Worms dio "Finished"!!!

Steve,

       Sorry I missed you, too many guys in baseball caps and glasses ( including myself). Unfortunately this gained no hardware, which I could understand seeing the other dio's there. (Although my wife, great supporter that she is, feels I was cheated) But no worries as this was my second attempt at a real dio and I learned a lot from it. I did however earn a third place for my Porsche 911 GTR, which surprised me as I'm not a big car builder. Spent a lot of time and money in the vendor area and came away with 11 new kits.

Nick- Thanks for looking in and I appreciate the tips!! These are things I can use for my next attempt.

-Stephen

Hey, Stephen. I saw this at the Austin show today, looks great in person. I looked around to see if I might be able to find you. Alas, 6 hours on my feet, ans too-many-hunders dollars later, I needed to get out of ther.

I'm curious to know how this fared.

Steve

Ajlafleche- Thanks for taking the time to look and the input! I agree with the sandbags, didn't think of it like that at the time.

The flesh on the faces was my first time using artist oils. I used titanium white mixed with burnt umber for the tones(or tone). I mixed one batch then painted all the faces, next time i'll vary the tones more.

-Stephen

Chiming in kind of late. The overall looks quite good.

Couple things for future reference,

The sandbag wall is ioce in that it is scratchbuilt and not the stiff Tamiya ones. I'd have built more of a base to give it stability. Something that tall with no supports would be very unstable.

Looks like you used a single commercial "flesh" for your skin tones. There isn't, in my experience, any commercial flesh that looks natural. Experiment with a variety of paints and colors to get a more natural looking mix. I've succesffully used burnt sienna abd titanium white oils to get a good flesh tone and varied the mixture for highlights and shadows. Currently, I use Vallejo beige red as a base caucasian flesh with their games dark fleshtone added for shadows and pale flesh added for highlights. I might adjust with a couple other flesh tones for variations, but as a basic mix, those three colors work.

Panzerguy- Thanks for taking a look, I'm happy with anyone's as long as it will help me improve.

SteveM- I took a look at your WIP French POW, and that is some amazing work you've got going on over there. I'd like to see that one in person.

Stephen- I will be there! Looking forward to seeing this dio in person. I'll be entering the dio I've got goin' in the WIP thread.

Steve

  Steve For all your "first's" you've done a really fine job here .

   I've been checking out your progress on this one and didnt add my worth only because imo there was nothing I could add to the great feedback and suggestion you were getting.

   Like doog I too like the implied look of the dio. The pose of the figs gives a very tense feel to it, like just second's before that MG was spraying rounds down that street.

   Looking foward to seeing your next one .

Thanks everyone for looking!! There were a few firsts in this dio. First time using oils (just on the faces), first resin figures(two of them), first building, first rubble and first home made cobblestone street.

Doog and Manstein-You  both have a good eye for the small details. If you could let me know what you see wrong so that I may correct it on future models that would be great. Some things are obvious like broken parts and some seams.

Buddho- Thanks for the kind comments, still have some improvements to make with modeling skills.

SteveM- I thought that there should have been more red to the rubble. I also think I need to flat coat the troops again. I was planning on entering the Austin Scale Modelers show in Sept., are you planning on attending.

Agentg- I love the caption! Epoxy is Germany's new secret weapon, stops the enemy in there tracks!

Hey Stephen,

Very nice work! I really like how the figures are laid out. A well conveyed sense of trepidation when approaching that corner. I'd personally like to see more of the the building's interior... lot of space back there and I'm curious.

I agree about having a backdrop for the shots. The bottles of Epoxy kinda take me out of "the moment". Another thing I might suggest is to get that darker brick red tone, from the building, into the rubble, to better tie the two together. I know it's there to some degree, but I think more wouln't hurt.

Great detailiing and painting overall. A piece worthy of competing. Are you taking this to a show in the future?

Steve

Looks really good! The buildings and groundwork all look good, the soldiers and tank are pretty nicely rendered, and I like the fact that the focal point of the actual enemy is implied, rather than directly modeled.

A nice job! 

All right!! I'm going to call this one finished. Some things could have turned out better, but I tried some new techniques that help out. I'd also like to thank everyone for there tips that helped me along. Well here are the pics there are a few of them hopefully they turned out alright

-Stephen

Okay, I think the base is pretty much finished, so here is what I have.

I'll be working on the figures next.

-Stephen

Squeakie- Thanks for looking. I'm not sure how open the building will be once finished, most likely I'll have the windows boarded up and the door closed. I'm wanting the main interest to be what's lying around the corner.

There will be a BAR gunner most likely the guy standing between the tank and the wall.

ww2modeler- The german mg post will be more abandoned looking  once finished. Just getting a feel for the items that were left behind right now.

-Stephen

That makes sense about the MG facing. Maybe have the helmet turned over and the boxes on there sides or leaning against something and the MG at an off angle to give it a more abandoned feel.

David

two small things I'd do.

*move the tank over a little bit at an angle. The open doorway is a good place to catch a Panzefaust. And you want every advantage you can get in this situation. But where the tank sits is important to the doorway.

* train that fifty on the doorway!! The main gun is useless in this situation. The troopers should hug the wall while approaching the doorway. Perhaps with a grenade or two in their hands. A couple rifles aimed at the doorway is a must as well using the tank for cover while the other two creep up on the opening. Pins for the grenades will be in their pockets by the way, and they probably will be used within the next five seconds.

*lastly one of the guys behind the tank (used for cover) should have a BAR. This goes back to Bedford Forest's quote "get their firstist with the mostis." If something goes wrong he'll also be the cover fire for the others to get out of there

gary

ww2modeler- Thanks for looking. Good point on the entry for the road block, but i'm not to sure about the machine gun. If my thinking is correct , at the road block you would be concerned about people or the enemy coming from the one direction. I think the mg position covers this well, if the enemy is coming from the other direction then they (the Germans) have been out flanked and it would be time to abandon the position.

Now at the time the 705th TD's got to Worms the war was nearly over so the towns were lightly defended and the germans were surrendering in large numbers. At least from what I've read. So I guess what I trying to show is the entry into the city with an abandonned road block and the americans confident yet cautious.

Manny- I'm still working on hunkering down the figures into the tank. But for some reason that TC won't listen to me and keeps sitting on the turrent, kids these days.LOL

-Stephen

No problem, glad to have been able to pass it along.

Steve

Looks good. One thing I would suggest if you are going to have that sign is a entry point in the roadblock. And IMO, it would be more realistic to have the MG more angled to cover both streets better.

IMO,

David

SteveM, this is exactly what I was looking for! Thanks for the links.

Stephen

Here are some places you can get some unit insignias from Archer. Good stuff: 

http://www.archertransfers.com/catalog.html 

http://historyondisplay.com/zencart/ 

Hope this gets you somewhere.

Steve

Huxy, you are correct, it is the tamiya road sign set. I'm thinking of "No entry without proper papers." In german of course. Thanks for looking

-Stephen

Outstanding.. Looks very well done!

Just two questions.. That sign at the roadblock, got that from the Tamiya 1/48 roadsignset? And what will it say? 

Well this is an update of what I have so far. I think the layout is pretty well set unless there is any glaring problems. Please any comments will be helpful.

I still need to add more rubble, finish the wall, weather the ground, and finish the figures. Still aways to go. Does anyone know where I can get unit insignia decals. Verlinden has rank patches but that is all I could find.

-Stephen

Birdgunner wrote:

Manny, you mentioned that there are some good books out there, I have been searching the sites for guides on how to alter figures, and have not been very successful.  Have found a lot of sites on how to paint them, but when it comes down to altering or modifying figures there is very little info I can find.  Do you have any sites, or titles of books that may help us who are new to working with figures, on how to modify figures.  Thanks for any help!!

RBaer- Thanks for looking, unfortunately the M-18's turrent is to long to have the T/C standing behind it to fire.

I think I'll make this thread into a WIP so that I may glean others expertise as I go along.

-Stephen