Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Allan wrote: "When I build a scene like that I usually build in 'blocks' - maybe three or four buildings shoulder to shoulder, then when I have enough to fill the given area, I spend hours believe it or not shuffling them around until it all looks right - then do it again the next day !" It really shows...that level of realism and authenticity doesn't come without a lot of thought. The townscapes and scenes sit together perfectly. 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 (edited) No I haven't Mikkel, it's on the previous page !! Cheers. Allan And Robinson, stop buttering me up, you're still getting the cathedral !!!! Edited April 26, 2013 by allan downes 3 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
freebs Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Allan wrote: "When I build a scene like that I usually build in 'blocks' - maybe three or four buildings shoulder to shoulder, then when I have enough to fill the given area, I spend hours believe it or not shuffling them around until it all looks right - then do it again the next day !" It really shows...that level of realism and authenticity doesn't come without a lot of thought. The townscapes and scenes sit together perfectly. I also think the continuity of building style and colours also brings it all together beautifully 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 (edited) Arranging and siting the buildings in the townscape below took longer to do than it did to build it ! Often the problem is that what you planned to go 'here', looks better over 'there' - then come tomorrow, it doesn't look better anywhere ! - and as for that castle...well it wasn't planned at all, it was just an afterthought that weighed a hundredweight and took two people and a hernia to lift it ! Edited April 26, 2013 by allan downes 8 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 I can't really compete with Allan's brilliant townscapes; the only ones I have done as big as that have been for architects and I didn't have any creative input at all, being told where to put stuff etc. On the creative modelling side, I do love the rhythm gained by juxtaposing roof lines and angles as per the master. Here are a couple of shots of Tetford Quay...the angles and placing of the warehouses was decided after much head scratching and a lot of tuined Wills slate sheets. The area to the rear was eventually the roadbed for the railway. Gratuitous gull shot! 9 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 While Robinsons holed up in his bunker, this might be a good time to explain why I rarely put any trees into a scene - and that's simply because they don't look anything like a tree, but more like a bad hair do ! The three aspects of modelling that seem to defeat us are water, grass and trees - whilst we, or the manufacturers can, faithfully reproduce a locomotive right down to the last rivet, nobody has yet taken nature on and give us a tree that is more than just a twisted length of wire bristling with bristles that looks more like a toilet brush than it does a mighty oak ! Water,and as long as you don't try using the real stuff - remember those early war films where balsa wood destroyers were battling it out for control of the Atlantic in a fish tank ?! - well that's what real water looks like on a model, you just can't scale it down no more than you can scale down smoke 'belching' out of a freighter taking on the Beatock Bank - futile whisps of oily smoke just aint gonna make it to the top or convince anybody that it can ! However, trees, or the need to include them because of the nature of the model, is something that I'd rather let nature take care of since it's the root of the problem in the first place ( all those 'Bath Sponge Specials' you see on many of my scenes are planted there by the client and in a perfect world, I could get there with a camera before he gets there with his trees !) so here, in an obviously desperate and urgent attempt, I iether use Sea Moss - or whatever it is that you can see if you're unlucky enough, sticking out most untreelike, but half a chance up on bathsponge, - on the scene below. 9 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Tetford Quay will certainly do for me Iain and a magnificent effort which one again, gives you the edge ( God only knows but that hurt saying that....) But brace yourself for what's about to come.... 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Thanks Allan... Now, just before the storm, if I am quick enough... I agree about the sea foam trees, especially if treated with various types of flock/foam and sometimes a blast of static grass works too for gorse. In these shots of the farm I mainly used teddy bear fur for the grass and sea foam trees...the gorse is rubberised horsehair, energised with static grass. Sorry about the wierd perspective on the ruined barn shot, my backscene didn't really work there... OK Allan, bring on the cathedral. Brace for impact, batten all hatches! 9 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Sure I don't need a cathedral to beat that, a few of my early rejects ought to do it.... I'll be back. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Sure I don't need a cathedral to beat that, a few of my early rejects ought to do it.... I'll be back. I thought as much. Here's a drawing to remember me by just before I retire to my nuclear shelter... , It was nice meeting you all... 11 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 I've just had a thought in a last desperate attempt to stop the cathedral from landing on my head... I remember that back in the day Allan, you achieved great things with something called "Old Man's Beard"...I looked high and low for this stuff but never could find it and suspected you were having me on...but there were some great photos in the press of trees and foliage made from it... Disappears down Cwmorthin Lake adit... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Best I can do Iain re 'Old Mans Beard' ( Pipers Mead, terrible - Woburn Abbey, even worse ! and with me looking all smug ( and vastly overpaid ! ) bur it was a rapid means to an end. What it is in fact, is a wild bind weed that grows like there's no tomorrow in almost every hawthorn hedge between High Wycombe and The Watford Gap in the winter - but North of Watford ? not a whisker ! 8 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Right, truce over - below, Pyruma Paradise ! 8 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 That explains why I could never find any in Aberdeenshire... Why is Dave Lee Travis in that top shot?? 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Why is Dave Lee Travis in that top shot?? Because, and as you can plainly see, he's a truly amazing modeller !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 'Pyruma Paradise' - a coloured shot, the only coloured shot ! 8 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 'Pyruma Paradise' - a coloured shot, the only coloured shot ! 234.jpg Really nice...love the goods shed and the slate roofs..all individually applied no doubt! Great stuff. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Well ol' buddy, and as much as I hate to do this, but the time has come.... 13 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gravy Train Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Ian, I have a7mm scale model of Notra Damm with all conceivable detail if you want me to slip it over to you on the quiet, don't tell Alan, its 20ftx 17ft with full interior :-) peter 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Ian, I have a7mm scale model of Notra Damm with all conceivable detail if you want me to slip it over to you on the quiet, don't tell Alan, its 20ftx 17ft with full interior :-) peter Thanks Peter...don't tell Downsie... seriously though...aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrggggggghhhhhhh!!! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 Well ol' buddy, and as much as I hate to do this, but the time has come.... Well.....what can I say. It's over. The exterior is impressive enough with all that amazing repetitive detail which must have taken a very long time...but the interior detail is stunning. It must have been a major physical challenge too. I can't really come back with anything as good as this, mate. Hang on..."chalk marks!! chalk marks!! Or should it be...new balls? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Well.....what can I say. It's over. The exterior is impressive enough with all that amazing repetitive detail which must have taken a very long time...but the interior detail is stunning. It must have been a major physical challenge too. I can't really come back with anything as good as this, mate. Hang on..."chalk marks!! chalk marks!! Or should it be...new balls? Actually Iain, it was a one off from Superquick - special order and all that... Before I built it, I had to read up on cathedrals and try and get a 'feel' for the thing but in the end I got so confused with the geometry I thought "To Hell with it, I'll do it my way - cut, hack and hope" - and it worked !! It took six months to build, required the making of untold masters which were then cast in whitemetal as and when I wanted them by Tony Langley of Langley Models, and at the time cost over 10 grand to build - today, and 30 years later, it's insured for over 30 grand by its owner and now lives in a villa on the Isle De Ischia in the Bay Of Naples. Cheers. Allan Oh, and it aint over yet, well not while you're ahead it aint !!! - so what you got next bro ?! 2 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
allan downes Posted April 26, 2013 Author Share Posted April 26, 2013 Ian, I have a7mm scale model of Notra Damm with all conceivable detail if you want me to slip it over to you on the quiet, don't tell Alan, its 20ftx 17ft with full interior :-) peter OK, the games up Iain, I'll be the same one he sent me for the contest - hired it out to for 30 quid a day, what's he charging you? Anyway, who is this guy......? Cheers. Allan Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 OK Allan, I'm winged, but I'll manage back to the corral....now let me see... Cloud of dust and rubble as Iain lifts old files in the archives... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iain C Robinson Posted April 26, 2013 Share Posted April 26, 2013 OK...how about a cathedral of clay...Clay Dries that is! Modelled roughly on Treviscoe, but for a low-relief location, the full blow-by-blow construction is on my blog. Oh, and it's 4mm scale. Oh, no...a monster seagull again! The wall textures. 15 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now