. I used casting resin (thanks for the previous thread input).

Anywho - comments are always welcome. The photos came out poorly because of the flash. Left to do - grass, mud, extra engineer on the side, saw dust, clean up edge and paint black. And whatever you all suggest.

Thanks

water closeup


#:-)

Scott

That`s some really cool looking water. You have made a natural looking stream. I love also the small trunks you have at the corners of the dio as they give the suggestion where the logs of the rivercrossing come from.
Great execution and a lovely scene definitely something that looks nice on your shelf.

congrats dude have a cold one (heineken)

Water looks great man! For the tank you should put some packs/bags, ammo boxes and mabye some rolled up tarps. Just a suggestion. Looking good though!

Very Very VERY NICE! That is a Great Diorama Good job

I agree with matrix it looks kinda bare without it.But besides that it looks very very very very very very...... I could go on forever, you get the picture great job!!

Very nice. I've been thinking on doing something with "fake" water here soon. I got a fountain I want to put water into. It's amazing the realism you can get with this stuff. Great job.

Guys - Thanks!! Here's a return Heineken for you. The stumps were fun to make - they were poured resin from a master. The same resin the water is made of - versital stuff!

Matrix, AW - I do appreciate the comments - I will add gear to the back deck.

Hi Slodder,
The diorama looks great, I really like the water it turned out awesome, I do have a suggestion however, in the second pic look where the threads are going over the "bridge", in my opinion, the bottom run of the tracks are to straitm, I think what happened is you built the tank on a flat surface, and when you stuck it in a diorama setting the tracks represent what they would look like on road, however when it's going over the logs it doesn't look right, I think if you used the individual style tracks(included in the Academy kit) you may still be able to bend them a little and hopefully not mess up the painting, or you could put "planks" or "packed dirt" onto the "bridge". I hope you understand what I'm trying to say, either way it's an excellent little diorama!

-Steve

Steve - I totally agree with you and to be honest. This little Stuart started out as a static OOTB display piece and I have had a bad case of feature creap. It just kept crowing.

I agree with the 'poor' look of the tracks. I have about 45 minutes of futsing with the logs as they are to get the best 'flat' bridge to this point. I do like the dirt on the bridge, that's a great idea.
I did an initial search for M3 indi tracks but only found the M5's and they weren't quite right for it so I went with the band type (oh well)
And hey - If I can't get it quite right I may just have to tell people to look at it from a high angle #:-)
Seriously - thanks for the feedback.

Man that water ROCKS. Truly the best I have seen in long time. Great work.

Patrick

Forgot to ask. What's the brand/type of casting resin you used and where can I get some? :-)

The stuff I used is called castin'craft Clear Liquid plastic casting resin and castin'craft catalyst. The resin ran about $8-10 for 32 oz and the catalyst is about $5 for 1 oz.
I used about 4ish ounces of resin and about 90 drops of catalyst.
I got it at Michaels Craft store and I've seen it at AC Moores and Hungates.

Yup, I love the water. How many layers did you have to pour to get it this deep?

The water is very nice....just to clear. The subject is very intersting and draws the eye. A real winner.

Marty - I poured 2.5 layers. The first two layers are about 4-5mm thick, the last layer was a 'fill in' layer. I let each layer dry for 12 hours before moving on.

Hello Slodder,
I understand your dilema, those Tamiya rubber band style tracks are a pain, just flexible enuf to wrap around the suspension




The M3 and M5 Stuarts used identicle tracks, and their were multiple types, Stuart tracks are more or less the same as Sherman tracks but smaller, the most common style of track on both variants was the T16(Rubber block) , other styles of Stuart track included steel chevron, rubber chevron, and 3 bar cleet, duckbills were occasionally added to help stop the tank from sinking in mud.

For your model, any one of these types of tracks would be fine, AFV Club produces T16 tracks, wich are fully workable, and fit the tamiya kit perfectly, not to mention they are only $12 and you can probably get them from your local hobby shop, I built these tracks for my M3A3 recce a few years ago, and they are pretty good, if you look closely at the kit supplied tracks you will notice the end connecters are placed in the wrong position, rather than connecting the two tread blocks(?) they are just sitting on the end...

Anyway, it looks great, about the water looking to clear, I like it better that way you can see the details at the bottom :-) if you were trying to do a swamp, after pouring each layer and letting it dry, you could airbrush some very thin paint on in sort of streaks in the direction the water is flowing, could get some interested affects, you could probably use dyes also, just don't do it with the top layer...

-Steve

Hi,

Looks very nice.

The wood logs closer one another and filling the gap of the stream are more convincing than those loose ones you have shown on the first aproach.


Very good work.

PLEASE TELL ME HOW YOU DID THAT WATER TO THE DETAIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Very very nice water, how did you make it build up on the corner of the base like a water "wall" What did you use? #:-)

Andrewss
1. I built up the two corners styrofoam from an old computer box then covered using celluclay (paper mache) as ground.
2. I then added the bottom material (RR balast and kitty litter) using white glue mix.
3. I painted in red brown, brown, shades of green, shades of grey, shades of black. No science just what looked good.
4. I then took pieces of sheet stryreen and encompassed the entire square. I used two part epoxy to glue the resin to the sytrofoam. This formed the 'walls'
5. I used masking tape on the outside all the way around being carefull to get it tight at the bottom edge. Sealing in the walls.
6. I layed in the first layer of logs using white glue to keep the from floating.
NOTE: I tested the wall concept on a test dio about 2" square. I knew the styrene would not stick to the water.
7. I mixed and poured in the first layer of resin. Let it sit for 12 hours or so.
8. I layed in the next layer of logs and mixed and poured in the next layer of resin. Let dry for 12 hours
9. I added a touchup layer to make sure all gaps were even. Let dry 24 hours
10. I took a knife and carefully cut down the natural slope line of the bank untill the styrene was cut through.
11. I pealed away the styrene. Done. I did not use any type of lubricant or anything between the water and the 'walls'. See the earlier post in this thread as to which brand of resin I used.
In my test I tried sculpting in ripples and such as the resin dried. You can do it very easily. I choose not so I could show a calm creek/river.

And thanks for the complement.

If you need more just ask.

Excellent dio Slodder. One nit-pick. I would add grass around in patches. Where trees would grow so close to the water, there would also be grass or weeds or some other type of vegitation. It would also add the "life" of the dio! Just a thought. I also agree with Matrix about adding some stowage on the tank! Just trying to improve on your already great work! I love the idea as well. Something I will keep in mind for trying myself some day!

How did you make the water?It looks real!

Hi,
Cartridge, look at page 2, he explains how to do it in the response second from the bottom.

-Steve

Slodder - I really like that water-work. I keep coming back to look at it - great job!

Gunnie

PlasticBattle Oh yea I agree. I'm not done yet. I was just really psyched that the water came out so well that I had to post the images. I'll be posting more later. I always like hearing ideas no matter what stage the diorama is in. That way I can adjust on the fly. Kinda like the feature creap I mentioned.

Cartridge - Take a look two posts ahead of yours and I outline how I made it. If there is any part you are unsure of I'd be happy to explain in more detail. The steps cover a wide range of things and I could go into a lot more detail on each. just ask.

GunTruck and TUGA - Thanks for the complements!

Thanks all - I'm looking forward to wrapping this diorama up!!

You can even see some currents in it. Very cool! :-)