Colossus of Rhodes Diorama in 1/700th Scale

[JBA]

Now that's going to be good, i am hooked already!
excellent sculpting technique so far
JB

[callen]

EXCELLENT!!

simply excellent!

Puts me in mind of the Van Gils sculpture using 1/700 figs on a 1/35 base figure

have a loo here-- click on the images for high res versions

http://andersheintz.blogspot.com/2010/0 ... ction.html

JIM B

Wow! That is stupendous. I can't believe that figure. It looks like a real person!

That suddenly give's me an idea.. Should I depict it completed? Or under construction?
...I guess I'd probably better stick with the original plan. But someday... maybe take another whack at it. Thanks for posting this Jim. Much appreciated.

Callan You sir are a very talented modeller and you bring with you a refreshing breeze of La difference.

Thank you Dave. Must be my French friends rubbing off on me...

Wonderful! Wonderful!

I just want to know............who is taking the photos? I see both of your hands in the pics.

Hey Carl. You noticed that? Yes. I've roped my oldest daughter and my wife into the documentation effort! Thanks for the encouragement. I hope you're feeling better these days. Looking forward to Omaha.

On sculpting with Milliput. I find the white type very sticky, so I use the standard yellow/grey type.

After mixing leave it to cure for 5 minutes or so. When sculpting use wet tools to stop stickyness. I use a square of foam plastic in a saucer or water, press any tools or fingertips on to the foam to dampen them.

Niall can you post any links to your work? I'd love to see how you do it. As you can see I've done a bit of floundering with this build so far, although miraculously it's somehow still moving forward. Went to the club meeting yesterday and on the way back bought a Figure how-to book at the local LHS. That guy uses epoxy as well, building up in layers that he cures in a kind of 'lightbulb oven'. His name is Kim someone. Fabulous work. I haven't figured out yet if I'm a carver or a sculptor.

All I can say is - I am not worthy!

I'm looking forward to seeing you tackle the trireme. You posted a picture of the Olympias: I followed her (re)construction from the initial research by the designers way back in the day. They have been the first in around 2000 years to successfully build and operate an oared warship with 3 banks of oars. Always wanted to row crew on her.

If you haven't seen it, her home page (with heaps of pictures) is here: http://www.triremetrust.org.uk/

I checked it out when I saw your post. Really great! I'd heard about the Olympias, of course, and had even done a search for her on the internet, but had not found this site. I've got a depiction in one of my books of a Trireme with this same great curvy hull and the deck with the trench down the middle. I thought it was so cool I told myself I was going to model it even if it turned out to be wrong. But that's how they built the Olympias! Very cool! That just inspires me that much more. Hopefully I can rope my French buddy Bruno Gire into this thing. Can't wait to get started on those triremes... three of them at least, and half a dozen cargo carriers... I only have about six projects to get out of the way first...

Now that's going to be good, i am hooked already!
excellent sculpting technique so far
JB

Mr. Andre. I just checked out your site. Goodness. I'm completely blown away. Everyone here you should look up this man's site. I'm not going to be able to do anything on that sort of a level. You've got me thinking now about 'story...' story... What story do I want to tell? I was just going to build a plaza and put some random people on it, you know... Obviously you're using epoxy and having success with it. I just looked through a few of your builds but I will be going through the whole site very thoroughly when I get a chance.

There is an atmosphere of 'Dystopia' about your work. Do you know this word? It's something I like to talk about with my writing friends here where I live. A la Blade-Runner, The Road Warrior, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, etc. I grew up with Dystopia. Melancholy and Desolate, but also very inspiring. Thank you for your kind comments.

[kennylibben]

Fantastic idea for a build!

Can't wait to see more progress, keep up the good work!

[callen]

Fantastic idea for a build!

Can't wait to see more progress, keep up the good work!

Thank you! I'm going to try and keep things going, both over here and on the carrack thread. This was a real whim to get this thing going... now I guess I'm more or less committed. We'll see how it goes. Personally I'm really looking forward to the Triremes.

[Niall]

I'll have to take a few photos of figures I've made. I try and upload them tomorrow.

[Niall]

Pictures as promised -

1st 2 pictures are 1/30th scale with the exception of the barrel of the Carl Gustav anti-tank weapon in the 1st picture, and the sword hilt in the second picture, everything is sculpted from Milliput. The Carl Gustav is made from brass tube, plasticard strips and carved Milliput. The sword is a Historex plastic figure part.

The 3rd picture is of converted Airfx Multipose 8th Army and Africa Korps figures. All the clothing including the officer's chain mail and greaves are sculpted in Milliput. The officer's helmet is converted from one of the Airfix WW2 helmets and plasticard and the officer's cloak is from paper. The ballista is plasticard with Milliput for the domes of the springs.

[MichelB]

There is an atmosphere of 'Dystopia' about your work. Do you know this word? It's something I like to talk about with my writing friends here where I live. A la Blade-Runner, The Road Warrior, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, etc. I grew up with Dystopia. Melancholy and Desolate, but also very inspiring. Thank you for your kind comments.

Andre knows his melancholy dystopia *very* well, and I'm a big fan of his work for it. Part of it comes from the Franco-Belgian comic or graphic novel tradition, with series like "Les cites obscures", obscure movies such as Taxandriaand the movies of Jeunet & Carot. You should really check these out, if you haven't already.

[callen]

Niall your figures are absolutely outstanding!

Beautiful Job!!!
If you have any more I'd love to see them. That is really first class modeling. Believe me, I have a new appreciation for that kind of thing now.

I have done more work on 'the little man' as my daughters call it. I will be posting soon, but I'll tell you, if I pull of the hands I will be really really happy. Figures are HARD. I may not attempt another one of these any time soon. Looking forward to getting back to freighters and triremes, etc.

[callen]

There is an atmosphere of 'Dystopia' about your work. Do you know this word? It's something I like to talk about with my writing friends here where I live. A la Blade-Runner, The Road Warrior, Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, etc. I grew up with Dystopia. Melancholy and Desolate, but also very inspiring. Thank you for your kind comments.

Andre knows his melancholy dystopia *very* well, and I'm a big fan of his work for it. Part of it comes from the Franco-Belgian comic or graphic novel tradition, with series like "Les cites obscures", obscure movies such as Taxandriaand the movies of Jeunet & Carot. You should really check these out, if you haven't already.

Thanks for the info Michel. Interesting to know there is some commonality of aesthetics there. Thanks for the references also, although I have to confess my French is none too good at the moment. I have a good bluegrass fiddler friend who is actually a fluent speaker. He's created his own French Method and gave me a copy. I may have to brush up one of these days when my life slows down a little bit...

[callen]

Ok!
Time for a colossus update.
The big question for me when I left this off last time was, going back to milliput as a medium for connecting the various styrene parts together. I'm happy to say that it works well in this capacity, and also I did not have the experience of itchy irritated skin this time, because I wasn't working it for over an hour, like I attempted to do last time.

I am also learning that I am more of a carver than I am a sculptor... which is to say, I have an easier time creating a shape by removing material than I do by adding it. I don't know if anyone else out there has had the same experience or not, or what the implications of that are for me as a modeler.
I can say the colossus seems to be going well, the next real hurdle will be the hands and feet...

Here is the progress:

Left Thigh. Now everything I have learned with the right thigh must be reversed... no small trick.

Two thighs together.

Beginning to carve the back. Very unfamiliar territory for me. When I was younger and drawing people I never attempted to draw the back...

Attaching the head with milliput. I was very worried about this joint and it was quite difficult to work the head in connection with the body, but when the putty had cured the bond was both strong and carve-able. Whew!

Head from behind.

Legs attached. I am working with the pose. The idea will be for him to be standing back on his left leg, arm raised holding a torch, after the familiar image of the Olympic torchbearer, etc. The left leg will be flexed and straight, supporting all of the weight. The right leg bent, with the foot raised slightly off of the ground. The torso (ideally) will be both twisted to the right and leaning backwards to counterbalance the weight of the arm and the torch. All elements will be out of 'true' straight up and down except for the left leg. This seems to be in keeping with what little I have learned about Greek statuary, etc. Wish me luck!!!

[callen]

More pics...

Beginning to try out paper-towel pieces for his garment... not sure what to call it.
This is a 'huge learning curve' as the saying goes. Two of my friends who are graphic artists (a sculptor/painter and a sketcher/painter) informed me about the 'head rule' of proportions... As we examined my work on this figure they both agreed that I had made the torso too long. After thinking for some time about how I might be able to correct this problem, I finally realized the best way would be to complete the figure and then saw it in half, since the act of sawing itself would remove a small amount of material, and each piece could be sanded to adjust as well. In addition, sawing the completed figure into parts would also facilitate casting for my collaborator/friends who are helping me with my various projects. (Bruno Gire and Jean Mahieux.) Although it seems drastic, miliput works really well in joining styrene pieces, so I am hoping that the process will go well.

That is all I have for now. I have spent the bulk of my time with carracks of late, when I have had a chance to model. Thank you all for your kind comments and as always, suggestions and advice are welcome. With the completion of the carrack masters I will have more time to devote to the colossus, so I should be able to post more progress soon.
Cheers!

[Cadman]

Very impressive!

[MartinJQuinn]

Holy crap - impressive doesn't quite cover it. Out-F**king-standing is all I can say!

[callen]

LOL!!!
Thank's Martin!

[callen]

Hello everyone!

I thought I would do some progress on this thread. For one thing, if I don't get some pics of an actual ship on here soon I'm afraid they'll kick it off the forum... There are going to be actual ships modeled!!!

So, to start things off, I thought I'd have a go at the lower legs of the Colossus. However, looking at it after a two month hiatus it feels really 'cold'... i.e. I don't remember clearly how I did everything and am not sure about getting back into it.

In this slightly over-exposed shot one can nevertheless see the measurement in scale 1/700th scale feet. He is already at 140ft, and is not yet to full height. This means that if the Archaologists' assessments of the Colossus' height is correct (107ft) I may have a colossus close to twice the height he should be by the time he is done....
Or to put that another way, I may have the option to model it in 1/350th Scale instead... Which is not a bad idea considering it would make everything easier and more impressive when it comes time to scratch the actual ships. The only problem is that the Colossus itself will not be as imposing. In addition to that, I will have to use 350th scale figures, and flat ones at that, which will not be as pleasing to the eye as the very small 700th scale figures... A difficult quandry.

I realized I would need to start thinking seriously whether I am going to persist with 1/700th scale or try for 350th. After mulling this over for some time, and also a little wary of trying to make a lower leg, I thought I'd warm into the project by creating a ship. I decided to proceed as planned with 700th Scale, and, as a first try, decided to model a Greek Trireme... That seemed appropriate, although, as I later learned the Trireme was no longer the prime naval weapon at the time of the Colossus, though still very much in use... So, here, for your consideration the (possibly first) Greek Trireme in 1/700th Scale...

We begin with two strips of styrene cut to an identical length and taped together using double sided tape.

Measuring... much too long, but that was intended... always easier to shorten things than to lengthen them...

Tapering to a fine point for the bronze ram at the bow.

We have trimmed and shaped to the correct length. Now opening the 'sandwich' of the two identical halves of the waterline plate...

The tape has served its purpose and can now be removed.

[callen]

Hmmm... Waterline? Or not? These were very shallow draft ships. If we created a full hull model we would have the option of modeling one out of the water. Also it would be a simple thing to hide the lower hull in the 'water' or to sand it off when the time comes... So, I decided to create a full hull Trireme. This would require a lower hull keel to guide the shape of the ship's bottom.

Ready to be glued to the waterline plates...

Difficult to make out, but we now have a waterline plate with lower hull keel glued in place.

Time to create bow and stern shapes...

Roughing in rods to fill out the lower hull shape. I realized that the waterline plate would also need to be the base for the rowing galleries. Not much room to model in these very small ancient ships. This one measures slightly larger than the consensus 120ft, but she is a 'later era Trireme' so that's my excuse.

Very difficult to photograph white smooth styrene.

[callen]

Creating solid ends for the extreme bow and stern. I would later have cause to regret this...

Note the gaps where the rods have been cut short of the outline of the hull, creating what will eventually be hollow spaces beneath the outer planking. This gave me problems later...

Shaping the ram bow was fun!

Comparison shot with Colossus.

[callen]

Notice this glossy sheen? This is dried styrene glue. This will have to be carefully sanded away before we begin the planks so that a good bond can be created between the plank and the hull filler. Dried glue will prevent the proper cementing of the two surfaces. Another hard learned lesson.

Shaping the first plank.

Starboard lower hull planking complete. Actually this is most of the planking for the hull, since the rest will be superstructure. The Trireme had a really interesting superstructure, almost reminiscent of a sort of ancient wooden aircraft carrier complete with a 'hangar' (rowing gallery) a flight deck (upper deck) and a really cool 'elevator' (open slot running down the middle where the main and foremasts could be raised or lowered. I will illustrate as I go. This semi-transparent structure was one of my main reasons for wanting to model this kind of a ship.

At this point I realized 2 things. First of all, the extreme stern which I had filled in with rod material would have to be open, necessitating the sanding off of all that material. In addition I was dealing with the complicated 'fish-tail' shape which deformed as I worked it, the hollow spaces beneath the planks becoming dimples in the hull shape... I also realized the bow was a bit too broad, so I started trimming one side and then the other... Yikes! Eyeballing the hull symmetry... no fun.

here you can see the dimples, which look like perhaps a slight cutaway for a prop or a centerline rudder... great, except there weren't any...

That's all for now...

[ARH]

OH, my eyes are sore, looking at all that small work, nice fingers, a very good piece of work,

[JWintjes]

Fantastic stuff, callen!

Good to see the ancient world coming to its right here.

Jorit