This is where I am so far.The kit has been modified for use as a movie prop.Everything that looks like metal I assume would be made from tin or fibreglass or whatever would look good on camera. After washing and sealing the seams with some thin super glue,and some light sanding of the fake metal ,I used some watered down black gesso (about 50/50) and a couple of drops of flow medium and painted on a couple of coats with a brush.Keep your coats thin as there is some pretty fine detail here that you don't want to cover up. I added a dowel handle for convenience. I plan to build all the wooden parts from real wood or wood veneer and just paint the fake metal parts.
On some of the newer websites that I post to there seems to be a misunderstanding about what my posts are about. About ten years ago when I first started posting it was my intention to promote the building of dioramas on the web.The armor guys had been well into this for a long time but there is little communication between the two groups.I wanted to help change that situation at a time when a lot of modelers thought that a diorama was a nice wooden base to put your model on. I post to about 30 different websites.RR,auto,ship,figure and aircraft as well as some other art and photo sites and I am also writing an online book about storyboard dioramas.I have always been a teacher and I love to share whatever knowledge that I may have with others.This is more of a How to..... thread than anything else.I am also an active builder of dioramas for museums and at 70 years old this keeps me very busy.I just don't have time to socialize on the net.If you are expecting feedback on every post , you won't find it on this thread.Please try to understand.I know that there is a lot of interest out there as my photobucket averages thousands of hits a day and that is reward enough for me.Cheers! John.
The smokebox backhead required a lot of fitting to get it right but finally it looks OK I think.There still is a small seam visible in some areas which I could re-do but I will leave it as is for now as it may not even be visible when finished.I can see that this is going to be quite a long process to really do justice to this fine old locomotive.When building in wood the replacement piece must fit exactly like the plastic it is replacing.Wood veneer also has its problems because when you veneer the plastic part it ends up just a little bigger than the original.I will have to shave down every plastic piece I use so things will fit properly.Luckily I have two kits so that will make it a lot easier to replicate any plastic part.I think that I will start with the running boards,I have two choices here,make them from solid cheery wood or shave down and veneer the plastic.Maybe I will do one of each as an experiment and use the best one on the model side. I have discovered a great set of reference pictures of the inside of the cab of the Lilly Belle ,Walt Disneys train.I will try to get permission to use these pics as reference here from the photographer .Cheers!
Permission granted ! I will have to start making decisions about color almost right away and I kind of like Lilly Belle's cab.It is very colorful which appeals to me a lot but I will be weathering it down somewhat and my painting won't be so shiny.Any suggestions ?
For a complete tutorial on cracking paint please see: http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/models/16792-how-build-aircraft-dioramas-266.html Cheers! John.
For a complete " How to....."on building a stone wall,my style,please see the above website. Please note: Because I contribute to 32 modeling websites of all kinds I have had to pick one to post detailed "how to's...." to.This site happens to be the first site that I happened to contribute to back in 03 .It also has all of my content in one place which will be of great value to me someday when I hope to do an online (free) book about my methods which I will then post to all the websites that have so kindly supported me and my work up in the past. Because of the type of work I do a lot of my stuff crosses over between different genres. I would ask that if on occasion that I make a mistake and post something on airplanes in a car or RR or ship site( or visa versa ) please be patient and I will try to correct it ASAP. But most of the time I am dealing with" modeling in general "that crosses all boundaries." I am by no means an expert in anything I do, in fact a lot of the time this is a real time learning experience for me too.A good example of this is what I am posting right now,this is my very first stone wall in paperboard,so you get it direct mistakes and all. I think that the guys that follow my stuff appreciate it more like this .It would be impossible for me to do it like this and post very detail to 32 websites everyday. Thank you for your patience and understanding ! Cheers! John.
I will build up in wood the small upper attic window which was probably used for ventilation more than anything else.Small sloping roof rooms on the upper floors were also common in those days.I will shutter the window or board it up,there will be no glass to attract the viewers eye. These walls look much more natural if you don't attempt to make them too perfect.A queen's castle is something different but for your ordinary turn of the century building you may have to even force yourself to screw it up just a little here and there to give it an increased sense of authenticity. Example. The bricked up window has very subtle errors built into it like the slightly different horizontal level between the stone and brick wall. The key here is be be very subtle about it so that it does not immediately attract the viewers eye(like in the deliberately distorted pic above) however, could be picked up after a thorough look at the main subject,which in this case happens to be an airplane but it could be a car,train or whatever the main subject of the piece happens to be.
The uneven blotchy color is only the first thin coat of paint that I put on to get rid of the stark white of the paper.If not covered now it will stick out like a sore thumb and will be almost impossible to cover later if accidentally touched with glue.This light gray color can at least be easily worked into the overall stone color of the wall which will eventually become the lightest color stone on the finished wall.The variety in shades on the individual stones happens automatically when using very watery acrylic paint ,as the pigment tends to settle to the bottom as you are using it over a period of time.
I build two types of dioramas ones that physically exist in museums and ones that exist in pictures only.The second type is a lot like a film or stage play where you build and bring all the components together and record the images as they once existed in the composition.You still get to make all the parts ,scratch or otherwise ,which is really the most fun in model making,but it is really the composition of these parts that tell the story.In fact when finished I often like the pictures of the piece more than the actual model.It is a lot of fun playing with the lighting,camera angles etc...doing all the things that movie directors get to do but on a small scale.An added bonus is that you still get to keep your models and display them the way you want.One nice idea would be to display your model with pictures of it in its original diorama setting.
