FLERS-COURCELETTE SEPT. 1916. A 1/72 mini Diorama....

[Guest]

Ron this is lookin good mate i do love the mud can't wait to see it finished. Are you off anywhere nice? Enjoy yourself wherever you go.

scott

[spanner570]

Thanks Scott, can you imagine the poor soldiers trying to stand up, let alone walk (as they were ordered to) in that mess? No wonder they were slaughtered!

Don't know where yet, but no 'Silver Bird' this time. The present Mrs. Ron has drawn a modest 50ml radius (for now) from our home in our camping book so she will use the time honoured method of a blind fold and pin and take it from there..Hopefully she will stick it in a pub car park! LOL

B.T.W. I am watching your latest build. Fascinating stuff mate.

Ron

[Guest]

picture this:- Me, my bouncy nurse and a can or two of Boddintons in a space capsule, on our own in ZERO GRAVITY!!

I really, desperately tried not to picture this but it is too late, I now have an image in my mind that, quite frankly, doesn't belong there.....

Great work on the dio Ron, once again you have put animation into the scene so even at this stage, it already has life and interest.

[spanner570]

I really, desperately tried not to picture this but it is too late, I now have an image in my mind that, quite frankly, doesn't belong there.....Great work on the dio Ron, once again you have put animation into the scene so even at this stage, it already has life and interest.

Thanks Graham, glad you like the progress.

More importantly, I hope I haven't upset your equaliibrium too much with visions of me floating around trying to catch the cans of ale....priorities old boy, priorities!

Ron

[Guest]

:laughing:

[Gern]

Ron, I'm disappointed in you! Do you honestly believe we think you're THAT careless?

Tut tut!

Gern

[spanner570]

I'm having a bit of a model storm at the minute until she has other plans!

Here finally, is my completed 1/72 WW1 diorama.

I have tried to capture how I think the battlefield would look a couple of days after the first line trench was taken. The trench has been well hammered, ammo boxes, bits of shoring liitter the place. What sand bags there were have been blown to bits....

The ground is still muddy but the mud on the stranded tank has dried.

This, the very first tank attack was a complete fiasco due to the poor conditions, half broke down, others stuck in the mud and only a very few actually reached the trenches! The element of surprise was gone and the Germans soon learned how vunerable these Mk 1 male machines were and just let them go past at 2mls/hr. then either climbed on top and threw a grenade inside or dropped one through the gun ports.

This gave rise to the 'female' version, which was armed with machine guns and were much harder to approach.

I hope you like my effort and all comments and suggestions are more than welcome.

Cheers,

Ron

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[Guest]

That, once again Ron, is five star class. Very nicely animated, superb composition and a very realistic view as to how it must have been. Top this off with cracking photography and you end up with perfection. Oh, nice model building to lol. Very nice Ron, really very nice.

[Centurion3RTR]

As Graham said "five star class", love the low angle of the photos Ron. Top work.

Have fun, John

[Guest]

Very nice. I like the little details, for example the left side door hanging open over the flooded shell crater. That's possibly the worst place I could imagine having to bail out of a tank, seeing as there's no guarantee you could even climb out (and thats assuming you didn't drown). It really emphasises the vulnerability of the vehicles.

I was going to suggest some fallen soldiers in and around the trenches, but looking at it now, I think the tank's isolation creates a nice sense of abandonment. The war has moved on, but the lumbing beast remains, fallen and forgotten. Nice work.

[spanner570]

Wa Ho! Five stars...

Thanks guys, that's great and makes me well chuffed that you both think it worthy of the big 5.

Greg, thanks to you too for your appraisal. I did think about including some cadavers but as I have made the model based on Zero Hour + 48, I decided the poor unfortunates would have been layed to rest by then. Apart from that I didn't fancy painting half a dozen or so figures made of that horrible soft plastic!!

Thanks again for all your comments boys.

Ron

[Gern]

Yet another cracker Ron.

Keep on like this and I'm gonna have to get the thesaurus out to find new alternatives for good, cracking, excellent, wonderful etc. etc.

It's either that or I'll have to start repeating myself - and nobody wants that! It's bad enough listening to my ramblings first time round!

Gern

[spanner570]

Thanks for the nice comments Dave.

Tell you what, you must have one big back garden to be able to keep a Thesaurus as a pet!

Where can I get one? Should I try the RSPCA first or are they on ebay?

Ron

[Guest]

Ron mate i've just caught up on this again and i am also giving you the big 5 as usual the dio is top quality and a lovely hint of realism especially with the photography, well done mate nice one.

scott