As I mentioned before, I have been working on a Diorama for a while to illustrate one day in September 1940 during the battle of Britain.
The day is September 10th 1940. The location is RAF Gravesend in Kent, a satellite airfield of Biggin Hill. This has been the home of 501 Squadron, equipped with Hurricane Mk 1s since 25th July. They are now being rotated to RAF Kenley in Surrey where they will remain until December. Arriving a the airfield to replace them is 66 Squadron, one of the first squadrons to have been equipped with Spitfires back in 1938. They have been at RAF Kenley for only 8 days having been based at Coltishall befroe that. So on this one day, Spitfires and Hurricanes shared an airfield...
So here we have Spitfire R6800 flown by 66 Sqn's CO, Sqn Ldr Rupert "Lucky" Leigh and Hurricane P3059 flown by Group Captain Byron Duckenfield.
So first the picture that inspired me:
[ATTACH]27460.vB[/ATTACH]
This comes from the Osprey "Spitfire MkI/II SAces 1939-41" book.
Next the planes:
[ATTACH]27467.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27469.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27471.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27468.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27470.vB[/ATTACH]
What you can see in the background are the other items I was originally goign to place in the scene and this is where my interest in Tillys came from! However as we know, Austin Tillys were never used by the RAF so I had to abandon that idea and sourced a Standard Tilly from Accurate Armour and you've seen the results.
The Spitfie is a Tamiya Mk 1 with Eduard seat belts but otherwise out of the box. The Hurricane is a Hasegawa one bought very expensively from evilBay since its quite rate and with the Eduard PE cockpit set. In the above photos, the Hurricane hadn't had it weathering added and the spit needed some more matt varnish.
So to add to the diorama I got the ICM figure set as you see above and I also acquired the Eduard RAF WWII Personnel set and the RAF Fighter Crew 1940 set, which have some, shall we say, unusual poses!
The ICM set has a nice set of tools as well. I did also source the Aber Hand Tools PE set but when it arrived I took one look and how minute it is and left it to one side! There is NO way I'm goign to be able to assemble that set. I took a photo...
[ATTACH]27473.vB[/ATTACH]
See what I mean?
So I built and painted some of the figures and tools and put them on my shelf while I proceeded to get distracted building a 1:35 Tilly and diorama.
[ATTACH]27465.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27464.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27463.vB[/ATTACH]
So far all the figires are from the ICM set apart from the chap poiring oil over the Hurricane's wing who is from the Eduard Personnel box.
So finally I completed the Standard Tilly (photos here) and had found a suitable base board for the diorama (another cheapo picture frame from Wilkinson) so decided to have a bash and getting the grounds started.
First step was to prepare the base and I forgot to take any photos of this step, but it was essentially several layers of lightweight Hydrocal, with the last layer thinned down give it coverage up to the edges of the frame. I then added some claycrete to represent a small bomb crater and a filled in crater. I did these on Sunday so by today it was all dry. I added some artist acrylic paint to the latter stages of the Hydrocal which gave it a more earthy colour.
Now knowing the land around Gravesend as well as I do having grown up there, its a clay-based soil over chalk, so I kept the colours more orchre than brown as that is the soil that tends to show up. Where I lived we were surrounded by chalk quarries so you got to know what the topsoil looked like and since I'm also interested in Geology (part for my degree contained some Geophysics and Geology) I wanted to get things looking right.
So once its all dry, I gave the crater a dark wash with darkened raw umber paint, then built up layers of colour, lightening until the highlights were "damp" brushed with white artists acrylic. I call it damp brushing as the brush technique was the same as used for dry brushing but the brush had more paint on it that usual fro dry brushing
Then this evening I proceeded to build the grass ground cover. Since there is such a large expanse, this had to be done carefully to get some nice variation in texture and colour since a field of grass isn't uniform. The result is below...
[ATTACH]27466.vB[/ATTACH]
This still needs some tidying up as the border is quite scrappy and the transition from the grass to the bomb crater needs more attention. That said I'm pleased with the result. I've added small stones and earth texture into the bomb crater plus left s few elements of claycrete a lighter colour to represent fragments of chalk and flint that you regularly find in this soil.
The grass is comprised of 3 main textures overlaid and mixed. The darkest is Woodland Scenics fine turf, then there are two varieties of static grass, summer grass and meadow grass that are used in different mixtures in different places.
Finally I couldn't resist a trial placement of the models so far
[ATTACH]27472.vB[/ATTACH]
I still want to add more figures - we have no pilots for instance, plus some more tools, wheel chocks and most importantly a starter accumulator which I think I'm going to have to scratch build as there don't appear to be any Revell starter until kits available anymore. I've got some fuel drums as well but I'm not sure how appropriate they'd be in an airfield setting. I would have expected there to have been a refuelling truck available. Maybe later when I'm feeling more solvent I might invest in one of the Accurate Armour refuelling trucks
Anyway progress is progressing...
[ATTACH]33306.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33309.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33310.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33311.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33312.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33313.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33314.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33315.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33316.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33317.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33318.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33319.IPB[/ATTACH]
The day is September 10th 1940. The location is RAF Gravesend in Kent, a satellite airfield of Biggin Hill. This has been the home of 501 Squadron, equipped with Hurricane Mk 1s since 25th July. They are now being rotated to RAF Kenley in Surrey where they will remain until December. Arriving a the airfield to replace them is 66 Squadron, one of the first squadrons to have been equipped with Spitfires back in 1938. They have been at RAF Kenley for only 8 days having been based at Coltishall befroe that. So on this one day, Spitfires and Hurricanes shared an airfield...
So here we have Spitfire R6800 flown by 66 Sqn's CO, Sqn Ldr Rupert "Lucky" Leigh and Hurricane P3059 flown by Group Captain Byron Duckenfield.
So first the picture that inspired me:
[ATTACH]27460.vB[/ATTACH]
This comes from the Osprey "Spitfire MkI/II SAces 1939-41" book.
Next the planes:
[ATTACH]27467.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27469.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27471.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27468.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27470.vB[/ATTACH]
What you can see in the background are the other items I was originally goign to place in the scene and this is where my interest in Tillys came from! However as we know, Austin Tillys were never used by the RAF so I had to abandon that idea and sourced a Standard Tilly from Accurate Armour and you've seen the results.
The Spitfie is a Tamiya Mk 1 with Eduard seat belts but otherwise out of the box. The Hurricane is a Hasegawa one bought very expensively from evilBay since its quite rate and with the Eduard PE cockpit set. In the above photos, the Hurricane hadn't had it weathering added and the spit needed some more matt varnish.
So to add to the diorama I got the ICM figure set as you see above and I also acquired the Eduard RAF WWII Personnel set and the RAF Fighter Crew 1940 set, which have some, shall we say, unusual poses!
The ICM set has a nice set of tools as well. I did also source the Aber Hand Tools PE set but when it arrived I took one look and how minute it is and left it to one side! There is NO way I'm goign to be able to assemble that set. I took a photo...
[ATTACH]27473.vB[/ATTACH]
See what I mean?
So I built and painted some of the figures and tools and put them on my shelf while I proceeded to get distracted building a 1:35 Tilly and diorama.
[ATTACH]27465.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27464.vB[/ATTACH][ATTACH]27463.vB[/ATTACH]
So far all the figires are from the ICM set apart from the chap poiring oil over the Hurricane's wing who is from the Eduard Personnel box.
So finally I completed the Standard Tilly (photos here) and had found a suitable base board for the diorama (another cheapo picture frame from Wilkinson) so decided to have a bash and getting the grounds started.
First step was to prepare the base and I forgot to take any photos of this step, but it was essentially several layers of lightweight Hydrocal, with the last layer thinned down give it coverage up to the edges of the frame. I then added some claycrete to represent a small bomb crater and a filled in crater. I did these on Sunday so by today it was all dry. I added some artist acrylic paint to the latter stages of the Hydrocal which gave it a more earthy colour.
Now knowing the land around Gravesend as well as I do having grown up there, its a clay-based soil over chalk, so I kept the colours more orchre than brown as that is the soil that tends to show up. Where I lived we were surrounded by chalk quarries so you got to know what the topsoil looked like and since I'm also interested in Geology (part for my degree contained some Geophysics and Geology) I wanted to get things looking right.
So once its all dry, I gave the crater a dark wash with darkened raw umber paint, then built up layers of colour, lightening until the highlights were "damp" brushed with white artists acrylic. I call it damp brushing as the brush technique was the same as used for dry brushing but the brush had more paint on it that usual fro dry brushing
Then this evening I proceeded to build the grass ground cover. Since there is such a large expanse, this had to be done carefully to get some nice variation in texture and colour since a field of grass isn't uniform. The result is below...
[ATTACH]27466.vB[/ATTACH]
This still needs some tidying up as the border is quite scrappy and the transition from the grass to the bomb crater needs more attention. That said I'm pleased with the result. I've added small stones and earth texture into the bomb crater plus left s few elements of claycrete a lighter colour to represent fragments of chalk and flint that you regularly find in this soil.
The grass is comprised of 3 main textures overlaid and mixed. The darkest is Woodland Scenics fine turf, then there are two varieties of static grass, summer grass and meadow grass that are used in different mixtures in different places.
Finally I couldn't resist a trial placement of the models so far
[ATTACH]27472.vB[/ATTACH]
I still want to add more figures - we have no pilots for instance, plus some more tools, wheel chocks and most importantly a starter accumulator which I think I'm going to have to scratch build as there don't appear to be any Revell starter until kits available anymore. I've got some fuel drums as well but I'm not sure how appropriate they'd be in an airfield setting. I would have expected there to have been a refuelling truck available. Maybe later when I'm feeling more solvent I might invest in one of the Accurate Armour refuelling trucks
Anyway progress is progressing...
[ATTACH]33306.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33309.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33310.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33311.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33312.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33313.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33314.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33315.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33316.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33317.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33318.IPB[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH]33319.IPB[/ATTACH]
Comment