Dad's Army 5 - Diorama 2

I've been working on the diorama layout all week, with very little to show for it; there's not even been enough progress to generate any worthwhile photos.

So little progress, in fact, that I'm giving serious thought about reverting to Plan A, which was to just have the figures on the church hall floor. It may not look as good, but it will be done in time. Given some of the problems I'm encountering, I'm unlikely to have completed even the left wall of the full project any time soon.

This week was largely concerned with the office door in the left wall. I have cut out the door surrounds, and have both 2mm and 2.5mm deep versions. The wall is 1.5mm deep, so 2mm is probably the correct size. However, 2mm doesn't really protrude enough and I'm worried it will disappear when I paint the model. The surround edges were mitred by sanding the pieces on sandpaper, and they have actually turned out quite well.

I have cut out the space for the door. This was done by scraper and scalpel, as I couldn't get the scribe and snap approach to work. Unfortunately, the edges aren't quite as clean and square as I'd like, so there's a bit/lot more sanding to do.

I drew up a pattern for the panels of the door in InkScape and printed it out. Unfortunately, the sizes were all wrong, so I redid them by hand on paper, and then transferred the measurements to plasticard. I'm using 0.5mm for the plain back of the door and another 0.5mm piece for the panel section, although I'm not sure how easy cutting very small rectangles from 0.5mm plasticard will be.

I taped "The Godiva Affair" episode last weekend, and it has provided a wealth of new screen captures, including some areas I didn't have, such as the main door to the hall. However, the downside to this is that there now seems more work to do than ever. One small example is that I noticed the insets on the office door are arched at the top, not straight as I had thought. This isn't a big change, but will make cutting out the insets that bit more complicated.

A bigger thing that I noticed was that the bottom section of the walls the whole way around is actually wooden panels. This means I'll have to scribe each one, probably 2mm apart. Having only just recovered from scribing the floor, I'm not looking forward to this.

As a break from modelling, I managed to get my skeletons nearly finished, and have cleaned and undercoated my next group, Pig Iron Heavy Infantry Command Squad,  Wardroids, and a couple of Citadel Imperial Guard Walkers.

I'll decide at some point next week on whether I'm parking the diorama and just building the floor, but the smart money says that's the most sensible approach.

Dad's Army 4 - Diorama 1

Just a quick update with some dodgy photos this week, as I'm spending all my time on the diorama. I wouldn't mind so much if I was making progress, but it's slow going.

The first picture is the cardboard mock-up I put together, to get an idea of what the size of the model would look like, and to see if it would be okay with all the figures in it, or if it would be too small/large.

The rough positioning of the figures below was taken before I started painting anything. It's still largely what I'm planning to use, although Pike and Fraser won't be on the stage (I'm not building the stage)

The current plasticard layout, complete with test figures, is shown below. Nothing's glued yet, so I have plenty of time to move things about if required. The positioning of the back windows will be changing, hopefully sometime this week. The layout is populated with some Foundry Assyrians and Victorian hunters because a) I had them handy and b) they're the same size as the diorama figures.

After a week, all I have to show for my time is:

• the wall sections. The back wall required trimming, after I realised that I had to have the walls on top of the floor piece, rather than around the edge (the office door would have been dangling in mid-air if the walls were outside the floor)
• the floor. This involved scribing 72 lines, each one 3mm apart. Each line took 10 shallow cuts, giving a total of 720 cuts. This took a full evening (I know you can get plasticard with these cuts; the problem is that the card isn't wide enough, and the cuts are the full length of the card, while I need them the full width)
• outline of the left wall in InkScape. I obsessed over this to a worrying degree, trying to get every measurement perfect. The thing that tripped me up was that moving something 1mm looks huge when you're working at 300x magnification. However, when applied to the model, it's barely noticeable. I'm going to try and relax when doing future pieces
• downloaded pictures of the posters that I'll need from a website. I haven't found portraits of the King and Queen yet, but I'm looking

The edges of the pieces aren't completely flat, due to the nature of working with plasticard (that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it). I have sanded them down, but there's still a slight slope. It's not obvious when you look at it, but it will cause problems when I come to glue the pieces together. My plan to work around any problems caused by this gap is twofold:

• use 4mm square rod to provide a surface for joining floor to wall and wall to wall
• pin the walls to the floor for extra support. Pinning will involve drilling 0.5mm holes through the base and into the wall, then pinning with plasticard rod. It won't provide much strength, but should be enough to help keep the walls straight

Next week I will get to grips with the left wall and ideally get it finished. The door will be tricky, and there's a radiator to think about, but hopefully I'll start to see some progress.

If worst comes to worst, I can always just mount the figures on the floor, but I'm still hopeful that I'll get the model finished in time.

Dad's Army 3 - Civilians Finished

I finished the civilians for the Dad's Army diorama last week. I'm reasonably happy with them, some more so than others...

The weakest figures are Mrs Pike and Mr Blewitt, but, to be fair, these figures don't claim to represent those characters. The Mrs Pike figure was pushing a bicycle in the original pack, and looks like she was simply meant to be a British citizen helping fight the Nazi invaders. Mr Blewitt is a fairly generic "old bloke with a walking stick", so again, I can't really complain (not that that will stop me)

I'm happy with the blacks on the Warden, the Vicar and the Verger. I used the Andrea Miniatures Black set for those, and I'm finally starting to understand how the different shades/highlights behave.

The only one of this group with markings was the Warden, and I'm fairly happy with how they came out. It was quite warm while I was painting, so trying to do fine lines and writing before the paint dried on the brush was tricky.

The figures that do represent characters on the show are very recognisable; it was just a shame that the casting of the figures was so poor.

Finished civilians

Note - the damage to Mr Blewitt and Mrs Pike (hat brims on both models) occurred as I was photographing them. I knocked one over, and just as I was thinking "let's not do that again", I knocked the second one over :-(. The damage, however, has been repaired.

Diorama Layout

I have begun thinking about this and planning stuff out.

I'm setting it in the church hall, but the original idea of simply having them on the bare wooden floor has expanded to include the back wall and the wall with the office door in it.

I've been taking lots of screenshots from the DVDs, and each picture depresses me more. There is a lot of detail in the church hall set that I'd never noticed before: pictures, posters, benches, tables, a piano (on order from Dixon Miniatures) and flags, to name but a few.

The problem is that I've never really done a diorama, or a scratchbuild of this complexity, before, and this strikes me as jumping in at the deep end. However, I've started to decide on some measurements and have picked up plenty of plasticard and foam-card (I'm expecting to make lots of mistakes).

It all needs to be done by the start of October (otherwise it'll be turning into a Christmas present). That gives me about seven weeks, but it has to be designed, built, painted and finished in that time. I suspect my evenings have just been booked for the next few weeks :-)

Claymore 2011

I was at  Claymore yesterday, where I spent the morning and a chunk of the afternoon wandering around the show with my brother-in-law.

My to-buy list before the show consisted of a few paints and a hope that figures would leap out at me. Four hours later, I had spent pretty much all my money, and had a number of things that I'll be keeping an eye on as potential future projects.

As usual, no photos, as there will be plenty of those about from other sources. This post is about things I bought, and some of the ideas that have started bubbling around in my mind because of the show.

Paints

Seeing as this was my main reason for going to the show, I shall start with them.

I added some more to my Vallejo collection - gloss and satin varnishes and some light greys.

Foundry continued the white/light grey theme with the Austrian White (67) set. I have the Andrea Miniatures White set, but it's more of a warm (cloth) white, and I was looking for a cold white.

I also picked up some Coat D'Arms from Fighting 15s (eventually - people were buying a lot from the stand so I gave up and went back later). I bought chestnut brown, dwarf flesh and their dark brown "Super Shader". It looks like another dip, so it should come in useful for my skeletons and other figures where I don't need/want to spend hours shading.

Books

I actually picked up a few books this time:

• Fighting Men of WW2: Axis forces. I have plenty of books of British uniforms, but not really any of German ones. I have some 20mm WW2 Germans to paint at some point, so this should come in useful
• Pirates: Predators of the Seas. Yet another Pirate book, but looks interesting
• Battle for Malta - the attacks on the island during WW2
• Langton Miniatures' Guide to assembling, painting and rigging their 1:1200 Dutch Wars ships. Naval warfare doesn't really do much for me, but the ships of this period are from the Golden Age of Piracy, which does interest me. I have always fancied painting a couple of these ships for display, and I've looked at them in past shows, but never done anything about it. The guy at the stand pretty much talked me out of the idea (the combinations and parts of Langton models looks quite daunting), but I'm going to do some research and order them online
• Chaos in Carpathia. This is a set of Victorian Vampire hunting rules from BlueMoon. I have plenty of Vampires of that period, but my hunters are all modern. I hope that the rules will be flexible enough to cope (after all, a wooden stake hasn't changed much in 100 years), but I may use this as an excuse to buy and paint some appropriate Victorian figures

Figures

Purchased figures covered a wide range:

• Pig Iron command squad. Having already got the troopers, heavy weapons and war droids, it was only a matter of time before I completed the set
• Lead Adventure Jesters. These will join my zombie clown troupe, although the figures aren't sold as zombies
• Lead Adventure Deep Dive Night 2. This is a deep sea diver and a figure with a large spanner. I didn't buy the figure when I first saw it, as I couldn't think of a use for it. However, at another stand (whose name I forget), they had various sea demons. An image of these guys fighting the deep sea diver immediately popped into my mind, so I picked up the demons and went back and bought the diver. It's a diorama idea, so whether it will ever manifest itself remains to be seen...
• Some Cthulu Cultists from the same sea demon place, along with a bloated zombie
• A Gremlin from the same manufacturer. What I really wanted was the base the miniature was on. However, it came with a blank base, and when I asked, I was told the base was from Fenris Games. I've tracked it down, but as they're an ebay store, and I don't have/want an ebay account, I don't think I'll be buying them
• Urban Mammoth Venom Drake. This was half price, and looks like it'll be suitable for my Demon Apocalypse, so it's in the lead pile
• Laughing Monk - Bearer of the Light. Bought this from Fighting 15s as I liked the look of the figure. Having looked at it in the cold light of home, however, I'm not so sure...
• Copplestone Terminators Robots. I had two of them already, so this will add some reinforcements. I have plenty of painted near future figures, so if I ever decide to have a Terminator style game, at least I'll have the figures
• Warhammer Vampire Counts Necromancer. This is the latest plastic release from GW. I think it's just me, but £8.00 for a single plastic figure seems to be a step too far. For metal or resin it doesn't seem too bad (although still expensive), but for one plastic sprue with no "extras", it just seems wrong. I got it at 10% off, but if it hadn't been at a show, I'm not sure I would have bothered. It's a shame, as it's a nice figure, and quite a few of the others in the range are nice as well. At the moment, however, it's a price point that's going to take me some time to get used to

Things I didn't get

One of the few specific things I went for was Dixon Miniature's "pianist with piano and female singer" set. I need a piano for the Dad's Army diorama and this one looked ideal.

Unfortunately, he brought the entire saloon set, but not the individual packs. It seemed silly to buy the whole lot for one item, so I ordered it online when I got home (not without incident, as clicking the "Add to Shopping Cart" button in Firefox 5 caused it to go into an infinite loop. I eventually managed to buy it using Chrome)

Inspiration for future projects

6mm ancients from Baccus.

I have a couple of painted 6mm armies from Irregular miniatures (Dwarf and some evil type army). I also have two unpainted armies from the same manufacturer (Orc and skeleton).

The main reason they're unpainted is that the casting quality isn't great, and it's sometimes difficult to tell where the flash ends and the figure starts.

The Baccus ones, however, look much cleaner, and I was nearly tempted into buying a 6mm Macedonian army pack. The things that saved me were:

• the old eyesight is not what it once was
• I'd have nobody to fight against, so I'd end up having to buy the Persians or Indians as well

Still, this is an area I may revisit, as the idea of a 6mm phalanx on the table is very appealing.

20mm modern British from Britannia

I have some 28mm moderns, although none of them are painted. These ones, however, looked amazing, and again, I was sorely tempted to purchase some. 20mm has the advantage that a lot of plastic kits are available in that scale and I already have some scenery (granted, it's WW2, but a bombed out building looks pretty much the same in every time period)

28mm, however, is more flexible, as I can use the figures with my zombies and other near-future figures (e.g. terminators). This means I won't be investing in 20mm moderns any time soon.

That's the end of my wargame shows for this year. There are still a couple in Scotland, but they're up north, so I don't bother with them.

Now I just have to wait patiently until next May :-)

Dwarf Wizards

Just a quick post, as I'm running late this week. The end is in site for the Dad's Army figures, and this week should see the civilians finished :-)

The diorama idea has changed slightly - to become more complicated, naturally. I'm still having it set in the church hall, but I'm now planning to put the back wall of the church in as well, rather than simply the floor. Anyway, I've just started thinking about that, so that's for a different post...

This week, some Dwarf wizards. In traditional fantasy canon, Dwarfs are not known for their magic use - in fact, they're considered quite resistant to it and unable to work with it, except through runes. However, this has not always been the case, and Citadel used to make quite a few "proper" wizards.

I think this one is a wizard - not sure what else he could be, and he was with the other wizards.

Finally, for the more traditionalists out there, a Rune Lord (I think. Mainly I'm going by the book he's carrying, but he could just as well be a standard bearer...)

That's all for now. I've just downloaded Google Sketchup, to help with planning the Dad's Army diorama layout, so I'd better go and have a play with that...

Storing Unpainted Figures

Storage cabinets

I keep most of my unpainted figures in storage cabinets - the sort normally used to hold nuts and bolts. Boxed sets remain in their boxes, but individual figures are tidied away into the small drawers. I find this approach means the lead pile doesn't look quite so daunting, and when I look through the drawers, I invariably find things I'd forgotten I'd bought.

The figures are spread across three storage units, and have started to outgrow even them - it's possible this signifies something, but probably not :-)

I do have a fourth unit (bright orange), but it has had a long and troubled history. After spending many years in various lofts, I finally reclaimed it a few years ago. However, it was really smelly, so smelly that I didn't want to put anything in it. I spent an afternoon washing the unit and each of the drawers in disinfectant, but it still didn't smell fresh.

With the pile spreading, and Claymore approaching (where it's just possible I may buy one or two figures), I decided it was time to either start using, or replace, the old orange unit. The unit has a dent in the bottom, so doesn't sit quite level, and this, coupled with the lingering smell, meant that the replacement option won.

However, I struggled to find an appropriate cabinet. They don't seem to be in fashion at the moment, but I finally tracked one down on Amazon. It has one more row than the unit its replacing, so should last for a while (famous last words).

It didn't come with any spacers - small plastic rectangles used to divide the drawers into two or three sections. The ones I found on Amazon cost nearly as much as the unit itself, and got some very strange reviews, so I have made my own from 1mm plasticard.

The next step was to reorganise the wardrobe to make room for the new unit. The old orange unit was sitting on top of a set of cardboard drawers which currently hold 20mm WW2, some old GW Epic models and some other odds and ends. As the orange unit was empty and didn't weigh too much, this wasn't really a concern. When the new one is loaded, however, it will be far too heavy, so something had to change.

The reorganisation was completed without incident, and the old unit's heading out to the recycling bin. The lead pile can continue to grow faster than I paint - nope, definitely doesn't signify anything.

New painting light

For more years than I care to remember, my painting area has been illuminated with a single 60W desk lamp. It's an excellent lamp and I've never had any problems with it. Unfortunately, with the EU directive to purge all incandescent bulbs from the pages of history, its days are numbered. I did try to fit a compact fluorescent bulb into it, but there wasn't enough room.

Given that, I have been trying for a while, off and on, to find a replacement lamp. I'm not a fan of fluorescent bulbs, as I find they don't provide as much light as they claim, but until cheap LED bulbs come out, it's all that's out there.

I picked one up this week, again from Amazon, and it has not been too bad so far (only used it for a few sessions, but there has been no eye strain, so that's a good sign). It did flicker something rotten the first time I switched it on, but once it warmed up, it was fine. The lamp has a daylight bulb in it, as opposed to the non-daylight incandescent bulb, so it'll be interesting to see if I notice a difference to the colours when I'm painting.

The lamp came with both a table base and a clamp. The clamp is nice and light, but the base weighs a lot - one review suggests eight or nine pounds, and they're probably correct. It just about did my knees in, as I had to balance it on them on the train journey to get the lamp home. Hopefully, the painting Gods will recognise and honour my sacrifice and suffering, and grant unto me the ability to blend colours properly and paint both quickly and accurately :-)

No photos this week, as I had various house activities to do that took up my usual photography time-slot. There's nothing much to report on anyway, just plodding through the Dad's Army civilians.

Dad's Army 2

I've just finished the first group of Dad's Army figures, so I thought I should post some pictures. They're not based yet, and won't be until the civilians have been painted (just starting on them).

The figures went together fairly easily - WW2 British Army colours are relatively simple. I was following the SHQ guide, which for the most part was okay. I should, however, have used khaki for the webbing, rather than Vallejo Iraqui Sand, which was too light.

When I was looking at reference pictures of the cast, I noticed that all the belts and puttees, apart from Mainwaring's, were black. Every other picture of British troops from that period that I've seen have the belts and puttees khaki. There were also some strange pouches being worn in the TV series, rather than the standard 37 pattern pouches that the Foundry figures had been sculpted with.

There was nothing I could do about the pouches, so I just painted up the ones on the figures. I decided to follow the cast photographs regarding the belts and puttees, however, so painted them black. I don't know if the BBC messed up their research, but it's probably more likely that units at that time (especially Home Guard units just after Dunkirk), would have got whatever equipment was lying around.

I did actually make an attempt at the shoulder flashes, but they're not very noticeable - one of the drawbacks of painting using an Optivisor is that things that look good at 2.5x magnification tend to disappear in normal use. They're just about visible on Godfrey's left shoulder below. The formation patch below the shoulder flash had "CP1" on it in the cast photos. I decided against trying this, however, as it was more likely to spoil things than add anything to the figure (that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it!).

I tried to match the colour for Pike's scarf. I think it's mostly there, although there should have been more purple in it.

And finally, the group shot, still on their painting bases.

I had trouble deciding on hair colour for Captain Mainwaring. I've seen some pictures of him with grey hair, and others with red-brown hair. I decided to go with the red-brown, as everyone else (apart from Pike) had grey hair.

Civilians

Next up are the civilians - the Vicar, Verger, Mr Hodges, Mrs Fox, Mrs Pike and Mr Blewitt. The figures below have been undercoated, with eyes done and the skin basecolour applied.

The Vicar, Verger and Mr Hodges are in black clothes, so I'm hoping that will speed things up.

I subscribe to the online version of Skirmish Magazine, available through Exact Editions. They quite often cover WW2 re-enactment events, so I shouldn't have too much trouble finding clothing ideas for Mrs Pike and Mrs Fox below.

Diorama layout

I had planned to set the diorama in the church hall, with Fraser and Pike on the stage. However, when I had a look at pictures of the hall, there are railings all along the front of the stage, which means that I'm going to have to change my plan.

The problem is that Fraser is kneeling and pointing, so looks out of place with the others. What I'm thinking at the moment is to have him and Pike off to the side - Fraser pointing something out and Pike pretending to shoot it. The alternative is to have Fraser talking to Mr Blewitt - as he's got a slight stoop, it might not look too bad.