The last building is William Fish & Son. The building is based on the T024a Industrial A – Warehouse from Scalescenes. For the roof I used the zinc roof texture from the Scalescenes Garage and for the slated part TX184 = Mixed grey roof slates from Modelrailwayscenery.
When I designed this diorama I wanted to use a large advertising board on this building. To create tis one I used a layered approach. And as I promised I would show you how I did it. You need two advertising boards to real
For the interior of the warehouse I wanted some (whiskey) barrels and crates.
Basic information I found on the very useful http://www.igg.org.uk/gansg/00-app1/common.htm
After reading this basic information my research on the internet began.
Then I discoverd that whiskey also was shippen in whiskey boxes. Mostly with the name of the distelery on top of it.
With the pictures I found there were also sizes metioned.
17 x 14¾ x8½ inch is in 4mm : 5,6 x 4,9 x 2,8 mm.
22½ x 15
I have finished my Sunday diorama’s and Monday is washing day. So my next diorama has to give an impression of the Monday washing day.
Just a row of back yard with washing lines could do the job.
The other possibility is washing lines crossing the street.
But I wanted use my Austin K8 for a delivery scene. Then I published an entry in the road vehicle group on the RM web. I wanted some information about the NCB electric van of the British Railways. After this I realized the Austin
The bookshop has its interior.
For the interior I used the pub interior from Scalescenes as a base and the bookcases are from a free download of Clever Models.
The used illustrations and book covers I selected from internet. This was a job I liked to do. Unfortunately when you resize them to 4 mm scale the sometimes beautiful designs get lost. Therefor I selected the fronts more on colour them on design.
Books are very tiny in 4 mm scale and hard to work with in card and paper.
In t
My next diorama is inspired by The Murder in the Vicarage. I started to make a diorama plan/map.
I started to make the base, and after that I started with the garden wall.
I will use the same garden wall texture from Scalescenes ( Brown brick - Garden Wall; TX 52) as I used for Rose Cottage. The texture is printed on a canvas photo paper.
Then I searched for a garden door on the internet. The door that I found is downloaded and made to size.
The door has a
I started a vicarage building using a kit from Scalescenes but I was not content with my choice. After some further research on the internet I found a floor plan of a vicarage building, dated 1928. I decided to use this plan as the start for my vicarage. Scratch building is totally new for my, so I have to see if I can manage the building of the vicarage. I also decided to give the building an interior.
The ground floor I created in a more traditional Victorian way usin
Let’s start with a quote from another RM blogger: “When I see some of the so called Art I become more and more convinced that railway modelling is very much an art form, yet one that we don't explore as much as we should.” Thanks for this one Dad-1. See his article here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/608/entry-17901-is-railway-modelling-art/
So now my contribution on this subject. On Facebook sometimes you get surprised with an inspiring post. This time my eye was cached
To add some details to Northall Dock I did some research. As a guide I used the Hounslow - Street Scene Design Guide from October 2012. Although not the area I’m building it gives a good overview of how you can design streets and what kind of elements are used.
From this guide I selected the following vertical street elements:
Advertising signs and A-boards
Bespoke Furniture
Bins
Bollards
Boundary Railings
Bus Shelters
Street lighting
Covers and gratings
Sur
Due personal reasons and some other modelling interest there is been some silence from around my modelling projects.
I still have to paint some cars, but that have to wait.
In a box I had a lot of OO gauge cars waiting for a project were one of them could be used. Some months ago, I found two cheap showcases. The cars moved from the box to the showcases. Now I noticed I had just bought cars from which I thought they could be useful. But I like to use them in my favourite way as histori
Everything got upside down
One
So, we made our plans. Then my wife had a serious fall in the bathroom and insured her back badly. Her recovery will take some time. The Billy cabinet has now to wait for a while. But that is now problem.
Two
I want to thank everyone who gave me useful information for the design of my Billy plank. I already started with making a new plan.
Three
One of the advices was to buy the excellent book Modelling Grassland an
Try out …
It is too hot for modelling and I also suffer again with hay fever eyes.
So I did some research and thinking about my story telling idea.
I found a wonderful description of a 1950’s week in the UK. So much similar the way I grew up in Utrecht in the 1950’s. This would give me the opportunity to create a serial of diorama’s that could give a good picture of daily live in Northall in the late 1950’s.
To try this idea out I used one of my old diorama’s and made a story to it. So
After I finished my first basic design, I wanted to answer the next two questions
- what balanced color choice could be used ?
- what is the right choice of textures ?
I will start with the answer on the second question.
I bought and tried out several textures from Model Railway Scenery, Clever Models and Scalescenes. I have laid several type of pavement and tried several brick options. Although all mentioned suppliers have excellent textures, I came to the conclusion that for my way
I started with the design of Caroline Street when I finished Station Road.
I had made my wish list for this one before I started with the first drawings:
- a row of Victorian 2up 2down cottages
- a factory
- a just a few people ( I had the idea of just one)
- a balanced colour choice
- the right choice of textures
The first attempts did go to the recycle bin. I tried to add some track into the diorama, but that didn’t work out. So you have to imagine that the goods line is in front
I have finished the Austin A70 Countryman. Lovely kit from John Day but takes some time to paint. I’m pleased with the result.
I have finished the diorama of The George Inn. The base of the diorama is 27 cm. I used some figures I had already painted and some I have used before.
The story behind the diorama:
The car belongs to Ernest Huntington. He is the current owner of Sweetman House in Littleworth. He has also a kennel with pointers. His wife is Julia Adderley. She
Here is update on my latest project. I have finished the pub, but there are some small things to do. Pictures are some great judges!
The pub is, as said in my latest blog entry, a Petite Properties kit. I have used textures from the internet (the lower brick part), Scalescenes and Clever Models for the pub.
It took a lot of time to put all the small paper parts into the frames. For the stucco I made my own PDF file with the right size for the stucco parts. Also, the chimney’s ne
When I started building the yard I got a problem. I couldn’t find a fitting texture from Scalescenes for the yard ground.
After some try outs I decided to build the yard with a part of the shop from the corner shop kit.
As you can see I had to use just a part of my Odeon movie board.
I just my preferred methods to build the building and the yard.
Now the scene is finished it is time to show the final step from black & white to color.
Next step was to put the fig
After building the 3D sketch the final diorama box had to be build. I use for that a MDF “baseboard.” A friend of us cut baseboards for the coming time. Don’t be afraid you will see only this kind of diorama’s in the future. My granddaughter (6 years old now) asked me to build a railway on which a loco could run. So somewhere in the future I have to build a diorama in an APA box in which a train can shuffle around.
I bought her in the past a Toby from Hornby. This loco is the reflection of
The starting point.
I hope I have not tested your patience to much.
Because I wanted to use the textures of the new low relief factory from Scalescenes I had to try out it first in scrap seeing of it would work out.
Let’s start with a picture of the design I made at first:
Here I used just the sign and windows from the new kit. The factory will have a totally different appearance. I started with the underside of the building.
But I was not happy with the dimensions
Pavement and road are in place. So I can start with the factory.
I started with the wall at the end of the diorama and the factory chimney.
The wall is build straight forward using TX24 Dark Brown Brick and the coping from RO11 Arched Bridge from Scalescenes.
The wall is weathered after building using in the Schminke pastels mentioned in the previous entry. To give you an impression I made a picture with the finished wall on a piece of clean printing on Fine Art paper.
Then I
Finally I started yesterday with some card modelling again.
In the mean time I was designing Northall.
Creating a believable story for the small Northall diorama’s is more difficult than I thought.
After some struggling I remembered a chapter in “Light Railway layout design” by Ian Rice. In the chapter about Orford he described how detailed this layout was designed with maps, Acts of Parliament etc.
This could also be the right approach for me. So I created a map for Northall. I used a
After I decided to place Northall as postcode borough W16 in Greater London. I wanted to use also a personalized street name sign, approved by the Northall Council.
I found a good article on internet how street name signs have to be used and designed.
The most important design advices I have copied below:
“Street nameplates shall be of uniform design throughout the Administrative County of London and shall be constructed as follows:
(i) Of durable, non-absorbent material.
(ii)
After the evaluation and the reading of some literature about building a shadow box diorama I will try a different approach.
In his articles about creating a artful diorama, Ray Anderson mentioned that the following things will help any diorama:
1. Tell a simple story. You can hold the viewer’s attention for a minute or two at most.
After finishing Northall Dock and reviewing the title of the diorama scene should have been “going to the pub”
2. The figures should be “smal
I have finished the roof. I have used a roof texture from Scalescenes printed on 100 gsm Rice paper from Hahnemühle. You can still see on the picture some white lines. I have already coloured them in with a dark grey pastel. Weathering is done using a dark slate pigment from Vallejo.
Northall has 'real living' persons. Here is the story behind the diorama:
"Margaret Gates is looking through the window of the pet shop. She wanted to buy some Spratt biscuits for her dog, but th
e love
I have finally finished my diorama of Station Road I have added a Reliant van. The van got some weathering for a better appearance. I used paint from several model paint suppliers.
This time I uploaded a picture of the diorama with the visual underground. Then I saw that a piece of brickwork of a chimney was lose. I repaired that immediately. I also took a picture of the diorama with my British Railway delivery van. I will use these pictures for my delivery story of Arthur Page.
Beca
I have finished the gent’s hair saloon. I have used textures from Scalescenes. The shop signs I designed using Publisher with an example I found on Internet. I save the result as JPEG file and with the photo program in Windows 10 I cut the designed sign out. I copy past the cut-out picture to Word and resize it to make it fit. The Brylcreem sign for the shop I found on Internet and resized it to fit in the window.
You can see Leonard, the barber, standing in his shop. Today’s costumer i
