clive_t

Thanks to @rob Lyttle, @Courageous, @Biggu and @Adam Poultney for your comments Progress has been a bit thin on the ground in the past month - a combination of domestic things and a receding mojo I suppose. I've resurrected the latter to some extent by doing a small vignette (thread link in my sig below), but I have at least started to get things together. I sprayed the wings with the fluorescent red/orange mix used earlier: Whilst the wings came out fairly well, there was - predictably - a lot of bleeding on the fuselage band. Fortunately, the overflow, once dry, was fairly easy to remove with a sharp scalpel blade - it looks a bit ragged at the moment but hopefully I can paint a straighter line by hand. So, wings and things all attached: A bit of filling needed, then I can finish the foiling. Thanks for watching

A bit more progress today - I scraped away the sand on the sandpaper where the bench would be sitting, to give it a slightly more 'bedded in' look, and also sprayed some Tamiya Clear Orange in the areas where the bench and the pots would go: The idea with this was to create an impression of damp gravel, where the sun would not dry it out as readily. That is, under the bench and around the bases of the pots. Here's how it looks with the capping stones glued - and pinned with short lengths of cocktail sticks - and the furniture in place (still loose fitted): Aside from a couple more touches, this side is done!

Very useful, thanks @Gorby for taking the time to compile this. I'm currently using Imgur with no problems as yet. Odd that they should forbid hot linking whilst at the same time offering the facility to bulk-generate bbcode strings for any number of images! Ah well, I'll continue to use it until they catch up with me then worry about it

Back to the other side, the render has been sanded to take off the sharper edges, and resprayed with thinned Tamiya X-19 'Smoke': As is my habit, I had put too much paint in the airbrush cup, so I applied the same to the capping stones: ... and to the paving slabs and gutter: Finally for now, with everything in place just dry-fit for the moment: Getting there! Thanks for watching

... meanwhile, on the other side of the wall, a bit of an update - some large flower pots, fashioned from Terra Cotta flavour Milliput: I only decided to do this yesterday afternoon, when during an ad hoc visit to my LMS I noticed some small scale trees, presumably sold as scenery for a smaller scale model railway. However, they were cheap (£1.50 for a pack of 4) and, I considered, of an appropriate size for 1:22.5 pot plants. Here's the result, just loose fitted for the time being: By now, the intended theme of this vignette may be starting to dawn on at least some of you! Thanks for watching

Hmm, sounds like a plan, thanks for the tip!

This is the other side of the wall: The bench seat is, believe it or not, a resin casting obtained a number of years ago for some miniature Christmas decoration that was ultimately not used. But, it will serve a useful purpose here!

Thanks Mr Mustang, very happy to have you along A bit more progress today - rather than sand the rendered wall straight off, I thought I might try applying a simple dark grey wash to see how it looked: Oh, and also I primed the capping stones too, as you can see!

Very true, indeed the egg-box technique is also part of the experiment - I am actually quite pleased with that aspect of the proceedings Anyway, after another going-over with the modelling paste, and a dry-fit of the capping stones on top, it currently looks like this: I'll leave it overnight before attempting any sanding, I think Thanks for watching

Thanks Badder, you have a point with the plaster. In hindsight that might have been a better way to go. I'm not that happy with how it's looking at the moment, but hopefully with a bit of sanding I'll get closer to what I am after.

Whilst waiting for the wall rendering to cure, this evening I have made a top for the wall from Milliput: Once this has hardened I plan to tidy it up a little before painting.

Thanks for your comment, Bill. A small step forward today - I applied some 'render' to the brick side of the wall, using Galleria modelling paste: I deliberately left some of the brickwork visible, to indicate that the render had peeled off the wall over time. The big disadvantage of this stuff is the amount of time it takes to cure - but it is flexible and should stay put once cured.

Hi folks, For a bit of background, I have for some years had a large scale railway in my garden - as a sort of a spin-off from that, I developed an interest in modifying existing figures (mostly Preiser) for my own amusement and to add a little uniqueness to the lineside. Then, back in 2016 I entered 2 of them in a modelling competition at my local club - I was lucky enough to win an award. That's pretty much how it stayed, until this week. It occurred to me that a small vignette could be made that would show them off a little better. I made use of a small, cheap picture frame: The middle was filled with lumps of expanded polystyrene - of which I have significant amounts retained from packaging down the years. The back of the photo was kept as a reasonably solid base on which to build: The slot in the middle would house a dividing wall - the significance of which will become clearer as we go along. For my purposes, one side of the wall would be stonework: ... whilst the other side would be partially exposed brickwork: Curious persons might be speculating as to the nature of the green material making up the stones and brickwork - well, they're made from egg boxes, and glued on with Mod Podge. But what of the ground surface? Well, on the 'brick' side, I want to do some kind of paving slab arrangement, in the manner of a pedestrian walkway with a hint of a road. For that, I used a lump of styrofoam: The irregular surface of the walkway was done simply by pushing my fingers into it to force small dents in the foam. The lines delineating the slabs were fashioned with a blunt toothpick. The roadway is an off-cut of styrofoam cut to half thickness along its length. The other side of the wall was a lot simpler - just a piece of coarse sand paper cut to size: Next up, some el cheapo car body spray primer (grey): A slosh of acrylic paint of various shades of stone for the stone block side: Similarly, some brick colouring for the brick side, oh and some primer for the paving slabs: This is where I am with it today - the gaps between the stones have been filled in with some filler to look like mortar: Hopefully more to follow in the next few days! Thanks for watching

Hi Mr Lafferty67, and by the way welcome to BM I didn't get any video clips, however I did manage to loose off some photos of the room, as well as a few of the models on show : There are a fair few shows in the South, although not perhaps high profile like those venues further north - Tangmere (albeit another 30 minutes East of Portsmouth), Salisbury, Romsey are the 3 I've attended this year. I'm pretty sure there was one at Bournemouth recently, too. Just keep your eye on this forum for news of upcoming shows!

Thanks for the feedback Eric, it's very much appreciated. I have passed your comments on. It would be fair to say that if more space were available, we would have certainly made use of it - still, lessons learned and all that, I for one hope we get to do another next year. I thought it was pretty good turnout given the appalling weather yesterday, with some great models on display. Nice to see the Pompey Pals there, and @malcchilds and the boys from Models for Heroes too.