Ever evolvin dio. ft. 'THE INDESTRUCTIBLE TREE' as ft. on youtube.

[Badder]

Progress has progressed.

The rest of the track area, and the 'forecourt' has been 'gauzed up' and just needs a skim of plaster, as does a section of bank at the front right of the dio. I still have to build up the area at the rear of the diorama but it's all 'dammed' and ready for a few more pourings of plaster. I will be inserting a plug of modelling clay into the plaster at this point. This will be removed at a later date to accept the trunk of the large tree.

I know that there's still a lot of work to do, vegetation-wise, and with the 'gravelling' of the track etc, but I feel I'm on the homeward straight now and that actually the diorama (not including the vehicles and figures) is going to be finished much sooner than I had imagined, maybe 8 months sooner!

 

TFL

Badder

 

 

Edited November 13, 2017 by Badder

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Sorry to hear about the Horses. If you need help my daughter has a dual degree in equine and ranch management. Shes been looking for work. Im going to guess not but thought I’d ask just in case.

[Badder]

On ‎13‎/‎11‎/‎2017 at 11:26 PM, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Sorry to hear about the Horses. If you need help my daughter has a dual degree in equine and ranch management. Shes been looking for work. Im going to guess not but thought I’d ask just in case.

Old Ned didn't snuff it, so all's well thanks.

Horses taking up valuable daylight hours though, so progress on the dio slower than I'd like. Horses and ponies are a good source of natural fibres though! I'm going to be making some plants from horse hair!

 

 

Rearguards,

Badder

[Badder]

Okay, no interruptions today, so hopefully the landscaping will be finished by tonight.

While the various pours of plaster are drying I can fill the time by making strips of stonework to support those areas of cobbles which are raised above the ground level. This will include the ramp. Then I can get on with the grassing-up and the track ruts etc.

 

Pics in about 8 hrs I expect.

 

TFL

Badder

[Badder]

Sorry for the delay. Horses taking up more daylight hours than I envisaged.

 

But here's the way things stand:

 

I've placed the building and tree.... er.... in place.... marking the tree's position relative to the building and the rear edge of the diorama. I've now removed the tree and building, but left a clay 'stump where the tree will stand. I can now raise the ground level around this stump.

Once the clay is removed I will have a hole in which to 'plant' the tree. However, I plan to make a 'collar' to fit around the trunk of the tree and this collar will have the roots and other details fixed to it. The collar will sit on the surface of the plaster while the excess trunk below it will be fixed into the hole.

 

The section of wall will curve around raised ground in which the tree will be planted. As the tree has very dense foliage, and because there are some free-roaming animals about (chickens, geese) I should think that the ground directly beneath the canopy is bare earth.

I'm going to fix a gate in the gap between the building and the end of the wall. Also, I will be adding some steps up from the 'forecourt' to the raised cobbled area.

So, I will crack on with raising the ground around the tree....

 

TFL

Badder

 

P.S. As this thread is extremely long, I've had the idea to subdivide it into chapters, with each chapter detailing a specific subject. I can then provide a list of chapters and their subjects and the pages on which they start, at the very beginning of this thread. Members can then skip directly to those pages which interest them without having to trawl through those that don't!

This will take some time though, so bear with me!

Edited February 22, 2018 by Badder

[Badder]

WHOOOOOPSIE DAISY!

 

I have late-onset type 1 diabetes meaning I rely on insulin injections to stay alive. Being 'late-onset' I have not had a lifetime of living with the disease, and have had little time to get used to the regime of recording dietary intake and adjusting insulin levels to suit. I get very tired if my blood sugar is too high, and can pass out and go into a coma if it gets too low. Usually my blood sugar is on the high side and I often fall asleep in the afternoons after a hard day at work.

I can fall asleep in one second flat. Anywhere, any time. I've can even fallen asleep while reaching for a pint of beer over the bar. I've done that. More than once, in fact!

And when I wake up, I have NO idea where I am, or what's happened. And usually I wake with a fright.

So when I fell asleep while working on this diorama today and my wife decided to try and wake me, the outcome was predictable. I woke with a jump, yelped and swore, threw out my arms in that 'falling out of bed' type reaction - and knocked over a pint of water I'd been using to wet the plaster of paris, and which I had placed on the track beside the mill race.

A whole pint, all over the grassy bank, in the mill race and all over the hedgerow! Luckily the glass itself didn't hit anything, so there was no mechanical damage. And luckily a few sheets of kitchen paper soaked up the puddles in the mill race. Everything else was left to air dry and thankfully all is now okay.

You've gotta laugh, haven't you?

 

LOTS of stonework tomorrow.

 

TFL

Badder

 

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Badder, you aren't alone in the Late onset Diabetes club. I joined 3 years ago. I know exactly what you're going through. I will wish you the best of luck in treatment and health. 

[Badder]

5 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Badder, you aren't alone in the Late onset Diabetes club. I joined 3 years ago. I know exactly what you're going through. I will wish you the best of luck in treatment and health. 

Thanks mate, and the same to you. I don't know what your health care system is like over there, but here it's pretty useless. Okay, I get all my diabetes related meds for free, but trying to get an appointment with a doctor is ridiculously difficult! I hope you fair better!

 

Unfortunately I have the added complication of also having CIDP, another auto-immune disease where my immune system is attacking the protective lining around my nerve endings in my lower limbs (elbows down to fingers and knees down to toes) so I'm in constant pain and suffer agonising shooting pains on top. Luckily the new meds I have for that work quite well most of the time so my pain levels have dropped noticeably.

 

CIDP does affect my model-making though. I can't do very detailed work with very small parts so easily - although I am going to force myself to try PE on several up-coming projects. I suffer poor and erratic muscle control, drop things quite often, and sometimes 'throw' things in reaction to the sudden pains!

I've developed methods to help in that respect though. For instance, I use blu-tac or modelling clay as a 'back-support' when cutting small parts from their sprue, that way they don't 'ping' off across the room, and I can then pick the blu-tac up with the part stuck to it rather than try to pick the part  up on its own. I suspect some of the techniques I've 'invented' are a consequence of trying to make things easier for myself, but can be of benefit to 'healthy' modellers as well!

 

Anyway, I have to go to work now, but thank you for your support. Best wishes to you.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

 

Edited November 17, 2017 by Badder

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Its not easy on the Doctor front here either. Your techniques do help if that matters. Please have a good day.

Edited November 17, 2017 by Corsairfoxfouruncle

[Vince1159]

On 15/11/2017 at 12:20 AM, Badder said:

Horses and ponies are a good source of natural fibres though! I'm going to be making some plants from horse hair

You need a couple of cats as well Badder,their whiskers make great ariels....

[Badder]

After messing around with a few more pours of plaster, a bit of carving and sanding, I eventually got around to making the stonework surround for the cobbles. I ended up using the 'foam board' as the material, rather than use plaster casts, mainly because I'm fed up with plaster! Here, the stonework is not fixed in place as more work is required.

 

 

 

The brick colour is just an undercoat. The stonework will end up mostly covered in moss and lichen.

 

TFL

Badder

Edited February 22, 2018 by Badder

[Badder]

18 minutes ago, Vince1159 said:

You need a couple of cats as well Badder,their whiskers make great ariels....

We have 3 cats but I've never considered using their whiskers! Molly (who was rescued from the wild at 3 weeks) would rip my face off if I dared try and cut one of hers off!

 

But I would think they are too thin anyway?

 

Rearguards

Badder

[Vince1159]

26 minutes ago, Badder said:

Molly (who was rescued from the wild at 3 weeks) would rip my face off if I dared try and cut one of hers off!

Lol,nothing that drastic they fall off naturally....

[Badder]

1 hour ago, Vince1159 said:

Lol,nothing that drastic they fall off naturally....

Well, our cats are outdoors hunting most of the time so any 'lost whiskers' will be somewhere in the fields or woods and I ain't going to that extreme!

 

I will make do with carbon fibre aerials thanks!

 

Rearguards,

Badder

[Badder]

I've roughed-out the areas of grass, track and ruts using watercolour paints. That's another to add to the materials list! The colours will show through the PVA after grassing up.

Again, there are a few areas where I've left the underlying metal gauze exposed to aid in the grassing up process.

For now though, it's back the stonework and that ramp which I keep putting off!
 

TFL

Badder

Edited February 22, 2018 by Badder

[Badder]

I hate it when people start a sentence with the word 'so', so I started THIS one with the word 'I', and continued, adding nothing of any consequence.

 

Looking at the photos above I realised that I hadn't added ruts/bare mud for when the farmer's cart turned right after coming down the ramp. Mainly, I wanted his usual direction of travel to be to his left, so that the remainder (and longest section of track on the diorama) would be less used and therefore more grassy. This more grassy area will be the direction from which the AFVs are coming.

 

Once I'd added the extra ruts I decided to mark out the positions of the AFVs, since adding the cobbles around the building has obviously reduced the 'useable' area for those AFVs.

My old Churchill VII came down from the bookshelf and was plonked in place. I scored lightly around the outside of the tank's tracks to define their width and thereby the width of any ruts they make.  I then took the Cromwell's hull from its box and plonked that on the track as well, noting that the tank's tracks inner edge would be only a millimetre or so outboard of the hull itself.

And then I read the instruction sheet and discovered that these Cromwells weren't deployed with Churchills. Silly me. 

 

IF ANYONE KNOWS ANY DIFFERENT, CAN YOU PLEASE LET ME KNOW? THANKS.

 

 

 

SO, what to do now?i

Well, I still have the Universal Carrier, which IS compatible. So why not two churchills and a UC, or one Churchill and two UC's?

 

Or, forget about the Brit armour completely and drop in some German stuff?

 

Oooooh I'm all in a quandary!!!!

 

 

TFL

Badder

 

 

[Pete in Lincs]

And there is nothing to say that a 'lost' tank crew wouldn't

join up with another unit until they find their own unit.

It's all coming along nicely and I'm sorry to hear of your medical troubles.

[Badder]

Thanks Pete, on all counts.

 

Yes, I suppose the Cromwell could be 'lost', or is out of action for some other reason, and the Churchill, UC and infantry come across its crew who are 'taking a break'.

I shall have a think about the various possibilities your suggestion opens up.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

 

 

 

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Heres an idea two seperate groups bump into each other. With knocked down road signs. Might they decide to knock on the farmers door and ask for directions ? 

[Badder]

3 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

Heres an idea two seperate groups bump into each other. With knocked down road signs. Might they decide to knock on the farmers door and ask for directions ? 

Well....... The Churchill kit comes with a commander figure looking at a map (Well, my OLD Churchill kit did, but it's possible the new Churchill doesn't - I haven't seen him pictured on the side of the box as previously) I will have to dig it out of my stash and check.

 

However, my second diorama since returning to model-making 'Lost in France' used that idea: with the Churchill crew asking the farmer for directions. So I'm reluctant to use that idea again.

 

I've had a brief look at the history of Cromwells used in the Normandy landings and found that they went into Villers Bocage where some were knocked out by Tigers.

In this diorama this Cromwell could have suffered some damage, or a mechanical issue, which meant it could only travel very slowly. Struggling to keep up, they decide to return to safety, but get lost in the 'Bocage'. The crew eventually give up, find a friendly local and park the Cromwell beside the big tree, waiting for rescue.

 

My diorama landscape isn't perhaps 'Bocagey' enough, but the scene could have occurred further into France/Belgium etc.

 

I do like the idea of parking the tank up beside the tree. It DOES fill an otherwise 'wasted' space and add interest to that area. It also frees up some space along the track (which was reduced in size with the repositioning of the building and the addition of the cobbled areas) It also gives me the opportunity to add that 'set scene' I refer to now and then.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

 

 

[Bullbasket]

Been a while since I looked at this one and although it might be the "never ending dio", it's certainly progressing well. It's hard to pick out any one item, but if I did, it would be the ivy growing up the side of the building. Very good.

As to what armour, you can make a case for anything. After all, it was war time and any scenario is possible.

 

John.

[Corsairfoxfouruncle]

Thats right i knew it seemed a familiar idea.

[Badder]

6 hours ago, Bullbasket said:

Been a while since I looked at this one and although it might be the "never ending dio", it's certainly progressing well. It's hard to pick out any one item, but if I did, it would be the ivy growing up the side of the building. Very good.

As to what armour, you can make a case for anything. After all, it was war time and any scenario is possible.

 

John.

Thanks for dropping in John.

 

You may be right with the 'never ending dio' I could do a 'building a HAS' type thing???? I jest.

 

No progress today so far as I had to drive 90 miles to London to drop off a car full of my step daughter's belongings. THEN I had to lug it all up 4 flights of stairs while she, her ox of a boyfriend and my wife sat and had a cup of tea.  Good job I was 'puffed out' or I'd have been able to swear a lot.

 

Anywaaaaaaaayyyyyy.... home now and staring at the diorama trying to visualise the possibilities!

 

Rearguards

Badder

 

 

[Badder]

2 hours ago, Corsairfoxfouruncle said:

That's right i knew it seemed a familiar idea.

Well, that diorama no longer exists so I could use that idea again. Only I don't want to. So I won't.

Still thinking on it.

 

Rearguards,

Badder

[bhouse]

On 11/11/2017 at 10:56 AM, Badder said:

If anyone can tell what this 'plastic' is,

It sounds as if it could be plastic or pvc skinned foam board. It might be worth phoning The Plastic People and describing it to them. They're usually very helpful...