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Rocky Road - off road trail


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Hello dio builders - 

 

Well, I have not given up on the 1/35 scale dio I already have a wip going for, just taking a break.  The plan was to make an off road truck, with a four link suspension:

 

 

If you're interested, the link is above.  The bottom line here is this truck should have suspension that can be dramatically articulated - and as it turns out, it does, so what better way to show it than on a convincing base?

 

First tho, some info on the truck and desired landscape:

 

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Short of getting too far into this, (you can have a look at the build thread if interested), you can see on in the middle picture, a Chevrolet 4x4 truck - but, rather than traditional leaf spring suspension, it rides on a four link system - note the axles/wheels flexed, but relatively flat body.  So, I decided to try and make a model of this.  The pictures of the white Toyota are illustrating the topography I'm trying to represent.  The two top pics are mid-WIP on my build - on the left, you can see the chassis and four link set up.  The suspension is posable but not operable - I have no interest or patience for trying to set 1/24 scale spring rates!!  😄

 

On we go  to the base:

 

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Going a bit old school for this - on the right, a piece of plywood, thin rigid foam, and plaster cloth over all of it - sorry about the poor quality pic -no shadows prevents you from seeing there is some topo there.....Once dried, used some hydrocal in rock mold.  The first pass was made creating a central topographic feature.  What you can't see here is that under this silicon mold, is this inverse pattern of a rock out cropping.  I poured some hydrocal into the mold, let is set about 10 minutes, then flipped it onto my plaster cloth base - it then set to match and adhere to the underlying surface.  I then made another mold of the same shape, let it setup a bit longer, and chipped out (still pliable) sections and placed them around  and shaped them into the central feature - wow!!! sorry - was that wordy!! 😄

 

And got this:

 

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Then, several layers of highly diluted acrylic paint and inks.  First though, I used the AB to spray Vallejo IDF tan primer along the edges of the outcropping - some overspray is fine.  Then, onto washes - First were with the ink - using drops of black and sepia, in water.  I painted this into all the cracks and edges I could see - to get some shadows.  If you try this, be patient.  The first coats absorb and disappear, so, you need to let them dry a bit and come back - then on went layers of colors, I went with various tans for the base, then mixed up a reddish shade using burnt sienna, orange, and camo grey - to get the faint orange/red tone.  Them, went in and dry brushed light air force grey on the "top side" edges.  And, ample amount of Life Color Dust 1 wash over everything.

 

And with some dirt/sand:

 

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This is model rr ballast glued in place - the image in the lower left shows it "dry" - once the glue set - the others show when the glue hasn't set up yet.  The colors seem to go together pretty well - and you can pick out the detail of the cast stone, and real sand - so far so good.

 

And for some context:

 

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And on we go - still need to finish the truck, and clearly more to do on the base!  You can tho see how the truck suspension articulates over the rough terrain.  I suppose this terrain could have been more dramatic, but I didn't want to push my luck with how far the suspension would flex and still look convincing - so, kept it a bit civilized.  

 

Thanks for having a look and happy new year!

 

Cheers

Nick 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Hello dio builders, 

 

Seems I'm now doing what I usually don't, which is to be building a few projects at one time - a guy has to wonder how so many model builders can do this, and still get so much done! Not me 😄

 

But, some progress is being made - now, some vegetation:

 

51819854670_1635ba7aa7_b.jpg

 

And there you have some plant life!  The tree started with a dried branch of something, with several tufts of woodland scenics foliage added.  This was surprisingly tedious.  It seemed to take forever, with minimal results, but not bad when done.

 

And while I was at it, decided it would be fun to play with some graphics - that is to superimpose some real photos, over/under the dio:

 

51819142276_9fa98a3feb_b.jpg

 

 

Above, you can see the dio on the right, while on the left, the dio plus a real image - seems to look OK, so I did a couple more:

 

51819854660_fff1d6515a_b.jpg

 

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As you have probably gathered, I didn't spent too much time searching for the perfect image to match the terrain of the dio, but all worked pretty well.  I'll add some pigment and natural debris, like branches next.  

 

I am really looking forward to finishing this and taking some outdoor photos - I'm hopeful the colors will really jump - these pics were taken with just ambient, interior light, and it was an overcast day - so, next time, this will likely be outdoors, with the truck - 

 

OK, thanks for having a look

 

Cheers

Nick 

 

 

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