Ardennes 44 diorama, or how I ended up spending the GDP of a small country

Hello again friend,

For years now I had wanted to build a Jagdpanzer IV. Its low silhouette, almost "predatorial" in nature, exerts a strange fascination on yours truly. Perhaps I need to see someone about that, I don't know. Anyway that ' s besides the point....

Having acquired the Tamiya offering ( a decent kit, probably not as good as its Dragon or else counterpart), it was time to think of a small diorama. Lacking any originality, I set my mind on a winter scene ( I still have to see a Jagdpanzer IV in a summer setting...) and naturally ended up picking THE winter setting: The battle of the Bulge... Yeaaaaah, another Ardennes diorama you'll say... And you would be right to say so.

Ok Ardennes it was then. Ok, I 'll need some troopers to go with it... Mmmh let's see,,, JagdpanzerIV, Ardennes, what about some Waffen SS troopers? Sure. Let's buy some Alpine figures, 4 sets of them. And while I'm at it, let's also buy the Miniart "Battle of the bulge" set.

Oh but wait, I m gonna need another vehicle to balance the scene... Ardennes, ss troopers,.... A SCHWIMMWAGEN of course... Let's also buy some photo-etch... here... and some crew from Mantis Miniatures... (I'll just eat a little less this month)

Now wait, I need to carefully research those cammo patterns... Let's buy a book... "Camouflage uniforms of the Waffen SS" by Beaver and Borsarello (Food is so overrated)

Mmmh I'm running low on paint and I cannot find the proper colours in my 100+ Vallejo collection... Oh Scale 75 makes dedicated ss cammo paint sets? 2 of them? Ok I'll take both then (I think I might still have some tuna cans in the basement)

My Scale 75 has arrived! Yeeeah! Let's try them... Mmmh they sure neeed a LOT of shaking... Can't do that by hand, I'll strain my wrist... Let's buy an electronic paint shaker! (At this point I'll starve to death, who cares?)

Ok, these Scale 75 are really rubbish for basecoating (they re wonderful for layering though). Let's see if I have better luck with their flesh paint set.... There goes another 20 bucks

This Panzer would look great in a "disc-cammo" scheme... Special masks by Uschi van der Rosten you say? Ok let's do it

Finally I'll need some building in the background... I could build it myself... or just go for a Miniart "Ardennes Building" (I was putting on weight anyway)

Needless to say, I also bought some Archer transfers (that I barely used, perhaps 2 or 3 collar patches and the eagles on the tankers' caps. By the way, I discovered that applying these transfers to a piece of black electrical tape first, then carefully trimming around the transfer and applying to your figure greatly helps to make them pop out. Otherwise you can't see much)

There are 2 things I learned from this build:
1) Scale 75 are wonderful paints for layering and blending. Not at all for basecoating, although the flesh set fares a bit better in that department
2) If you want to keep your sanity, don't ever attempt building a Miniart house. Unless you a) make extensive use of sheet styrene to reinforce gluing points or b) you rebuild the walls with your material of choice ("extruded polystyrene" (?) in my case)

Here are a few pics.

The house rebuilt in foam (This was the first version, I ruined it by using a solvent based paint to prime it and had to rebuild it...)

An initial layout of the diorama

Another layout

And still another, which was the one I kept in the end (it wouldn t make much sense that a full platoon would guard 3 prisoners...)

I didn t take many in-progress pics unfortunately

And the final result

(In this time of crisis, I realise how unthoughtful it is to display a roll of toilet paper... my apologies)


Happy Modelling!

Treflon

Hedgerow diorama

Hello again,

Here are a few pics of my latest model. The Marder is the Tamiya "Normandy Front" 1/35th offering , with the figures built from the box. The US paras are an old Dragon references, with Hornet heads for 2 of them. Nothing fancy, the Dragon engraving was "sharpened" with a hobby knife and helmet straps were built from scratch. Apart from that, they were built from the box as well.

Happy Modelling!

Treflon

By the way, the dead leaves are from a discarded teabag (a kind of "fruit tea"). You'd be surprised at how many hidden treasures and diorama material your kitchen holds....

10 things a modeller hates to hear

1. “Oh what a cute little plane.. does the propeller spin?… craaack… ah no”
2. “I used to build models too… as a kid”
3. “I know a guy who also does model planes, but unlike you, he actually PAINTS them, he doesn’t LEAVE them like that…” (when looking at a natural metal finish)
4. “Mmmh military subjects… what’s wrong with you?”
5. “Is that a swastika? Are you a nazi?”
6. “You must be very patient”
7. “The paintjob is so intricate. Do you use a one-haired brush or something?”
8. “I told my 4 year old to go and play with your toys. I hope you don’t mind”
9. “Ah models, nice. I ‘m a big Lego fan myself”
10. “You must have a lot of time on your hands…”

Crashed Defiant at Dunkerque

Introduction

Since 1980, this is my 4th Defiant build. First came the old Airfix kit, which vastly increased my cursing répertoire, much to the dismay of my parents. Here's a picture of the build:

Then came the Classic Airframes 1 48th offering ( the old version, not the new one), which was the most painful experience I ever had with short run kits: horrendous fit, inconsistent engraving, disintegrating decals, vacuformed canopies ( I hate vacuformed canopies) just to mention a few.

Next came the Czech Master Resin in 1 72th. A nice kit, with mostly resin parts, but being a short run item, it was a bit "rough" in parts, and again it had vacuformed canopies. ( Not to mention that selling one of my kidneys barely covered its acquisition)

Finally sometime in 2015, Airfix issued a new tooling of this bird, which is the subject of this post. With the addition of an Eduard photoetch set for the cockpit (a bit of a luxury, since there's not much you can see, even with an open canopy) and metal barrels for the .303 machine guns (can't remember the manufacturer though), I was good to go.

Planning the scene

Since the Defiant was not very successful in its original day fighter role, it felt only natural to present it in its "natural habitat", i.e. "crashed". Quite a few Defiants were lost during the evacuation of Dunkerque (sorry, as a native French speaker, I simply cannot write "Dunkirk"...), so this fact provided a context for the scene to come.

First order of business was to find pictures of crashed Defiants to determine which kind of damage it could sustain and still be able to belly-land. Since thee only photo I could find was this one....

...I used it as a base to represent damage. As for the belly landing, it is simply the best way to suggest that the plane has actually crashed and not just landed.

Armed with a cutter, plastic strips, plastic sheets and metal foil, I attempted to reproduce damage to the best of my very limited strachbuilding skills.

I wasn't satisfied with the result and ended up using metal sheet for the shredded fabric.

Building the diorama

I used a small picture frame as the base, with a piece of foamboard for the small dune, and everything was covered with modelling paste (I believe it was air-drying Fimo...). Once dry, I sprinkled a fine layer of artificial snow (mine comes in a brandless plastic bag, so I cannot be specific as to its precise designation) over a coat of white glue and airbrushed with various sand colours. Then came some burnt Umber oil washes and drybrushing with Ochre, light yellow and white oil paints.  

The figures

Initially my thought was to have French soldiers walking on the beach and examining the wreckage. Unfortunately I couldn't find any so I used Zvezda's 1 72 British Infantry figures. These are hard plastic figures aimed at wargamers, and very nicely done. All they needed were a few strips of plastic to better define webbing and shoulder straps.

The pilot and gunner ( I haven't figured who's who) were more or less converted from

- A Revell RAF figure (ex Preiser) (on the left)

- A mixture of Revell legs with the torso and head from the Airfix Defiant's kit (on the right), with metal sheet for the coat and Duro for the life vest.

Arms were scratchbuilt with Duro

The plane

Not much to be said really. It was painted with Gunze and Tamiya acrylics, panel lines received a wash of .... Tamiya panel line wash.

All panel lines were then lightly accented with an mist of very diluted Tamiya brown and black paint on one side of the line and Sand yellow on the other side. I use business cards as masks, spraying directly on them. This leaves a nice, sharp, delimitation on one side of the painted area and a very subtle fade on the other.

Final Assembly

At this stage, I couldn't help feeling a sensation of emptiness... Pictures of Dunkerque in 1940 show beaches CLUTTERED with abandoned vehicles, equipment,...(are you reading this, Mr Nolan?...). This was perfectly depicted in the 1964 film masterpiece "Week-end à Zuydcoote" (are you reading this, Mr Nolan?...). So I pulled out the Duro from the fridge (yes I keep Duro in my fridge...) and modelled bits of clothes and stuff. I also discarded a French Adrian Helmet from an old Esci figure and added it to the scene. The idea was to convey an idea of precipitated evacuation and despair.. I'm not sure I succeeded, but at least the beach looks a little less "bare"...

That's all. 

Happy Modelling!

Treflon

Wunstorf airfield diorama

Hello again!

It's been more than a year since I last published something. Thing is I have been awfully busy: some jobs have found me and so I had to deal with them...

Anyway here is my latest diorama, representing (very loosely) the capture of a German airfield in April 1945 by British paratroopers following operation Varsity. I intended to faithfully recreate the capture of Wunstorf airfield on April 7th 1945, but truth is, after having spent hours reading about British Army organisation, divisions, brigades, batallions,... I just gave up. I honestly think you need a PhD in astrophysics to understand anything about the structure of the British Army. (and to understand the rules of cricket, but that's another story...)


The idea was to have a post-battle scene, when our paratroopers have been rejoined by forward scouting elements of the Guards' Armoured Division. (I picked the Guards Armoured division because I had some leftover decals from a Bren Carrier, and because the name sounded cool...)

The choice of the subject was dictated by the fact that I always wanted to build a diorama including both planes and armoured vehicles. And also because of the kits I had in my stash. I know people usually plan a scene and buy the kits accordingly, but I must confess I do the exact opposite....


So on to the build....

Messerchmitt 109 G-10 Erla built and Eduard Brassin G6 engine

This is the Revell 1/32 offering, ref 04888. It's a very decent and cheap kit, but, as usual with Revell kits, the parts' plan is all over the place: the part numbering defies any logic known to man. I suspect Revell engineers are all former RAND corporation employees. Or aliens hell-bent on driving humans mad....

Since the aircraft was supposed to be abandoned, it made sense to expose inner details, such as the engine, and to remove part of the canopy (I've always wondered why abandoned German planes featured on WW2 photos often show the moving part of the canopy missing...)

For the engine, I acquired the wonderful Eduard Brassin set for the Revell BF 109-G6, hoping there would be no fitting issue. Luckily, there weren't any. On the plus side, even though I hate working with resin and photoetch, I must admit the build was fairly enjoyable. Which is a good thing considering the engine kit price is twice as much as the plane....

Here's a pic of the undercoated engine....

 ... and one of the (almost) completed engine

... fitted on the finished plane

 The building

 After sketching the general shape on paper, I cut some pieces of foamboard to form the walls. These were temporarily taped together to have an idea of the final aspect.

Walls were subsequently covered with engraved plastic sheet.

Hangar doors, a small door and window framing were all added from plastic strips and sheets. A piece of homemade corrugated metal sheet and a drainpipe from plastic tubing were also added.

 Finally the building was undercoated with brown acrylic paint from a spray can and placed on the base to check the general composition

The vehicles

The dingo is a Mini Art reference, which builds into a very delicate (in fact too delicate for my taste, I don't like spending hours assembling invisible details such as the supensions...) model.

The BSA motorcycle and welbike are both Tamiya references, and were assembled in no time. All were given a base coat with a mix of XF51 Khaki Drab and some XF61 (I think, I can't remember exactly) and weathered with washes of Burnt Umber Oil paint.

The BSA and welbike were drybushed with a mix of Ivory, Yellow Ochre and light Green oil paint, while the Dingo wasn't drybrushed at all. Instead higlights were carefully painted on with a 00 brush and some Vallejo Model Colour light green paint, in a similar way as figure painting. Tiny scratches were added with brown-black and very light green Vallejo colours, and some streaks in various shades of brown were painted with oil paints.

Final touch was the use of  "Green Earth", "Cassel Earth" and "Yellow Ochre" artists' pigments in various proportions.

 The figures

 The paratroopers and MP are from Tamyia. They were built straight from the box, except for the MP who received a Hornet head. (I must say that Tamiya most recent figures have really improved, but even then, some of their faces are not quite up to modern standards)

The 2 officers inspecting the plane are from Mini Art ("British Officers" set), and had their heads replaced with Hornet ones.

Aaah Mini Art... Mini Art figures... What can I say? Invariably with Mini Art figures, I always experience 4 stages of growing disapointment:

Stage 1: Excited by the subject and the figures' poses, I buy the box.
Stage 2: Opening the box, one can usually notice a severe amount of flash and poor quality of the most minute items. Not big a deal,,,,
Stage 3: Inspecting the faces, you notice a strong resemblance with a acid-burnt baboon's face
Stage 4: After thoroughly cleaning the figures, replacing the heads, sanding the whole figure (the plastic is rather "grainy" and has many micro imperfections), undercoating and applying the first coat of paint.... you discover in horror that the micro imperfections have magically reappeared!


I wouldn't mind if they were reasonably priced, but hey, they cost the same as Dragon's! (Granted, at least they pick interesting subjects, unlike the latter. I'm surprised that Dragon hasn't issued "9th SS division on the beach" or "10th SS division go fishing" yet... I guess it's only a matter of time...)

Here are some pics

All together....

 And in position....

 The tree

 Simple electrical wire, twisted and covered with Duro. The smallest twigs are zeeschuim glued to the larger pieces of wire.
The leaves were made as described in an earlier post, here , and individually glued to the zeeschuim twigs. I agree the final result looks a bit sparse, but I got a bit fed up after 6+ hours of gluing individual leaves....

  To add an element of interest, I added a small birds nest made with a british helmet covered in static grass.

Completed diorama

Here are a few pics of the completed dio

That's all. Happy Modelling!

Treflon