When Dios Go Pear Shaped.

RealSarahdactyl wrote:

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

You've certainly gotten the look and feel down pat.  I had been kicking around the idea myself of modifying Erika's Afrikakorps uniform to represent a gendarmerie uniform of some fictional Balkan Republic with an aesthetic resemblance to WWII Germany and create stories about a female war veteran returning from a disastrous war to find her home in ruins and being forced to take work as a border/guard or gendarme in a fairly lawless area.

I gave up on the idea of course...though I probably would have tried to do something if the Afrikakorps uniform were available in some of the other colors it was made in like Olive or Green-brown.  There are some of these on the 1/6th market, but they are for male figures and much too large for female figures.

What about rit dye? Like using a dye to great the colour you want? You suits are tan, a little like Yalenas Gorka. I'm going for green like the girl above.

You could totally do that idea! With a mish mash of old WW2 weapons and soviet stuff!

Home dyeing is never very permanent an I'd be terrified of ruining one of my expensive TBLeague figures by have the dye stain them. As to the mish-mash of WWII weapons and soviet stuff, that's exactly what I had in mind actually, along with things like German army style mess tins, which were adopted all over Europe (and japan) and in service from WWI to the present. Kimono Troop even has a few...they are great for cooking nikujaga....

I don't know if you're familiar with the Tintin comics by the Belgian cartoonist Hergé, but I certainly am because of my ancestry. Anyway, in his comics he created a couple of fictional Balkan countries with written language looking like Cyrillic but sounding more like a cross between German and Bruxellois, and the appearance of the troops and gendarmeries in the particular volumes featuring those countries is very much what I had in mind.

I was recently chatting with Colin/Londonroadhog. He was explaining washing the clothes to prevent staining on Phicens. I think the biggest issue would be if the fabric is synthetic it might be no good at retaining dye.

Yalena is on a Very Cool, and even if I get the long hair sculpt. I'll likely put it on its own body. So when I eventually dye a suit! I'll let you know if it staines the soft parts! That said, they're not the exact consistency of the phicen doll I have.

It reallt is a shame that Ultimate Soldier went bust. They made so many cool unique weapons that would have been perfect for your baddies.

Am I familiar with Tintin!?! I loved Tintin, our school had the books in the library growing up and as a kid it was the only thing my brother and I would get up early for!

I think I've got a picture in mind of what you're thinking! You know what could possibly work, is Soviet gear from female figures in some cases. That or finding stuff to flimmer built smaller male figures like Hasrbo Joes and taking in the seams.

https://www.gijoeelite.com/WWII-Soviet-Female-Sniper-Uniform-Set

This might be helpful!

The uniforms I really like are these from Battlegear Toys.

https://battlegeartoys.com/collections/german-wwii-uniforms/products/dak-tunic-2nd-model

I always soak new clothing in a solution or warm water, dish soap and vinegar and thoroughly rinse before putting them on the figures. The thing about home dye jobs is that they dyes are not fixed the way they are with professionally dyed fabrics and I don't trust the results very much. I think if I tried it, I would still put a barrier between the figure and clothing...a layer of plastic wrap most likely.

As for Tintin, there are a lot of gags and jokes, including in place names as well as some character names that you only understand if you understand Bruxellois a little, at least in the French language versions. I don't know about the English language ones. For example, the ruler of the fictional country of Khemed beard the name of Mohammed Ben Kalish Ezab. You have to know that "Kalish Zap" is Bruxellois for syrup, particularly the type used to make licorice.

Oh gosh! Battle Gear Toys! I got two rifles on there and a double barrel shotgun to use them as hunting rifles. That place is a goldmine of neat things.

See I know nothing about dyeing cloths so this is all useful information to me. But yeah, if the clothing can accommodate date that. Even a cotton underauit like longjohns would work.

Oh thats cool! See I never picked up on the subtle things like that, but I loved that show as a kid. Did you see the 2011 CGI film?

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

  For example, the ruler of the fictional country of Khemed beard the name of Mohammed Ben Kalish Ezab. You have to know that "Kalish Zap" is Bruxellois for syrup, particularly the type used to make licorice.  

Which has no doubt now been subsequently claimed to be "racist"....licorice being black of course.
I too was a huge Tintin fan, but found the later 2011 3D movie a little disappointing, with the enhanced motion-capture process rather spoiling the charming naivete of the original drawings.

Home dyeing is rarely successful, the dyes available being almost incapable of being "fixed" permanently. They will run, and bleed too.
However, in true contradictory form, they will never come out of anything they affect....like I imagine your Phicen's skin!
Remember Crepe Paper? Same thing. A drop of water and the colour would run, but just try and get that same colour out of anything it stained!

I'm a sucker for old school animation, you can't beat it no matter how polished CGI might be.

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

You might want to look at some of Julia Colibry's work on Flickr

I too am a great admirer of her very fine work. 
A small detail, but one that really contributes to the realism is her mastery of "tossed fabric" such as bedclothes etc. It's very difficult to get the loose folds to sit right and look realistic due to the out of scale thickness of the fabric, but just take another look and notice how well she accomplishes the task.
Work such as hers transcends 1/6 scale modelling and becomes a true art form.

That’s looking fabulous.

Okay...A lot to answer here.  Yes, I did see the 2011 film and while I did enjoy it somewhat, the film attempted needlessly to merge elements of four or five different books into a single story, plus things that occurred in none of the stories.  I came away thinking that while Spielberg gets some of the form of the Tintin stories, his understanding was very flawed and it could have been a much better film if he had just stuck to two books' Le Secret de La Licorne and Le Trésor de Rackham LeRouge, which are parts one and two of the same story.   In case you did not know this, the artist that sketches Tintin in the Brussels flea market at the beginning of that film is supposed to be Hergé himself.  Also, I have been to that very flea market.  

Hergé was accused of racism, anti-semitisim and even of being a Nazi sympathizer, though none of this stands up to close scrutiny.  To begin with, the last pre-war volume he published, (Le Sceptre d'Ottokar) is a thinly veiled condemnation of the Nazi Anschluss with Austria. While it would be totally accurate to say that he clearly had a Eurocentric view of the world and it's peoples, hid caricatures were not limited to Jews or Africans. The included Americans, Latin Americans, particularly Latin American revolutionaries and dictators, pre-war Japanese, Arabs, and Soviets.  His main recurring villain,  Rastapopoulos is an Italian American with a strangely Greek sounding surname. Moreover, he was a man of his generation and shared his generations prejudices. I do not say this is right...just that there were few Europeans of his generation that did not have similar prejudices.

Battlegear Toys.  Have used them a bit. There stuff is great, but they are quite expensive. As to 21st C toys stuff, a lot of it is available parted out on Zhukov's Attic.  https://zhukovsattic.com/  All of the stuff there is second or third hand. Prices are cheap, but beware, a lot of the weapons have things like broken sling swivels or sometimes a missing part.  This being said, their service is good and they ship quickly.


I also have the BG toys double-barrel.  

Blam, Blam by Gary  Menten, on Flickr


Heidi the Bounty Hunter by Gary Menten, on Flickr

RealSarahdactyl wrote:

https://www.gijoeelite.com/WWII-Soviet-Female-Sniper-Uniform-Set

This might be helpful!

yeah, I know that one. They appear regularly on Monkey Depot, but it's not the look I'm after.

LeStryge wrote:

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

You might want to look at some of Julia Colibry's work on Flickr

I too am a great admirer of her very fine work. 
A small detail, but one that really contributes to the realism is her mastery of "tossed fabric" such as bedclothes etc. It's very difficult to get the loose folds to sit right and look realistic due to the out of scale thickness of the fabric, but just take another look and notice how well she accomplishes the task.
Work such as hers transcends 1/6 scale modelling and becomes a true art form.

Julia's work is awesome.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, my late father actually met Hergé and photographed him in his home in 1974 as part of an assignment for the CBC. I was on that trip, but did not get to visit Hergé, though my father came back with a personally autographed album "Tintin au Congo," which he mistakenly thought was the only one I didn't have. The one I was missing was "Coke en Stock."

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

Okay...A lot to answer here.  Yes, I did see the 2011 film and while I did enjoy it somewhat, the film attempted needlessly to merge elements of four or five different books into a single story, plus things that occurred in none of the stories.  I came away thinking that while Spielberg gets some of the form of the Tintin stories, his understanding was very flawed and it could have been a much better film if he had just stuck to two books' Le Secret de La Licorne and Le Trésor de Rackham LeRouge, which are parts one and two of the same story.   In case you did not know this, the artist that sketches Tintin in the Brussels flea market at the beginning of that film is supposed to be Hergé himself.  Also, I have been to that very flea market.  

Hergé was accused of racism, anti-semitisim and even of being a Nazi sympathizer, though none of this stands up to close scrutiny.  To begin with, the last pre-war volume he published, (Le Sceptre d'Ottokar) is a thinly veiled condemnation of the Nazi Anschluss with Austria. While it would be totally accurate to say that he clearly had a Eurocentric view of the world and it's peoples, hid caricatures were not limited to Jews or Africans. The included Americans, Latin Americans, particularly Latin American revolutionaries and dictators, pre-war Japanese, Arabs, and Soviets.  His main recurring villain,  Rastapopoulos is an Italian American with a strangely Greek sounding surname. Moreover, he was a man of his generation and shared his generations prejudices. I do not say this is right...just that there were few Europeans of his generation that did not have similar prejudices.

Battlegear Toys.  Have used them a bit. There stuff is great, but they are quite expensive. As to 21st C toys stuff, a lot of it is available parted out on Zhukov's Attic.  https://zhukovsattic.com/  All of the stuff there is second or third hand. Prices are cheap, but beware, a lot of the weapons have things like broken sling swivels or sometimes a missing part.  This being said, their service is good and they ship quickly.


I also have the BG toys double-barrel.  

Blam, Blam by Gary  Menten, on Flickr


Heidi the Bounty Hunter by Gary  Menten, on Flickr

I know that name, forgive me though I read them in English. I vaguely remember the one that was two part story of two books.
I think lots of people cry racism about things from days gone by, I mean, I'm sure the Tintin books are no longer in the school library. The thing is, it may be perceived as racist now, but wasn't intended as such back in the day. Either way.. Tintin is awesome.

Wow. I never knew about this site! Thanks for the link!
I still have some 21st Century stuff in the box. I think a pilot I picked up for 5 bucks, a hand set for a couple dollars. I also have a tan Kettenkrad that is still in the box. I bought it with the intention of painting it that garish Adventure Team yellow, but then had second thoughts. So now I am stuck with it, and because of the treads I cannot even pull it with a string. Haha.

I think the Kettenkrad would be a good starting point for a conversion to a post-apocalyptic recon vehicle or something like that. As for the Tintin books, there were several that were two part stories. Aside from the two mentioned, "Les Sept Boules de Crystal" and " Le Temple du Soleil," "Objectif Lune, and "On a Marché Sur la Lune."

The Tintin books were not intended to be racist but they did reflect the contemporary attitudes of Europeans towards non-Europeans. When "Tintin au Congo" was first published, Belgium was still a colonial power owing a huge piece of real estate in Africa (The Belgian Congo) plus what are now Rwanda and I think Burundi which were ceded to Belgium by Germany after WWI. The Belgians were possibly the worst colonialists in history and one can easily see why someone of African ancestry would deplore the characterizations of Congolese natives in that book.

However in the very next volume, "Tintin en Amérique," the author lampooned Americans much more severely (I think) than he ever did the Congolese, and it's obvious from "Le Lotus Bleu," that he was very sympathetic to the Chinese in the 1930's while depicting the Japanese who were engaged in military adventurism in China, in a very negative way. Some of the main villains in that book are Englishmen also. So as I said, the charges of racism simply don't stand up to scrutiny.

All this being said, I'm wondering if I shouldn't use some of those Afrikakorps uniforms available from BG Toys to dress male members of a Balkan constabulary.

There is another forum Dal, Dave and I are members of where one of the other members who is from Puerto Rico has been building a set of alternate history figures for the military and police of an independent Puerto Rico, largely based on German uniforms and equipment, but with a mish-mash of other stuff. His creations and back stories are quite interesting.

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

I think the Kettenkrad would be a good starting point for a conversion to a post-apocalyptic recon vehicle or something like that.  As for the Tintin books, there were several that were two part stories. Aside from the two mentioned, "Les Sept Boules de Crystal" and " Le Temple du Soleil,"  "Objectif Lune, and "On a Marché Sur la Lune."  

The Tintin books were not intended to be racist but they did reflect the contemporary attitudes of Europeans towards non-Europeans.  When "Tintin au Congo" was first published, Belgium was still a colonial power owing a huge piece of real estate in Africa (The Belgian Congo) plus what are now Rwanda and I think Burundi which were ceded to Belgium by Germany after WWI.  The Belgians were possibly the worst colonialists in history and one can easily see why someone of African ancestry would deplore the characterizations of Congolese natives in that book.  

However in the very next volume, "Tintin en Amérique," the author lampooned Americans much more severely (I think) than he ever did the Congolese, and it's obvious from "Le Lotus Bleu," that he was very sympathetic to the Chinese in the 1930's while depicting the Japanese who were engaged in military adventurism in China, in a very negative way.  Some of the main villains in that book are Englishmen also. So as I said, the charges of racism simply don't stand up to scrutiny.  

All this being said, I'm wondering if I shouldn't use some of those Afrikakorps uniforms available from BG Toys to dress male members of a Balkan constabulary.  

There is another forum Dal, Dave and I are members of where one of the other members who is from Puerto Rico has been building a set of alternate history figures for the military and police of an independent Puerto Rico, largely based on German uniforms and equipment, but with a mish-mash of other stuff.  His creations and back stories are quite interesting.  

The Kettenkrad could definitely be a post apocalypse vehicle, but I'm not sure a post apoc Kettenkrad really works with my stuff. Eventually I'll post the one I have out of the box next to it and list it.

I get that some people would find it racist. I don't know, it's like most things for me. It's not a hill to die on. If someone feels offended by Tintin, that's up to them. I guess though, despite trying to make a habit of not worrying about being offended. I often worry about offending. With forums online it is sometimes hard to tell if you have upset someone. Part of why I ended up just walking away from the hobby online and otherwise years ago.

I think just use the uniforms, if you have them to bash some guys and see how it goes. You could always have thr uniforms, then make them sort of more tactical with modern vests and gear?

I'm definitely interested in this other forum with this guys work. So far I'm just part of AMMO, MWD, Sideshow (where I follow one post), Fuzzhead Quarters and OSW.

This guys work sounds like the old PC game Iron Storm.

The forum I'm referring to is called One Sixth Figures https://onesixthfigures.forumotion.com/

I'm there as ThePhotogsBlog
Dal is Bamcomix

The guy with the alternate history Puerto Rican Defense forces is "The Boo Bomb."

Other members who are very gifted in their creations include Reverend Spooky, Ephiane, and Ovy. I think you would especially like Reverend Spooky who does fantastic post-apocalyptic figures and builds just awesome dioramas.

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

The forum I'm referring to is called One Sixth Figures    https://onesixthfigures.forumotion.com/

I'm there as ThePhotogsBlog
Dal is Bamcomix

The guy with the alternate history Puerto Rican Defense forces is "The Boo Bomb."

Other members who are very gifted in their creations include Reverend Spooky, Ephiane, and Ovy.  I think you would especially like Reverend Spooky who does fantastic post-apocalyptic figures and builds just awesome dioramas.  

Oh my mistake! I did join this but I haven't really explored it yet!
I'll poke around there soon!!

RealSarahdactyl wrote:

Kimono Troop Command wrote:

The forum I'm referring to is called One Sixth Figures    https://onesixthfigures.forumotion.com/

I'm there as ThePhotogsBlog
Dal is Bamcomix

The guy with the alternate history Puerto Rican Defense forces is "The Boo Bomb."

Other members who are very gifted in their creations include Reverend Spooky, Ephiane, and Ovy.  I think you would especially like Reverend Spooky who does fantastic post-apocalyptic figures and builds just awesome dioramas.  

Oh my mistake! I did join this but I haven't really explored it yet!
I'll poke around there soon!!

It's a great site Sarah, look out for reverandspooky too!

I think this looks great! I was going to suggest a thin white-wash over the blue to see if it would make it a little paler, but I was too late to the party... Looks great in white though.

Sarah,

It looks like the walls are attached to wood. How did you attach them?

Thanks,

Daryl

TNshooter wrote:

Sarah,

It looks like the walls are attached to wood. How did you attach them?

Thanks,

Daryl

Oh thats just chair behind them. The diorama itself is just two walls and a base made of foam

That's thick foam. And it looks to be a wood color.

i've been meaning to ask, your brick wall dio, how is it held together?

TNshooter wrote:

That's thick foam. And it looks to be a wood color.

i've been meaning to ask, your brick wall dio, how is it held together?

So the diorama is built out of that blue construction foam. I think I used what is labelled as half inch for the walls and one inch for the base.

After carving the brick detail. I painted it with acrylic paints. Mostly the same stuff I used on my street scene diorama and right now its a little sloppy as I've had to add new bricks and paint over the blue with white.

Also this is the glue I stick it with.





I hope this help!

That glue is a definite. 
Most other glues will dissolve the foam, and PVA, although safe enough, takes forever to dry in large sheets, if it dries at all because the air can't get at it.