Diorama question (grand scale)

hey b ,

well i have had sort of the same idea as you . my brother talked me into it. once we get our house the wife said the basement is all mine. so my brother decided it would be cool to make a large scale 1/35th scale diorama of d-day. i would love to do it but i think right now it is just a dream just because of the size and time to make it. for now i am sticking t o the small scale dio's. whatever you decided to do just have fun doing it :)

kenny

I saw one back in 2004 in March at the IPMS Region 2 Regionals in Washington DC...

A guy from Canada had a split diorama, same street in Germany, May 1940 /May 1945... it was really cool... showed the exact same street 5 years apart, the entire dio was probably 4'x6' split into 2 2'x6' "halves" to better show the differences 5 years of war can make.  Extremely detailed, and very well done.  I don't have pics and I can't remember the guy's name...

http://www.ipmsslc.com/gallery2/v/Contests/album03/KansasCity2006/P8040005_001.JPG.html

That's one from the '06 Nationals in KC...

 

Cool idea.

My thought is that you should make it modular- that is, comprised of separate interchangable smaller pieces.

This has two functions.

1.) You don't get overwhelmed. You can work on a smaller terrain and finish it in a reasonable timetable.

2.) Transportability. If you are pleased with the work, it can either be shown as singular segments, or transported in parts and recombined on location.

Consider if you will (I do not know what scale you intend to work in) in working with 12"x12" or 16"x16" squares which are easily transported and stored.

Hope this helps!

Thanks for the replies guys. As soon as the damn bills stop getting in the way, I'm gonna start my first project (not sure what yet).

Kolschey, I had considered your suggestion. I do want to make it easily transportable, and have at least some possibilities to remove segments for seperate dios.

I plan on working in 1/35 scale for armor and 1/48 for aircraft. The aircraft will either be suspended in the air by fishing string or placed far enough away from any armor or figures so that the scale difference won't be too noticable.

Thanks again for the replies and I look forward to getting my first project started and to see more of your great work.

Peace, Brad.

I think you aren't alone in dreaming of something like this. I've been planing one for a couple of years now, and decided to start work on it a few weeks ago. First, I built, not painted or anything, a BR52 locomotive, and a truck to use for measurements of scale. I suspect the dio will be about 2 feet wide by 7 feet long, and will be a small German railway stop. All I can say is this: plan well. I suspect I'll have to put in a few months of labour for planing and sketching alone.

If your going to be doing armor and aircraft another possibility is doing 1/32 aircraft as well as 1/35 armor b/c then you could more easily pull off the scale difference.