The Blog about Diorama Clervaux

I am heading for a two week holiday trip to Scotland on Monday, so don't expect any updates for a few weeks. This week i did put some more work on the finishing of Module 5 and adapting it to the other ones. That means, after grouting the cobblestones, finding the right colors to have a good transition from one module to the other. While i can't avoid the gap i should at least try that. I also repainted the roofs of the last two houses and started doing the backyards. I want to get to the point where i have to do more groundwork, this could then have plenty of drying time the next two weeks. I am probably going to work until H-1 hour when my wife needs to tear me away from the hobby cellar and force me to finally pack for travel.

Have a nice summertime and hope to see you back end of August

I am not really interested in the Football World cup, but as a Luxembourger (and ex- triathlet and bike rider) i am a Fan of the Tour de France. Particulary because our little country has one of the top contenders for the first place in the race in the person of Andy Schleck, i am right now loosing 1-2 modeling hours per day to the TdF.

Modeling wise this week was not very interesting. The tiling of two roofs took the biggest chunck of time. The dormers have also been made,


Slowly i like the look of it!

As i am waiting for a photoetch railing from Royal Model to finish the pâtisserie i worked on some sorte of gate. To the left of the butcher shop (this is based on ref. pics) was this gate as an entrance to some sort of park alongthe river Clef


I have no complete picture of it, only other views from very far. I used my trusted stonework from the castle to make this gate

As soon as i have the railing and also replacement blades for my Cutter i am going to finish this, just in time before i must make a break for my summer holiday.

Uhh, i nearly missed my regular sunday update. Only 20 minutes to go.

Ok, this week, a lot of work was put in the windows of the two houses. Casings, frames, doors, ... I decided to do one butcher shop and one mixed Restaurant-Patisserie house. This is based on old ads i have from the contemporary travel guide.

Here is the butcher

The facade is not yet made! I decided to whiten(sp?) the storefront to show the unoccupied shop. No picture from the other shop, but it is mostly done also. Now i am going to do the roofing work of those two,

I also planned the backyard of those houses and the rest of Module 5. This are "only" 50 cm to fill, peanuts ! The biggest challenge is the difference of height. I need to overcome it quickly as the next module starts immediately with the river, so that's level 0. Here is the first step

I came so far


It's start looking not to bad i think. A lot of vegetation comes in here later.


This mess is a bit normal during such construction phases , isn't it? :-)

I absolutely want to bring Module 5 to the expos. It does not need to be completely finished, but to enhance the overall view in must be started at least. After a little frustration regarding some painting on Mod.4 i decided to start No.5, Well, for once i made some correct pictures, i mishandled the camera at one point and the pictures are only 640x480 resolution. No way i can use those for printed publication. I start with the missing road part between Mod. Village and Mod.4, some 40 cm of cobblestone, with a long curve as special challenge. Some cobbles were already made during the last weeks, others are done during the little time i spend in front of the television to watch the World Cup.

Here you see the work done after two days, including a nice side wall to limit the road

I am changing permanently again, working on one thing during the drying time of the other. So i also started on two houses to put in here.

I want to do the two houses in front of the Bus in this photo. The road is the one leading to the river bridge on the left side.


I have on big problem here. This is a flat roadpart here but i have a steep downslope of 6 cm to cover in only 30 cm space. I will need to improvise a lot here. For now, this is my plan


In front of the right house i will ad some sort of terrasse to access the shopping windows. This will add some good viisual interest to the part. I will also be able to not hide the back row of houses what is a very good thing.

I also do not know what kind of shops this were. No idea! So i am looking in the advertisement part of my 1930 Clervaux travel guide to find something suitable. I do not intend to show something in there. The main reason is that in the future, in a completed diorama, this fronts will only be seen from theother side of the dio, at some two meters distance! Do you think it is worth the work to put some shop nterior in here. I don't think so. Let's keep my energy for the houses intend to do on Module 6.

After every turn it looks that there is one more thing to do before finishing. So i am still working on a lot of fronts at the same time. A lot of work was to get the courtyard, stretched over 3 modules, to the same look. I did not remember anymore and of course did not note how i painted the part two years ago. Washes after washes i couldn't find the right match to the one already finished, the one with the truck on it. I did not want to touch the truck. Finally i lost patience and i repainted everything using different acryl colors, painted wet in wet, and going as close as possible near the truck.

During the last 14 days, i also started to twist branches for the trees to put in this yard, using very thin copper wire. I soldered the branches to fix the strands of wire well and also to eliminate already most of the twisting signs.

After that i fix them on a real branch

Here is it after i worked the transition from wood to wire with magic sculpt.

Another time consuming occupation was the preparation of the dead leaves to put under the trees. I am using Thymian leaves found in the "wild" :-)

This are painted red brown ( in fact i am using up old Tamiya colors of bright green and orange, this mix gives a nice fall color). Those are dispersed on a bed of white glue and flattened later. The left side looks white now because of the diluted glue

Without picture, but just to mention, is the work i am doing right now on the high tower of the castle where i am replacing all the ivy leaves. I did not like them anymore, to big after all, and naturally colored to an ugly brown. So i am replacing them by Thymian leaves also.

2-3 more days to go and i will be done with this one, for sure :-)

Saturdays are my major workdays. When a part nears finishing like now there are so many differnet things to do.

Today, i first glued the furniture in the Café and did some more details ( don't forget the bad view you will get from this! No need for hyperdetail and superfinishing!)

I also redid for the third time the entrie doors to the Café and i closed the gap behind the houses


and set de wall on it


I also started already with the wire trees i need to do and made one big branch already

I am now finishing a 12 hour modelling day

Now is the period that everything is nearly finished and i have a big choice on what to do first. So there are a lot of small bits to do and doing a Blog entry about that is not really worth it. I made a quick picture with the flash for you before i close down for today. I want to show you that i finished the furniture ( i may repaint the beer tap) . The trick with the brass wire looks also worth remembering. I glued it on with glossy acryl varnish.


It's all painted wit oils over acrylic and needs a few days of drying time. The bottles in the cabinet are only pieces of clear sprue and some painted green clear from Tamiya. Behind the glass that looks ok for me.

Don't forget that the viewer will have to bend down and only have a side view in a badly illuminated room to see this. So this should proof more then enough to simulate a café's furniture.

So, i am alternating the tasks again. Not only out of fun, but also because of planniung needs. If i don't finish the street now and paint the rear of the wall before placing the houses, i will have big problems later.

Doing the grout between the cobbles with a mix of plaster, fine sand and glue.

I also covered the wall with plates.

With a mix of VanDiyck Brown and Payne's Grey oil color mixed to White Spirit i made a wash


I need to wait till it is dry, but i think i took away some of the color and the cork is shining through, so i need to repaint a part. Let's wait tomorrow to discover that

I used seldf hardening clay to make the bark of the tree. I have a lot left and as i already had a package drying slowly away because the package was not closed airtight i prefer using this clay to build a wall programmed anyway. It is meant to put behind the houseson the edge of the parking. I rolled it out 1 cm thick between two pieces of wood and simply scribed the pattern in while workable. I did this a few times, not knowing exactly the curing point and slowly getting to this look. This are slate stones put one on top of the other without mortar


I will cut the wall lenthwise in two pieces to get roughly a meter of it.