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I envy you incredibly.

I've never had the balls to get into Historic Modelling -- the risks of being shot down in shameful flames by being innacurate frighten me hugely. However after seeing the care, but constrained ambition you have shown, I might just give it a go.

My Tamiya Flak 88 is in the post, thanks to you.

Peace.

sA

Thanks for the comments guys.

@ Xanthos552 - too many hours! :-) I've lost track to be honest but its a project thats spanned weeks so far (and not even a lick of paint yet). I've used lots of books and internet articles for the research as I wanted to get it as accurate as possible. Actually A great deal of time has been spent pouring over colour slides of KV-1's to pick a colour scheme that matches the area and the engagement... and when I've found something I really like I've worked hard via research to try and blag it in without being unfaithful to the period! haha most of the time its worked and I have been able to fit the things in that I like while being accurate. I've ruled out a lot of things that looked cool, because they werent justified for that engagement or season.

@ Deff - the photos are from numerous sources, alot of them from books, and some from the Internet. A great deal of the internet photos though I already had in books to be honest.

@ Alfred - What you mean like this one?



yes I know what you mean, progaganda and staged images are always a problem. But these photos seem to be more reliable in that the battle scenes are a lot less staged including actual combat engagements. Also for the purposes of knowing what kind of uniforms, equipment, and terrain features they are helpful, although as far as engagements go I wouldn't take them as gospel.

By the way did you present you're relative with that other diorama you did yet?(sorry if you mentioned this already I have the memory of a goldfish with short term/long term memory problems.)


Do you know where I can get a bit of information on the 8th SS Cavalry division?

@ Assassin, glad to hear you've given it a shot!

You don't have to go too deep into things, you can always do a generic AFV or something similar. Thats what I did in my Winter T34/76 scene to a certain extent.

The most important thing is to just enjoy it, I got into it because I loved the modeling and painting. My interest in History was just a side note and an extra that I decided to pursue for myself. Doubtless if I posted on a scale model forum they would bash my stuff too! But for me it's about having fun, learning something cool, and enjoying all parts of the process, not about being a detail facist.

@ Deff - I'm going to Minsk in July to hand this over and present the T34/76 diorama. So just over a month to go till then. I will post updates to that blog once I've taken pictures of passing the gift on


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Umm as to the SS I'm not so sure. I don't model German stuff, but there are some good resources online.

I stumbled across a Historic modeling SS forum the other day by chance but didnt bookmark it. I will try to find it again for you.

Thanks I am really intrested in historical modelling thinking of buying a few kits from a company called "Dragon" I like their WW2 german stuff,not sure what quality it is but would like to try it.

Deff go for the Dragon kits for sure. Dragon is a very well known company and they produce some excellent quality kits for good value as well.

Dragon kits are used often by professional scale modelers and experts.

Ok cool,I love WW2 German stuff and over here the kits are much cheaper than any GW make so I will be sure to try it out.One quick question,how is painting those photo etched parts different to plastic?(by this I mean do you prepare it in a special way,must it still get a basecoat and such)

Exactly the same as painting plastic or white metal.

Just undercoat it the same time with a spray and you can paint over it with anything. Acrylic, inks, Foundation paint, oils, turpentine, or thinners.

Ok thanks,hope everything goes well and you get the diorama finished soon.

This looks so good, i may have to give it a go when i have a minute then.
Actually, in light of that reply post, many hours!!lol.
I know what you mean about finding the right parts that look good and are historically accurate.

Well, anyway I can't wait to see it finished and a big double thumbs up!!

This is great stuff the scenics are looking good. Can't wait to see more of the figures. How big is the base by the way because I'm interested to know how your planning to fit buildings, a heavy tank, a machine gun nest, a staff car and a trench line all on one base?

Thanks for the comments guys.

Llama, dont worry it will all fit, the base is actually rather big compared to the scale of the figures (Base is 12 inches by 11 inches). Also if you place things right you'd be suprised how much you can fit in.

Heres some work on the Scratch built Farm house:



Based on this reference picture:



Some work on the other tankers, preparing the tank helmets, I plan to build these up and flesh them out some more tomorrow.

Whats that farmhouse made of?

Oh and maybe it is just my pc but the reference shot is not working.

Thanks Deff, I've fixed the image of the reference picture now.

The farm house is being made out of match sticks. The extra long kind of cooking matches. They are thicker than normal matches and give a good length to work with. For the planks over the top of the wall this are match sticks cut in half to make thinner peices for external detail.

It won't be an entire Farm house but just a section cut at an angle near the edge of the board.

Finally had time to get an update up.

I've been working on quite a lot of the diorama recently. The figures and GAZ 67B Staff Car are primed and undercoated and ready for painting.
I've also been working on painting the terrain and adding to the scenery.

Following a really helpful point from a poster at Warseer I decided to change my machine gun nest. As the person rightly pointed out even though the dug out is shallower than the river bed, the water table would mean that the bottom of the machine gun nest would get very wet and have some standing water at the bottom. To remedy this I sealed the bottom of the dug out and put down some wood planks to help solidify the ground for the soldiers and soak up surface water (to a certain extent).





Not only did this allow me to deal with a logical and natural problem, but also let me add more detail and work to the machine gun nest to make it look a little more interesting.

Work on the scratch built farm house progressed steadily:











The scenic base:









I also tried various approaches to the weld seams on the front hull. I tried different kinds of epoxy putty, procreate and milliput but just wasnt happy with the result at 1:48 scale. It just didnt look as good as it does at the larger 1:35, so I decided in the end to just use the glue method, to apply an even bead of glue and let it settle and melt the plastic before making the weld marks with a scalpel blade.

In the end I decided that this gave the most subtle look and was the least invasive at 1:48.

Looking good.

One question(sorry if you mentioned this already),is the river bed going to be left empty?

And if not how are you going to make realistic looking water?

Deff Dread red Edition wrote:Looking good.

One question(sorry if you mentioned this already),is the river bed going to be left empty?

And if not how are you going to make realistic looking water?

Hi Deff, the river bed is going to have water in it. I'll be using Crystal Resin to represent the water flow, it's fantastic stuff is completely transparent and sets hard. The only thing is that you have to add it at the very final stage once the ground work is done and all the painting finished, so there wont be any fishing in that stream for awhile!

I see hope to see it more soon,one more question.I see machine guns in the machine gun turret(the smaller ones I mean)so my question is more historical.What was Russia's standard troop issue weapon.

If I'm not wrong it was the Mosin Nagant, then later the semi-automatic SVT-40? It didn't catch on during WW2, much like the G43 the Wehrmacht produced, came in too late for any measurable effect. The submachine gun was memorably the PPSH.

Mosin:



SVT-40:



PPSH:



sA

Thanks sA,bit of a history buff are we?

Tada!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SVT-40

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosin-Nagant

Those were the standard issue rifles of the Soviet forces by the time the War came to them.

Edit: Someone hit enter faster than I... Though as a note the SVT-40 didn't come too late during the War, it was mostly production, cost and supply issues that kept it from fully replacing the Mosin-Nagant during the course of the War. It also had somewhat of a negative reputation early on which was carried over from issues with an earlier version, the SVT-38. These issues were fixed, but much like the M-16 in Vietnam they lingered and created negative opinions at times.

I like to think so.

I'm a bit better at heavy artillery than small arms, though.

sA

smiling Assassin wrote: I like to think so.

I'm a bit better at heavy artillery than small arms, though.

sA

General Eastern fron nut here. Not amazing in my knowledge but I can help out every now and then.

And you were bang on on the Small-arms sA

Some interesting discussion here, and good points from Smiling Assassin and Neconilis.

It's also stated that Steel helmets were unpopular with Russian troops who saw them as a sign of cowardice. I've seen it argued that they preferred the soft peak cap, although I'm not sure how widely practiced this was. I would expect that lack of steel helmets would be down to supply issues, as red army troops often had a diverse and eclectic range of equipment that was heavily affected by lack of supplies and resources.

Don't forget the Maxim heavy MG, that was also very popular, as was the Degtyarev Pekhotniy light machine gun

Thanks for the replies,sorry if it is a little stupid of me I have never been one for researching the 2 great wars.(I don't mean great as in cool or good but in scale)I however as I am getting older find myself more "into" researching such things,but a bit more on the German side of things.

No worries Deff, let us know if you ever have any questions.

One of the things that really made these projects fun for me was the research actually, one of the extra bonuses of military modelling!

If you are interested in the Wehrmacht there are plenty of great reference books by Osprey. From History of campaigns and engagements,, down to individual generals, and equipment.

I'll keep an eye out for them.

So how is the project coming along.

Just a stunning amount of skill, creativity and detail. Excellent work!

@ Deff, I'm hoping to get base colours on the Staff Car and figures over the next few days, which will be really nice and give me a chance to get some actual models painted and on track. I've also finished the tank now and will prime and undercoat that this evening. I'm hoping now that the main part of the build is done that the other stages will shoot along quite quickly and that shortly you guys will all be able to see something that resembles an actual scene!

The only outstanding building stuff really are the tankers helmets on the remaining two crew men. I've done the base and the armature and need to bulk them out and finish them off with green stuff. The three Tankers are the only crew I haven't undercoated yet.

@ Inyoka - Thanks alot, I'm hoping that over the next few days progress will be quite quick and there will be alot more for you guys to see

Sounds good,I can't wait to see the officers painted uo.They really are very detailed minis and will look even more excellent with a good coat of paint.