Whippet maintenance

[Jabberwocky]

I felt I wanted to produce a build to commemorate the start of the Great War. Looking at images of the period, it was clear that people outnumbered tanks and vehicles by a large ratio in every picture, so I was going to have to overcome my dread of figure painting if it was going to work.

Firstly though, I have not tried to go for total accuracy here, merely to try to capture the feel of the era. I have used a great deal of artistic license and probably deserve to have it revoked, but this is what I came up with. The scenario is that some enterprising chap has "acquired" one of the many Model T Fords that found their way to Europe, and is using it for high-speed refuelling and maintenance of his tanks. I decided to go for the 99% boredom rather than the 1% action aspect of proceedings, which made it a bit of a challenge to find suitable figures, as most seem to be moulded in "over the top" positions.

The Whippet is the venerable Emhar kit, with the Hotchkiss machine guns dressed up with a bit of lead wire and drilled-out barrels, the exhausts drilled out and with thread wrapped around to represent the insulation. Dust guards are paper.

The Model T is a kit from RPM, planked with styrene strip to hide the seams. An ordinary four-hole paper punch used on a sheet of clear acetate provided the headlamp glass and the starting handle is a bent paperclip.

Figures are Master Box with rifle slings and chinstraps made from masking tape, apart from the officer who came from ddayminiaturestudio.com, (35023). Poppies came from Green Line. All mistakes, errors and inaccuracies are my own. This is the result and I hope you like it. It was built with all those who served in any theatre in mind, whether they made it back or not.

Thanks for looking,

Paul

[beefy66]

A fitting tribute to All who serve great job like the bloke getting a wash nice water effect

Beefy

[Carius]

Amazing dio.

[louiex2]

Excellent work. I like how you achieved the 99% boredom/1% action in the scene.

[trnkepfc]

fantastic .... congrats

[Darby]

The poigniancy of the diorama can be summed up in the expression on the figure's face and his overalll posture in front of the poppy, realistically stunning, as is the whole display. All round doffing of caps for this one

[stevej60]

That,s a superb diorama,very animated.Great job.

[The_Lancaster]

Awesome diorama, brings life to the model!

[Buzby061]

You've brought that together superbly, it really works.

I know how you feel about figure painting.

Pete

[jimbob1974]

I think that's fantastic

[Jabberwocky]

Thanks for all the kind words everyone. It's greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Paul

[BerndM]

Great diorama, you brought this to live, well done, for what is the officer looking ?

[BeeKay]

^{A lovely tribute very well presented - great modelling skills}

[batcode]

very nice work , looks great and great scene . looks great nice job