"Memories of Flight School"

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You know I never liked this roof anyway!
It always looked too big to me,out of scale
with the rest.Now I find that after all my
careful calculations that i missed the
obvious.The roof hangs over the outer
limit of the diorama. sad.gif I will now have
to re-build the roof and cut the length of
the rafters.This of course will cut into the
squareness of the checkerboard roof which
will have to be re-designed.I can't believe
that I made such a stupid mistake.
 
That wasn't such a hard fix after all ! I trimmed the roof back to the edge and I will just have to live with the odd size checkerboard pattern.Now I can finish the roof.
When they build the case they will have to make room all the way around for a border of some kind.Not my problemo!
 
Here I am beginning to work on the office entrance.I am working mostly with pastels to add some color and weathering here and there.The field grass is from an old brush that my dog (Dolly) a Siberian Huskey/wolf, had taken outside a year or two ago and hid amoung her treasures in the backyard.I took a hammer and chisel and hacked it apart and now it is one of my diorama treasures.It looks just like field grass would look, in November, here in Canada.It has a nice rusty bottom were the metal pins are holding the bristles to the wood which gives it a natural earth color..I am using it as is, with no further coloration.I stuck the clumps in the microwave for a couple of minutes (while my wife was out)to kill any critters that may be lurking inside.I don't plan to use a lot of this stuff only for interest here and there.
 
This pic of Harley was taken of him guarding the front door to the office.The air mail pilots always make sure to bring him his treats.It is just outside this door that I am now planting the field grass.
 
The front ramp.
Although I really don't have a lot of room to play with,it is what I wanted for the front of this diorama.Sort of a stage like setting with the hangar doors acting as curtains and a minimum amount of distractions for the eye.I wanted it so that it is almost like 2 dioramas in one.One ,a sort of shadow box/stage when viewed close up from the front, and the other ,a more traditional diorama when viewed from the other 3 sides.
There is only about 1/2 inch of landscaping to be done in the front and a total of 11/2 inches to the dioramas edge.The frame and case will add another few inches but the viewer should still be able to get up close and personal with the main story line which is the WW1 fighter pilots grouping and of course the Jenny.
 
Simply amazin' and beautiful work, John. You are really enforcin' my belief in what you do. The pic with the lamp, desk and chair is stunnin'.

You sure this isn't 1/1?! I am confused now! Testament, testament!
 
Now that was a boring job!
The ramp right now is too long and will be gut where the individual boards end.I left it oversize so that I could temporarily screw it down to the base to prevent warpage ,as I apply the watery landscaping material.I think that I will use the same glue/sand mix as I used at the office and color it with pastels to look more earthlike.From pictures that I have seen of old airports and hangar areas it looks like they used earth,sand and compacted gravel .Cement or blacktop was just too expensive I guess. The metal tips on the leading edge of the props were there for a good purpose to prevent dings on the prop due to stones etc....
I have applied a first coat of sand over a glue base and will let dry overnight .Next I will lay down a real goopy mix a sand and glue and let that dry thoughly to a rock hard finish.I will then cut off the ends of the ramp and blend the ramp into the landscape.
 
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