Hi guys.
Here is my entry into the 2016 build challenge.
It is half of a diorama I am working on for a demonstration at our Pioneer train show next month. I wanted to show how I went about finding inspiration from prototypes and manipulated and spliced these inspirations into a design for my model railroad - Tellynott. 'Tin shed and friends' is a block of four different New Zealand prototype structures spliced together to make a pleasing group of shops on a sloping street. This group of shops will be balanced by a larger industry nearby, and part of the same diorama.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
I like it when structures are built up a grade. I'll be following along.
Jaime
Narrow Gauge Convention photos (http://www.narrowperspective.com)
(https://modelersforum.com/gallery/24-150916090021.jpeg) (http://modelersforum.com/gallery/24-150916090021.jpeg)
Looks great Mark.....I'll be watching. :)
Pegi asked me to ask you to bring some cases of Kim Crawford Sauvignon Blanc from Marboro to the next expo for her. ;D
All these build threads, feels like Christmas ;D
Hi guys.
Good to have you along for the ride! Thanks for your comments Jamie, Gregory, Tom and Janbouli, they are much appreciated. Gregory - I'll see what i can do - but there might be a bit of a wait!
OK - so below are four photos of scans from various books and magazines.
Photo one shows the tin shed at Okains bay on banks peninsular. I have flipped this structure horizontally and placed it on the steepest part of the street. It will be clad in Campbell's corrugated iron.
Photo 2 shows a small block of shops on a steep street in Dunedin. It is still there and looks just the same as when this photo was taken. The small structure in the center will be the structure to the right of the tin shed.
Photo three shows an early movie house. This structure is spliced with the structure to the left in photo 4. I wanted a tower of sorts, and this little top notch is perfect.
Photo four also shows a small structure to the right of the structure with the tower, and this will be the last building in my block of shops.
The back side of my 'tin shed and friends' will be based on the back view of photo four, with horizontal flipping, positional juggling and various other manipulations employed as necessary.
Dimensions were calculated using a standard door size. Adjustments can be made at the next stage if required. I'll draw up a 1:87 scale drawing and place appropriate Tichy Train Group and Grandt Line doors and windows and see how things look.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
Well I have decided to include a little of the other half of the diorama in this thread to help put things in perspective, and to share some other techniques that come up when working as I often do from old photos.
First up below is a sketch of my larger structure which will balance my block of shops. I'm not yet fully happy with my design, and am considering steepening the roof pitch and adding a tower at the front as in ...
... the second photo.
The third photo shows the main inspiration with the nice unusual angle. Several other prototype pictures have been used for the other downhill additions.
So - for the techniques.
Basically I was trying to find somewhere near the correct dimensions for the second photo. In this particular photo there was very little to go by. So in the end I sat a box of Tichy 6/6 windows in front of me and compared their height with the men in the photo. I measured the height of the Tichy window and converted that to prototype feet and inches. I gathered that the men in this photo would typically be around 5' 8" in height and tried various windows until I found one that scaled off in the photo to somewhere near this measurement. The window looked to have the same proportions as the ones in the photo, so that gave me something to scale the lengths to. I then drew diagonal lines from the top right on the side of the structure to the bottom left and from the bottom right to the top left. Where they cross is the half way point. I then drew a vertical line at this half way point and continued in this manner, splitting the half into quarters, the quarters into eights, and the eights into sixteenths. If you enlarge the photo and look closely you should hopefully be able to see this. At the point of 16ths I had one vertical line very close to the left of one of the windows, and one vertical line close to the right. I then put a ruler horizontally on the photo and measured the distance between the two lines, and the width of the window.
The Tichy window was 11mm in width.
The window in the photo was 7mm in width
7x=11
x=11/7
x=1.57
The width of the 16th of the side of the building at the same place was 9.5mm
9.5 by 1.57 = 14.92mm
That's close enough to 15mm for me!
15 by 16 = 240mm
And for you imperial people 240/25.4 = 9.45"
So the length of the side of the structure (not including the tower) is 240mm or just under 9 1/2 inches.
The height of the structure can be worked out the same way.
In this manner you can work your way around the photo finding the required measurements, and they should be in proportion and fairly close to the prototype.
I know for many of you (especially the scratch-builders) this will be old hat, but I thought it was a simple technique to share - an it is my impression that, apart from getting everybody motivated, this was the point of this build challenge.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
I look forward to this scene developing, your models always look as if they grew out of the local topography.
Mark
This sounds like a great project. I will be following along.
Quote from: S&S RR on September 16, 2016, 07:44:51 AM
Mark
This sounds like a great project. I will be following along.
Me too, looking forward to how it goes.
Tom ;D
Hi guys.
Its great to have you along for the ride Barry, John and Tom!
I must say, it is most excellent to have this many build threads going along at once! I'd like to add that personally I like it better if everybody has their own thread. It means you can follow and comment on those you are most interested in without feeling guilty about not commenting on everyone's work, and basically just not get overwhelmed. Sometimes you get busy for a week and when you get back to the modelling there are pages and pages of posts, and the thought of trying to catch up on everyone's work can just be too much - and so you stop.
So - I did a little more searching for prototype pictures and found a few with some interesting shapes and additions I can see working with my larger structure. Hopefully I will find time this evening to record my new ideas with a few sketches.
While they were fresh in my head a drew up a 1:100 scale plan of the two complexes and cut them out. I then drew up three circles - 3'4", 3' and 2'8" in diameter, in 1:100. I placed the cutouts of the two complexes in the circles and moved them around trying various positions. This is a technique I use often to help me visualize the finished product with very little effort. The next stage is making mock-ups, which is much more time consuming. In this way you can check your ideas work with minimal effort and make alterations if needed before committing to the next stage.
The picture below shows the cutouts in the circles. 2'8" may be big enough, but I think 3'4" is bigger than I require.
For the train show the weekend after next I have been asked to sit at a table and do some modelling. My thought was to try and show people how I work from prototype inspiration through to a diorama (or chunk of my layout). I will have a notice board behind me with various inspirational pictures and some of my own working sketches, and then build up the landscape out of polystyrene pre-cut blocks on the round base I will have on the table into roads, railway, building sites and landscape, and then place scale mock-ups on the building sites. I should be able to put things together (if I label everything well) in five or so minutes, then take it to pieces and build it up again for the next group of people. After the show I will start on the building of the block of shops.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
I managed to find a bit of time over the weekend to get a bit more work done on the diorama. After a bit of playing around and thinking about the setup at the train show next weekend I decided that a rectangle will be best suited for the diorama base. The theme of the show this year is 'getting started' so a rectangle shows how one can work on a smaller area at their workbench and then insert it into their model railroad when finished. It will also fit much better on the display desk.
I drew up a couple more 1:100 plans, moving my small cutouts of the structures around and drawing in roads and track and shoreline until I found something I liked. I then cut out a polystyrene base 780mm by 560mm (30.7" by 22") - the top of which will be the water - and a second piece of 50mm (2") polystyrene to raise the land above the water level. I then drew full sized floor plans of the two structures (in HO scale). After some more looking at some of my photos I found a lovely structure I had photographed in Timaru with a 'rats hole' going through the structure and some lovely angles. I decided to tag elements of this to the large complex. I found some peco set-track and cut to the desired lengths to fit my plan. I then considered the various heights of the floors and cut up polystyrene roads. I cut the road to the desired width and then work out the desired slope. I mark and cut the roading into wedges, and then cut these wedges into 50mm (2") pieces. With the track pinned in place and the building footprint cutouts in position I then placed the roading pieces in position until I was happy with the overall look. I marked the roading on the top piece of 50mm polystyrene and cut out the shape of the roading with a jig saw. Likewise I marked the wharf/ water line at the back of the large complex and cut this out as well. It was then out with my trusty expandable foam gun. I used nails to pin down the main sections of 50mm poly and the first road section. I then foamed the side of each piece of roading and pressed up aginst the last piece - working from left to right. The foam expands and fills the gaps and glues together the pieces of foam far better than glue (it is also brilliant for attaching plaster castings) and cuts just like the polystyrene if changes needed to be made at a latter stage (where as many glues dry very hard). The only thing is you need to be vigilant with the cleaning of the gun between EVERY use. I marked and cut the polystyrene in front of the roading to form a shoreline and then shaped the land, splicing a second piece of poly of top to add additional height. I created a slight directional ridge which I emulated with a larger landform in the back left corned - to try to help make it look as though the land was there first and the site for the track and structures was cut into the landform.
Below are three pictures of the diorama so far.
Next up is making the mock-up structures.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
My way to read forums is to click and open all the new links, then move from tab to tab in my browser.
When I got to this one and saw the drawing at the top, I knew without looking this was another build by our master of the slopes, Mark Dalrymple!
dave
Quote from: deemery on September 25, 2016, 09:58:24 AM
My way to read forums is to click and open all the new links, then move from tab to tab in my browser.
When I got to this one and saw the drawing at the top, I knew without looking this was another build by our master of the slopes, Mark Dalrymple!
dave
Dave
I second that title for Mark - "Master of the Slopes". I watch his build threads with great interest - I have many towns to build on the slopes of the Superior & Seattle and will be watching with great interest.
Not many slopes for structures in the Florida Flat Lands but I follow his builds with the same if not more interest than others.
Mark is certainly more on the upper slope of craftsmanship than most.
Interesting to see how he pulls everything together.
Tom ;D
Hi Mark:
You have some interesting structure there. I especially like the one the the small room on top of the porch. Very interesting touch. Also so like the J. Modfat & Son Building. I'll be following along.
Karl
Thanks for your comments Karl, John, Tom and Dave!
Karl - I found a book in the library a while ago about early movie houses in NZ. There were some very interesting looking structures in there.
Well, its Saturday morning here in NZ and I'm off to the Pioneer train show. It is the 25th anniversary of our show here in Christchurch and the theme this year is 'getting started'. I'm hoping to show that to build a complex diorama is just a matter of a few small steps and that there is no magic involved. I have made all the mock-ups and assembled a pin board of pictures to display. Just getting it all together to take down and set up now. I'll take some photos while I'm down there and update later today.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
Yesterday went very well at the train show. It was almost a constant stream of people and I think I sold several expandable foam guns! I placed the notice board with all the pictures in front of the desk and the diorama on top with a small finished model to the side and a few scratch-building supplies next to it. I pinned my 1:100 scale drawing with the two tiny building floor plans on the front of the diorama and had the two full sized site plans at the back of the desk. I was then able to talk people through the inspiration and sketches on the notice board, the experimentation with the 1:100 plan, the experimentation of the full sized floor plans, creating the terrain and the roads and building the mock-ups. I finished with a quick description of the scratch-building supplies I used to create the finished product. In my down time I worked out which windows I would use on the structures and drew in their positions with black marker. As you can see - there wasn't a lot of downtime!
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi Mark.
Wow! That's a really interesting project!
I'll be following along. ;)
Hi guys.
Thanks Pol.lux - great to have you following along.
Well - it was around to my friends house for Tuesday modelling night last night. I had a sheet of matt board to take around and cut out for my tin shed, but when I got there the matt board wasn't! I was given some very thick but good quality card and I use this to make the shell for the corrugated iron cladding. Cutting the windows and doors out was quite a challenge! All the doors and windows fit snugly. Next I will be applying the corrugated iron cladding.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Great start, I'm like the way you are going about doing this build. Buildings on a hill isn't modeled very often.
Rodney
Hi guys.
Thanks Rodney - I don't think I model anything that isn't on a hill! - or a curve for that matter!
Well we had an early finish at work today - so I got a little more done.
Photo 1 - shows the card shell covered in double sided tape. Before I put this on I work out where I want the joins of the corrugated iron to go and mark the top edge around the walls with a pencil - giving me something to help keep things in line when I peel the double sided tape backing off.
Photo's 2 and 3 - show a little progress on the corrugated iron instillation. I like to go to the extra effort of giving the effect of lead headed nails. Unlike nails in weatherboards, lead headed nails are quite visible. I'm a little confused about why they are so seldom modeled??? I cut the corrugated iron to the desired lengths (usually based around three foot centers for the nail rows) and then cut the sheet in half to make it easier to work on. I tape two pieces of tape at each end of the halved corrugated iron strips and mark where I want the nail rows - typically 1 mm from the bottom, and 10.5 mm centers. I don't put the top row in unless necessary, as the sheet above will lap this. I use a compass and a ruler to gently depress indentations into every second trough of the iron. When I get the next sheet ready I place it at a slightly different height on the cutting board so that when the nail rows are lined up on the structure the pieces of iron will be slightly different lengths (I mix the two different lengths up randomly). I then score and snap (by wiggling back and forth a few times) individual pieces of iron at scale 3' widths (10.5 mm). When these pieces are flipped the depressions look like lead headed nails. You have to be careful not to push too hard and pierce the iron. I peel off the double sided tape backing from the bottom of the structure up, only where and as I need it. I measure and cut around the openings as I get to them and use a steel rule and a one sided razor blade to bend 90 degree bends for the corners. Always work from the bottom up (as you need the top pieces to lap over the bottom pieces to keep the weather out). You also need to consider this at wall roof junctions, and valleys in the roof - its no use putting the valley on top of the roof planes, or all your LBP's will get very wet next time it rains in your model world!
I'll put in a picture of the tape on the cutting board, markings, iron etc in the next post.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
Thanks for following along.
Firstly is a couple of photos as promised showing how I set up to put lead headed nail impressions in my corrugated iron. I've explained the process in my last post, but the photos should help clarify things.
Next we have three photos showing the process of putting things on in the correct order (to make sure the LBP don't get rain running into their structures when it rains in model land). You can see I put the lower roof card in place with double sided tape on the top. Once this was glued to the structure I peeled the backing off the double sided tape and attached the sheets of iron. I made sure the iron was a little proud both at the ends and the sides, and varied the lengths slightly. I then smoothed out a piece of aluminum foil and attached a piece of double sided tape to it. I trimmed this to the desired width and length, peeled the backing off and carefully attached this to the top of the corrugated iron sheets, creasing it up onto the wall junction. I use a small metal rule to help position as I go. I then used a compass to depress the aluminum foil into the undulations of the corrugated iron. Another piece of double sided tape was then attached to the small side wall above the lower roof, going over the aluminum foil 'flashing' where it is turned up onto the wall. I then cut and attached small pieces of corrugated iron to this small wall, folding the end ones around the corner a short distance. The top roof template was then cut, covered in double sided tape, and glued in place. I made sure there was a piece of double sided tape going over the ridge, and before attaching the roof template I peeled half of the ridge piece of tape backing off, cut the backing along the ridge line with scissors, and then reattached the backing. I did the same from the other end. This meant to roof template would fold nicely, but the double sided tape spans across the ridge line making the installation of the ridge capping easier.
The last photo shows a side view of the back wall of the tin shed. You can see how the lead headed nails all line up, but yet the sheets are slightly differing lengths.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
Well, I have finished the iron on the tin shed.
I attached the iron to the main roof area, leaving it down just a touch from the ridge. I changed the purlin spacing slightly to keep the lead headed nail rows fairly even. I then cut a piece of aluminium foil stuck to double sided tape 5mm wide and a piece of plastic rod the same length as the ridge line. I carefully started peeling the tape backing off the foil and taped the foil, sticky side up, with a piece of painters tape at each end. I carefully laid the rod down the centre of the foil. I cut the ends of the foil a little longer than the ridge to allow enough to fold down over the ends of the rod and cut out the corners. I melded the foil evenly over the rod using a finger and thumb, and carefully laid the rod down the centre of the ridge-line, starting at one end and working my way along. I then used my finger nail to meld the foil further over the rod on each side, and then my clutch pencil (with the lead in) to meld the foil into the iron undulations. Finally I folded the foil over the ends of the rod. A little fiddly but a good representation of a lead ridge capping.
Photo 1 shows the iron installed.
Photo 2 shows the ridge capping on.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Mark,
Great build and excellent tutorial on the siding. It looks fantastic. I'm enjoying this thread very much.
Tom ;D
Hi guys.
Thanks for your comment, Tom. I hope to get a lot more modelling done in the coming months.
Things got very hectic coming to the end of last year and I had almost no time for model building. Hopefully things will be different this year (although that might be wishful thinking).
Below are two pictures of the movie house coming together. Walls are Floquil CN grey #17, trim is harbor mist grey and the roof will be Pullman green.
I'm hoping to get these four structures done before the end of the month.
More very soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
Well there is lots of gardening to do and jobs around the house - but I am managing to get a bit of modelling done every day over the holidays. And what a nice surprise - it has just started raining hard! No more gardening today!
I moved sideways to assembling the two story 'Dunedin' structure with the steep pitched gable roof and flat roof to the left. Colouring is Floquil SP lettering grey for the siding and roof brown for the trim. The cladding is shiplap which is typically blind nailed - but I love my nail holes! With this material it is important to brace horizontally due to the way they machine the wood in relation to its grain. With clapboard it is most important to brace vertically. I've shown my bracing on the gable walls as well as a shot showing the bracing for the card roof. I braced up and down the rake of the gables and across the top of the flat roof area, and then installed ridge bracing and bracing near the side walls. This allows for a fairly sturdy roof on a small structure and also means I can glue the card roof well without worrying about unwanted ooze. The walls were weathered in my usual fashion. I quick wash of Floquil grime followed by dabs of dirty paint thinners (my brush cleaning jar) smeared in with a paper towel, and then a quick wash of A&I. You need to dip the brush right to the bottom of the dirty paint thinners jar to get some nice brown sludgy paint on the brush and just not wash off the grime with thinners. I then jerkily paint down the shiplap joins (or along under the clapboard laps) with a fine brush before dry inside out gym socking the walls with paint. This is to give a peeling paint look, but to put paint on where nature takes the longest time to remove it - under the laps of the clapboards or in the joins of the shiplap. Its then nail holes and another quick wash of A&I.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Mark
The build is coming along great - the siding looks fantastic. I also love the models of the model - it really helps develop the scene and we can see where your heading. Excellent thread my friend.
Hi guys.
Thanks John - much appreciated. Yep those models of a model help a lot.
I did the main part of this roof with Campbell shingles. I made up my roof out of black card, cut it to size, and scribed the fold lines for the ridge and valley. I drew horizontal lines to help keep the shingles straight and glued the card to the structure. I covered the card in double sided tape and cut lots of strips of shingles a little longer than the roof. I positioned the first row of shingles at the bottom of the roof, pressing into position every inch or so to help keep straight. I then ran a thin bead of canopy glue along the top of the first row of shingles and attached the second row. In this manner the top of each row of shingles is glued by the double sided tape, while the bottom is glued to the row below by canopy glue. The last row of shingles below the ridge I cut down in width so the ridge capping will finish where the top row of shingles start. Photos below show the roofing coming together.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
Hi guys.
A bit more progress.
The Campbell shingles have been finished and painted. I used Troels Kirk's method to paint the shingles. Troel's technique is to paint the shingle roof a dark brownish black, and when dry do a serious of dry brushes - tans, light browns, paynes grey and white mixes, and a little black soot to reverse if needed. Finally add bird droppings and enhance the edges with flesh or light tans.
I added fly rafters to the front and rear of the structure and some rafter tails to the side. I'll have a think about what this little structure could be and then add some details. I'm thinking of having the block of shops being closely related to the larger structure in this diorama, so knowing what that is is somewhat important.
Below are some photos of my progress.
More soon, cheers, Mark.
NICE!!!!
Hi guys.
Thanks Donato!
Well I assembled the walls for the small shop between the tin shed and the movie house. The side walls will be hard up against the other two structures so I just used matt board for those. The walls are Floquil big sky blue and the trim is reefer white.
Cheers, Mark.
Mark,
This is a fantastic build thread. I've enjoyed following along and seeing the thought process behind it all. Well done, very well done.
Tom ;D