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----------------------------Grave Doubt--------------------------------
‘The Grim Reaper speaks out about hand grenades and horseshoes’
Dioramas give the modeler a chance to put their build in an interesting format that will invite the viewer to stop and look, much like a painting. ‘How to build Dioramas’ by Shep Payne was my first real stretch to build a better model. Its still available and should be in every modeler’s reference library. The well known aviation artist Jim Dietz says, ‘... the process of creating a realistic painting is like describing how a magic trick is done. Once the process is understood the viewer is apt to say,”Oh is that all there is to it?”... “They are to fulfill my own desires.” Someone once said that ‘...aircraft dioramas are limited to maintenance or standing. The dioramas that have worked well for me are; in flight, taxi, factory assembly, field assembly , type test, acceptance tests, crashes & salvage. Of these there are usually the two types of dioramas that can have great impacts but are easily spoiled in their manifestation. Here I would like to discuss crashes and salvage dioramas. These deal with the delicate subject that is at the focal point of war. There are two things that can kill a diorama’s chance to compete successfully. Too much blood and too little planning. When recreating a crash scene ask yourself, ‘...what is my purpose for doing this?’ Monster figures with distorted and twisted features are one thing as I’ll discuss later. Recreating the morbid death of a realistic historic figure is another thing altogether. Sympathy for your subject matter is engendered by most people and their own experiences with death. If your treatment of the subject is perceived to be ham-fisted, clumsy or insensitive, your work will be unacceptable to most viewers including contest judges.
Here is what does not work;
1. I remember a fantasy diorama done with skeletons, dragons and warriors from small scale metal figures. While intriguing and the multiple heads that were lopped off simulating blood oozing from their open wounds was colourful, it detracted from the overall idea. With wounded figures a little goes a long way. Why would skeletons bleed anyway?
2. I have also seen a WWI trench scene with portions of a cadaver sticking out of the ground. While very realistic judges past it by because the artistic appeal was nullified on the idea that a modeler would attempt to recreate a rotting human corpse.
3. There was a Napoleonic vignette where the soldiers were freezing to death and eating the carcass of a horse. Fortunately the pink snow covered up most of the horse. It did not win anything but distain...
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