the hard side of war am i wrong for it?

Well I have yet to do my first Dio but I would think that as long as its done tastefully then there shouldn't be to much of a problem,,,atleast as far as I am concerned. I have seen a couple of diorama's that have had dead bodies in them and there was no gorey messes involved. Back to your original question... I dont think your wrong for doing it,,, no,,,, death is a part of war,, besides Verlinden makes a couple of dying figures anyway.

Whos to judge?
Verlinden and Nemrod both make dead and dieing soldiers for diorama work. I say whatever you feel best conveys your message.

If you want to have the lines going into the pits and showers at Auschweitz, that's your perogative. It's really up to you.

Dioramas are a 3 dimensional representation of a photograph. I say photograph because it conveys that there is some thought or message being presented or conveyed. A snapshot is just that, a random pic of something with no thought. Think of what you are trying to say, or what story you are trying to tell.

Violence for violence sake is a parlor trick and reserved for low budget movies with no story line. No thought, and little creativity and the storyline or message is lost in the sight gag. Personaly I look for that unusual or creative thing that really sends a message or has an impact. Where is the tension and drama of the image? For example. I thought that the WTC crumbling down was dramatic, but the bigger impact was the aftermath. The pic of the guy falling to his death was horrifying and was heartstopping, but the more poigniant photo was of the fire/rescue worker who was exhausted and collapsed with fatigue in a doorway, his search and rescue dog equally fatigued and curled up in his arms. The photo of the marine with half his face gone and his arm torn away at Iwo Jima is shocking, but the more reflective photo of the Marine at Chosin with that thousand yard stare and the whole shock, stress and resignation of his plight reflected in that gaze into the camera lens said volumes of the impact of war. I think you see my point here.

Dioramas are creative expressions of ourselves and our imgainations and reach to each of us differently. Some may be jogged into memory by what they see, others may be indifferent. If you are building it for a contest, expect other peoples expectations of your work. Meaning, don't be surprised or disapointed if they have much different views or reactions of your work. If you build to impress others, you are subject to their whims.

Shep Paine mentions it in his book on Dioramas, pointing out that if you are going to have casualties in your diorama, make them look like they have died or fallen, not stock figures simply laid down or look as though they've fallen. I think it can be done in such a way that conveys your message and will satisfy your thought or idea projected in the project. How it should be judged by you and anyone else is based upon the level of creativity you project.

Good luck with the project, and lets see some pics.

Mike

Go for it, don't worry about the few PC-heads that might object.

Italeri also made wounded figures and figures one stretchers, etc.
Part of the war so why hide it.

Warrior is releasing several figures, one is a partially de-composed body of a soldier. The other is a set of skulls wearing German helmets. Saw it over on Hyperscale under 'What's New?'. I don't have any problems with the figures themselves.

Glenn

Go for it Andy. Good luck in your future project.
mark956

Show it.

War is a horrific, brutal struggle. I could go on for hours about it philosophically, but I'll stick to the basic facts. War involves destruction. Destruction of your enemy before he destroys you. As modellers, we think nothing of depicting a rubbled building, a knocked out tank or a crashed airplane. But airplanes, tanks and buildings must have people in them to function. When those things are destroyed, people are killed and mangled along with them. War isn't glamorous but it is necessary for our survival and it demands a great cost in resources and lives. These are sad but true facts of life and we need to face them.

As modellers, we spend vast amounts of time and resources in pursuit of realism on a small scale. Don't stop yourself short. Portraying the dead and wounded doesn't glorify the violence, quite the opposite, it shows the human consequences of the action. To do anything less is to perpetuate an unrealistic image and devalue the sacrifices of those who fought and continue fighting to protect us.

the one photo that comes to mind is that one that was taken, I think on Saipan, where there is a half-sunk transport and the soldier on the beach half-covered in sand with maggots all over him is one that i think is fairly moving

The way I see it is that we are recreating history or at least the ideal of that era that we model. Death happened and did alot. I see no problem with showing this in a diorama since it is part of the story. It's no worse than the hundreds of deaths that everyone sees on television every week. I say go for it and if someone don't like they can always walk away.

Go for it.....death and war go hand-in-hand.....you're building history, and I don't remember a time where death wasn't a part of history!!

Andy, I did a dio with 2 dead German soldiers in it. I even posted it here and nobody has complained to me yet.

Also, why worry? How many OSCARS did Saving Private Ryan earned? Lot's of blood and dying soldiers there, too. And we even enjoyed the movie.

In war only the dead are at peace. Go for it, you can not make an ommelette without breaking an egg. We depict the result of politicians mistakes and megalomania and have to highlight the suffering of inocents.

your in the right, if you want to show how terrible war is, then thats exactly what you want to do, and even if u dont, but just want a dio like that, your not wrong in my opinnion.

I am curently building a USMC dio of retreat from Chosin and it includes dead and wounded Marines,, as combat vet I dot like the thought of recreating bad memories but u r right it is a part of combat,,
Here is a thought My point with my dio is show MArines don't leave their dead and they did carry them out of the Chosin, so my 'passed' Marines are wrapped in tissue paper ponchos, the death is actually more impied than shown,, I hope it works,, Also the wounded are to tell the story of taking care of our own and I am using modified Verlinden, Warrior & Italeri figs to show this..Good luck and model what you want ,,It is your hobby! My only advice would be like Shep Paine's go easy on the gore and blood, And use a brown with some red mixed in for the blood ,,it looks more realistic..Happy Modeling

I had the same problem with thinking about doing Gestappo or SS models. Those guys are just so cool with how professional they look and their jet black uniforms and all that stuff but I had to remeber what they did. Even though modeling death and SS is kind of the same in that bolth subjects deal with the darker side of war, death can be alot more tasteful. Numerous heros have fallen and should be remembered; I'd say go for it. And renarts, nice words man and if you were the guy that did the dio of the two midevil guys with axes duking it out and won the prize at some modeling convention, good work, those are awesome, if your not, then sorry for the rambeling.

Renarts hit the nail on the head about the dying and especially the dead. The dead human body does not look like a maniken lying down. Asleep is the the closest, but aleep looks relaxed. Sudden, violent death is something else, relaxation coupled with with gravity. At death, every joint is loosenrd into the positon gravity dictates. Seen it first hand before anyone else except maybe the truck druiver wo hit her and ran did.
On most figures you buy, gravity is working head to foot. Foold hang own in that direction, and laying a standing figure down will look completely wrong, though you may not immediately see it. If the figure has not been sculplted prone and relaxed , you have a lot of work ahead of you. FLesh tones will have to be much more waxy and pale than a healthy upright figure.

It happened therefore it can be re-created. As long as it is tasteful I suppose.

hey guys thanks for the support, I modified a Tamiya figure with all sorts of body parts to get the right pose. Hes cluching his stomach from a womb and hes propped up draging himself to help, I havent figured out how i want the rest of the dio to go yet but i have nothing but time so i hope it works out right, I didnt plan to make it too gorey just alil blood and that was about it. But i do appericate the advice

I don't know about you but I always model for myself.I model what I like and how I like.If you wish to do a dying soldier,then do it.It's not like your going to hold someone and force them to look at it.The only time it may be a problem is if you want to enter a competition and then your at the mercy of some judges idea of right or wrong.I don't agree with someone telling me my idea for a dio is wrong as long as I'm not trying to depict an actual historical scene.As long as it's my idea,and it comes out the way I wanted it to,how can someone tell me it's wrong.Our creativity is not yet controled so go for it.If someone finds it offensive,then don't look.
Good luck and hope you post some pics for us.

never convince yourself you cant do anything that is a fact of life. its easy to make death tasteful. a friend on armorama did a panzer grenadier with a bullet hole through his hand to his helmet and it looked really good but still tasteful. anyone that has seen anything military has most likely seen death. the only war without death could have been the cold war, but even then people were killed.. im sure spies were caught and stuff behind the scenes. its not fair to leave death out of war. otherwise people may think it glamorous. it makes modeling more real that way...

Death is a consequence of war. Don't be afraid to show it.

Just an idea for you here , if you are going to have blood in it ... tamiya red clear is so convincing , it would have convicted OJ simpson !

Just skip the blood and gore-I saw a Sherman dio with a crewman helping a fellow out of the tank with one of his legs blown off-stump, blood et al. It was a beautiful model but unnecessarily gorey-at least to me.

I say DO IT!!!!
Make sure it satisfies YOU first, and don't worry about what everyone else may or may not think. It's your expression, not theirs.. This is the essence of art.

Unfortunately, war always comes with death and destruction. Therefore building dioramas with dead soldiers or falling soldiers is normal. If you are building it for yourself, I think you should go for it.

Yet, if you plan to displace you dioramas in the public, say in a model show, I suggest you to take some pre-caution in presenting them. Modeling death in a diorama might involve certain gore and bloodshed. If this is present in a overly exaggerated way, it could generate replusive feeling on viewers.

I can give you an example.

Back in 1981, I attented a public model show in Hong Kong. There were several dioramas involving death soldiers. Most of them were presented in professional way. However, there were four of them that are so disturbing and controversal that they were ordered to be removed. Why? It was the gore and bloodshed involved were so exaggerated and eccentric that most viewer could not stand. They can be described as following

1) This one contained two Airfix 1/32 soldiers, one Japanese and one British. The scene showed a Japanese beheaded a British soldier during the fall of Singarpore. The red paint(blood) used was overwhelm. Way more than it should be.

2) This one also contained two 1/32 figures, one Japanese and one GI. This scene showed the Japanese soldier bayoneted th GI to death. Not only the gore was overdone, the modeler also scratch built the guts and internal organ of the GI. Again that was totally unnecessary.

3) The scene in this one showed a German Panzer 38(t) ran over a Russian solider. You can imagine the gore involved. The Russian soldier collapse was scratch bulit(by some putty or plastic sheet I assume).

4) This one showed Alien(yep, the space monster in the movie Alien) ate up a human being. Well you could see Alien holding broken human arm and leg on it's hand and on the floor with a human broken skull with brains smashed(made by plaster)

All four dioramas were built by the same person.

The officals in the show considered these four doramas, built by the same person, should not be showed to public due to the graphic nature. and I agree. There is a difference between showing horror of war and using exaggeration in gore to gain attention. That is why movie like 'Saving Private Ryan' and 'Passion of Christ' are prasied and movie like 'Toxic Averger' is critized. It is the intention of the builder we should forcus on.

Furthermore, that modeler was insensitive. Expecially, showing diorama #1 and #2 in Hong Kong where the Japanese troops committed lots of atrocities during the war.

It was very sad. I had seen this modeler's dioramas before they were removed. I can tell he was a very talented young man. He surely did not had to do this(boy God know how many bottles of red paint) to gain attention.

Fortunately, the above is only a very extreme case. Most of the dioramas I have seen are presented in a professional way with resonable gore. Andy, I am confident you are a professional and mature modeler like all of us. When you complete your diorama, show it to us. Thanks.

I agree with everyone. It would be a shame for us modelers not to show the grim consequences of war. We can't make everything all sugar-coated and nice. I don't mean we should always use gore and destruction, because there are some good ideas for dioramas that don't require all the destrucion. Death is a vital part of what we modelers try to emulate in our dioramas and models. Go for it. Hope it helps.

Dead men have indeed died in vain if we the living refuse to look at them and the sacrifice they gave.

Dead men have indeed died in vain if we the living refuse to look at them and the sacrifice they gave.

QUOTE: Originally posted by Anthony Yet, if you plan to display your dioramas in the public, say in a model show, I suggest you to take some pre-caution in presenting them.

Indeed, the IPMS national contest Rule 5 (http://www.ipmsusa.org/CH_index.html) stipulates, in part:
The Chief Judge will exclude or remove from competition any entry considered by Contest officials to be inappropriate or offensive to generally acknowledged standards of taste and acceptability.

The following may be entered in the competition or put on display but can be presented only behind opaque screens or similar visual barriers and only where visitors are provided with a fair description, in written format, of the contents of the models behind the screen. This screened presentation covers competitors and the general public, but no person younger than 18 will be admitted except in the presence of an adult responsible for the young person, subject to the provisions of governing local law:

Models or dioramas of historic events (e.g., general dioramas or specific depictions of the result of the activities of the communist Cambodian Pol Pot regime, a Soviet Gulag, or a Nazi death camp) where the suffering of human beings, or the result of a pogrom, is depicted. Where the theme, content, or subject matter of presentations is graphic or would violate any provision of part A of this policy, the presentation is prohibited in any setting.

So, if you're planning on entering any regional or natinal (and that will be in Atlanta in 2005) contest, you should consider carefully how you depict your figures.

I am reminded of the horrific image of the photograph of a 10-year-old Vietnamese girl burned with napalm, walking naked in the road. There were people all around who let her suffer alone. At least that is the impression I had when I saw the photo for the first time in Time magazine.
I don't think a model of this subject could do more than the photograph. At best it might trivialize the impact of that photograph. Choose the subject well.
I saw a diorama of a Corpman station on Iwo Jima that hit me so hard I began to cry. The suffering was so palpable, and the humanity given in such tenderness I could not stop the tears.