Designing a shadowbox diorama

[Hauk]

One of the projects on my bucket list is a shadow box diorama of the engine house/workshop at the terminal of "my" railroad, Thamshavnbanen.

It is a really nice-looking brick workshop with a wooden annex for the engine house. Lots of heavy lathes and other machine tools to add interest. Especially the gantry crane is a nice touch:





The building is still standing, and even if all the machinery is removed (it is used as a warehouse), it still got a lot of character:



But I just can't make my mind up over  the design for the diorama. There are two concepts I am contemplating. First, a design that could be described as just removing a section of the side wall:





As the workshop is quite symmetrical with doors at both ends I have made a mock-up with a mirror. A half-model of the gantry crane should be suitable for hiding  the edge of the mirror:




The second design is a diagonal cut through the building:





I have felt that the first design is a bit too static. But after visiting the Lyon Museum of Cinema and Miniatures. I am not so sure anymore. In this museum they have an excellent collection of shadow-box dioramas.  Almost all of them are of the "removed wall" type with the floor plan orthogonal to the looking window. Here is an example:



So, what do you think? Which of the concepts show most potential in your opinion?

All input is very welcome!

[Ray Dunakin]

Great prototype, those arched rafters are beautiful.

I tend to favor the "missing wall" format. To me, it seems to provide the sense of seeing the interior as if you were actually there, having just walked into the room.

[Hauk]

Great prototype, those arched rafters are beautiful.

I tend to favor the "missing wall" format. To me, it seems to provide the sense of seeing the interior as if you were actually there, having just walked into the room.

Ray, your post triggered a new thought; why not just use the old black and white images as guides for the design?

The photographer has chosen the most dramatic viewpoint for the pictures. All I need to do is chose what end to model.

This would result in a shadow-box that is much deeper than it is wide, which is exactly the case with most of the dioramas in the Lyon museum as well.

Time for a new mock-up, me thinks. Thanks for kicking my brain back into gear!

[1-32]

hi hauk.
i love the trusses in the original picture.curved lamination structural bearing now that is class.
cheers

[Hauk]

hi hauk.
i love the trusses in the original picture.curved lamination structural bearing now that is class.
cheers

I agree, it is almost like a church hall!
I also think that this will stand out better in the diorama if I go fot the photographers view.

[finescalerr]

Me, too. -- Russ

[Hydrostat]

Ditto.

Volker

[Dave Fischer]

Hauk-- The view "down the tunnel" certainly looks the most dramatic (I love the way the roof trusses build on each other), though the box becomes very deep. Trying to force the perspective would get very complicated, especially if you are using manufactured detail parts and don't have control over their relative sizes, but it might be interesting to to try an "aerial" perspective where the colors lighten up and gray out as you work back toward the more distant objects, just like in the photo. The whole issue of "scale" color adds dimension and makes small models LOOK the size they are supposed to be.

Sure would be nice to have a Museum of Cinema and Miniatures closer to home! Good luck with this one-- sure looks like fun!   DF

[Hauk]

Hauk-- The view "down the tunnel" certainly looks the most dramatic (I love the way the roof trusses build on each other), though the box becomes very deep. Trying to force the perspective would get very complicated, especially if you are using manufactured detail parts and don't have control over their relative sizes, but it might be interesting to to try an "aerial" perspective where the colors lighten up and gray out as you work back toward the more distant objects, just like in the photo. The whole issue of "scale" color adds dimension and makes small models LOOK the size they are supposed to be.

Sure would be nice to have a Museum of Cinema and Miniatures closer to home! Good luck with this one-- sure looks like fun!   DF

Down the tunnel we go, but no forced perspective! That would have meant building an engine in the same forced perspective, a little too ambitious... The model will not be that big in 0-scale, the prototype was also enlarged before the pictures sere taken. So a somewhat shorter building would also be prototypical.

The Lyon Museum was a great inspiration, and if you ever have a chance to see it, take it.

Here are a few more pictures:

[Bill Gill]

Hi Hauk, The long tunnel view certainly will look good and will emulate the feel of the museum's shadow boxes that you admire. It might be, however, that the various photographers chose the only view available for the engine house rather than the optimal view. There isn't a place they could stand to take in the interior width of the building.

Having seen the wonderful attention to details on your models, would much of that be lost 'looking down the tunnel' where all that machinery will be seen end on and far away? If one of the long side walls were removed instead of an end wall then all of the machinery and miscellany could be seen 'broadside'.

A question might be do you want to emphasize the physical size of the space or everything that is packed into it? Depending on where you made the cut, if it were just enough to remove the exterior wall you would have a foreground that is a row of machines to look over/through to see the rest of the interior. Or, if the slice were a little deeper, you would only have to model about half the machines - those along the far wall, but they could be better seen than in a tunnel view.

[Lawton Maner]

Be sure to include the traveling crane at work.  The visual contrast between the arched trusses and the strong horizontal lines of the crane will delight the eyes.

[Hauk]

I have started to make the CAD-files for the milling of the roof trusses jigs, nothing worth posting.

But I have also started to experiment with methods for making the concrete floor. The starting point is two articles in the 2013 Modellers Annual. (Marc Reusser´s article on the small garage, and the Mogadishu diorama.

Plaster with some gravel added, stained with Tamyia diluted with Tamiya thinners. Some pigment powder.  I know that the rust along the track is a little on the heavy side, and that the oil stains are not very convincing. Other comments?

[finescalerr]

Cracks? Other kinds of stains? Polished rail tops? And, in a workshop, would the concrete be darker overall from grime, dirty feet, and spills? -- Russ

[Hauk]

Cracks? Other kinds of stains? Polished rail tops? And, in a workshop, would the concrete be darker overall from grime, dirty feet, and spills? -- Russ

I think you are right on all the points except maybe for the polished rail tops. The track in the workshop gets relatively little use, so I think it might be a bit darker than outdoors on a track with heavy traffic.

[Hydrostat]

Hauk,

I second what Russ said. And what you said about the polished rail heads. For sure rolling some wheelsets a few times over the burnished (?) rails will get close to the appearance of a shed track. Additionally to me the rust stains don't fit to well; I wouldn't expect to much brake dust in a shed, rather much more oil and grease dropping from axle boxes and gears. Concrete may benefit from some tonal variation and maybe the 'grain' is a bit to coarse for the scale. For the oil you may try some drawing ink, which builds up a bit and leaves a somewhat tarish surface, starting with thinned ink/washes and then changing to covering layers.

The following thoughts are only relevant, if you're going to model the floor in a meticulous prototypical manner. In your first picture it nearly looks like a tamped gravel floor around the pit or concrete is already heavily worn out. It looks like both pictures were taken at the same day?

The usual vignol/flat bottom rails seem to be lowered in relation to the floor and there's a step made from timber in the first picture and from angle section (?) and timber in the second one. What ever reason there was for it, this gives a nice touch to the scene. The space between the rails again is lowered a bit (approx. flange height). Maybe this simply served as drain. To me the timber seems to be an important buffering element between the rails and the architectural structure. Especially the first picture shows some really interesting floor textures, giving a good impression of the rather rough work done here.

Volker