Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" - Conclusion

Update 23 Nov 2011

I made a video of the diorama which can be seen on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaReFFDEZJ4

Please note: because I had put the video to the music from James Last, it is blocked in Germany.

Es tut mir leid Freunde!

Today, I'm glad to say the Schreiber-Bogen "Pfalz bei Kaub" project is finished! Let's do a short re-cap. Building the castle was a challenge as it was the most complicated paper model I had attempted to-date and took approximately 18 hours to complete. Up until this project I had only built fairly simple four-walls-and-a-roof paper models. There were some frustrating moments in the construction. Many small components were a challenge for old fingers and eyes and the model itself has a couple of design flaws. The walkway from the tower to the wall does not line up with the registration marks on the wall. Even though the tower sits exactly where it's supposed to on the courtyard floor, the registration marks on the castle walls are too far forward. However, unless you're right on top of the castle and it's been deliberately pointed out, you'll never see it.  One thing you can see is the mis-aligned course of bricks at the 'prow' of the ship-like castle.

Schreiber-Bogen's own photo shows the mis-aligned brick courses.

Now look at my model.. This is built exactly as the model is designed.

This is how the castle front is supposed to look. All brick courses parallel to each other.

There's nothing that I could have done to correct this and so I built the model as it was designed. It's still an attractive and unique structure. But the castle is so small and looks so puny sitting all by itself on a shelf, that I thought it needed something more. The Pfalz bei Kaub is also unique in that it sits in the middle of a river versus on a hilltop like most castles, and this cried out for a display diorama. The hoped for diorama was meant to be a simple affair using as many on-hand materials as possible. I found a scrap piece of MDF shelving that was already in a size suitable for the base therefore no cutting or sawing. I used Styrofoam and scenery materials for the rock base, all of which I already have. Then it struck me that the base needed some kind of frame. I bought a pre-finished, plastic-like moulding, cut it and glued it to the base. This was my undoing! Not being very good at wood working I really screwed up the miter cuts ending up with gaps at the corners which then had to be filled with epoxy. Yet another purchase.

Which brings us to the end of the project. One last purchase to make - a can of spray paint. I bought a can of  'Rustoleum Specialty Plastic' spray paint in gloss black. I bought this because the can said it needed no primer. But first I had to protect the scenery base:

Painter's masking tape was placed inside the framework and newspaper attached to the exposed tape, then folded over and taped to itself.

All painting was done outside. The frame was given three coats of paint allowing approximately 15 minutes between coats. It's hard to tell looking at this photo but the diorama is sitting on a box and is actually raised above the plastic. This was a great paint to work with and was dry enough to handle within 30 minutes.

A little touch-up painting was done inside the framework, the trees were stuck into the Styrofoam, and the castle simply placed on the base - not glued down.  Overall I'm satisfied with the way the diorama turned out. I like the gloss black paint on the frame much more than the wood-grain effect of the original moulding and it gives a real nice contrast to the blue of the 'water' on the diorama. Showing the castle sitting on exposed rock in the middle of the river has a dramatic effect and the overall size of the diorama is just fine for placing on shelf. Hope you've liked our 'Building A  Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" ' series. Now let's look at the finished diorama. Enjoy!

The finished project!

The framework looks bowed but that is actually camera lens distortion. In order for me to get the side to look straight I would have had to back up from the work so far  that many of these shots would have been impossible to make. I use a Canon PowerShot A590 for my photos and while it does a fine job it does have considerable distortion. Perhaps one of these decades I'll be able to afford a better camera. Until then....

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 9

It's been a couple weeks since any progress has been made on the Schreiber-Bogen "Pfalz bei Kaub" diorama. Admittedly the project languished while I concentrated on other things. But it's time to lay this sucker to rest and finish the project. Because I did such a hack job on the framing for the layout base, it was necessary to fill the gaps and build out the corners a little. I thought of trying this Locktite product which is normally made for automotive use but the packaging does say it can be used on plastics. This is fine because the moulding surrounding the base is a plastic-like material. The epoxy-putty is an all-in-one product, simply slice off a small piece and knead it with your fingers until a uniform color is obtained. Place it on the surface of your work and let it cure - approx 24hrs. A variety of files are used to remove the excess. I'll need to do more filing until I reach the contour I want. Then, the frame is going to painted. Gosh, this whole project was meant to be kind of a quickie but it's turned out to be a little more challenging! On the bright side - it gives me more to blog about :-) Enjoy!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub", PT 8

At first I wasn't going to post anything about the progress but then thought you'all might be interested. The last major step in the project was to put a frame around the perimeter of the base, which I did. BUT, in short I screwed it up - Royally! I mean I REALLY made a mess of things. Understand that I don't work with wood. I don't like working with wood and am no good at it. I s'pose if I practiced more my skills would improve but it becomes a vicious cycle: I don't like working with it, therefore I don't work with it, therefore when I do work with it my projects turn out terrible causing me to not want to work with it, etc, etc, .........  Like I said, a vicious cycle. 

Here's what happened. I bought pre-finished moulding so I wouldn't have to mess with stains or paints (the moulding is actually not wood, but a kind of plastic material). All I had to do was make eight simple 45degree miter cuts. That's it - four pieces of moulding, eight cuts. Simple.

10 pieces and 16 cuts later I ran out of moulding and said 'To hell with it!!@#^!*$'

(those weren't my exact words - I cleaned it up for the blog)

I took the best pieces, and hot glued them to them side of the base. They didn't match up right (DUH) but by then my frustration level - and blood pressure - were peaking!!! I attempted to fill the gaps with wood putty hoping to color the gaps to make the wood putty match. Well, it seems the wood putty wasn't all it was cracked up to be and dried kind of dry and flaky, and attempts to color it didn't work as the putty would just flake out! CRAP!

OK, I do have plan to fix this whole mess but it's gonna take time and there may not be updates for a while as I'm now working other projects (I had thought this project would have been done by now). I'll keep ya posted!

As always - Enjoy! (my misery) :-)

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 7

The "Pfalz bei Kaub" diorama is slowly but surely taking shape. This week a significant step forward was taken with painting and landscaping. See details below. Enjoy!

The outline of the castle was drawn onto the painted Styrofoam and then masked off. This way, after all the scenery materials have been applied, the castle will have a flat surface to rest on.

Using a very light tan latex house paint, a 'halo' was painted around the perimeter. For this step it's best to use a dry-brush technique - dip the brush lightly into the paint and rub most of the paint off on a scrap piece of paper/cardboard. The hoped for effect is that when the gloss medium is applied to simulate water this 'halo' will look like the submerged part of the rock - Cross your fingers!!!

The rock is then painted with a heavier coat, being careful not to cover everything - we want some of that darker hickory color to show through in the low spots.

The really messy part:

1. I let the first coat of tan dry, then using a brush with a heavy coat of paint, paint a small area (only the top of the rock not the sides)

2. While the paint is still wet and using a kitchen sifter I sifted on a fine, light gray ballast normally used for N scale model railroading. Do this on the portion that still has the heavy coat of paint on.

3. Next came a light sifting of 'Woodland Scenics' brand burnt grass. Don't completely cover the ballast

4. Add small clumps of 'Woodland Scenics' coarse turf

5. Taking a straw I carefully blew away loose scenery material from around the edges of the paint and off of the diorama base

6. Lightly spray the scenery area with a mixture of water and liquid dishwasher detergent. Normally this is a step most modelers will do after the next step. I find that by spraying the area with this mixture first allows the glue/water mix to spread out better

7. I next soak the area just sprayed using a 50/50 mix of white glue and water, laced with about 3 tablespoons of liquid dish washing detergent.

(the liquid soap makes the water 'wetter' - in other words it decreases the surface tension of the water, allowing it to hunker down and get into every nook and cranny - that's how your dishes get cleaned! I use more per mixture than what is normally recommended, usually just a few drops, because it seems to works better for me)

8. Wipe off any water/glue mixture that may accumulate or run down the sides of the embankments.

9. Paint the next patch and repeat the scenery making.

Allow at least a couple of hours before pulling the masking tape off the castle footprint.Wait at least 12 hours for everything else to dry and set up. Generally speaking it's usually a whole day before I can get to the next phase which is plenty of drying time. Scrape off any little flecks/scenery bits and pieces and paint the blue of the water. After looking at several aerial shots of the castle, it turns out this shade of blue will work quite well. I'm okay with the diorama so far. Just a few more steps and we'll be finished!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 6

It's nice to report that there's been some progress on the  Schreiber-Bogen "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" diorama this week. Perhaps not a great deal but progress is progress after all. I'll detail the particulars below.Enjoy!

Taking a rather large box cutter with the blade extended, the Styrofoam was slowly whittled down to a  contour I was satisfied with. I use this material for many of my projects and am used to it but oh brother is it messy! However, I've formed a workable routine: carve, pick up loose chunks & toss in garbage, vacuum. Repeat: carve, toss, vacuum

Next, the foam gets a cover of ready mixed, light-weight, patching plaster. It doesn't really hold detail well and would generally not be suitable for exacting scale work. It has a decent working time - about 15 minutes, and because it doesn't dry rock-hard like plaster, one can just poke in trees, shrubs, poles, whatever. Wait until it sets-up enough before painting - about 30-45 minutes. 

Now everything gets a coat of paint. This will be the base color upon which lighter colors will be layered. Normally I use a dark brown, but felt that this hickory shade will be just fine for what I want to do. With Styrofoam it's important that one uses latex paint - NOT oil , lacquer, or spray paints. They will eat away the Styrofoam like acid. Oh, and by the way - do protect your work surface. This is not a mess you can vacuum!!

 The dioramas featured here on Toys & Stuff are simple by choice. I'm no Master Modeler and know that I'll never make it into the Modelers Hall of Fame. But I'm willing to bet most of you readers are in the same boat I am. Just average modelers who want to work on their hobbies without over critical reviews. In other words, we're in it to have fun!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 5

Progress on the "Pfalz bei Kaub" diorama has been slow going - mostly because I've been too pooped after work to mess with it! However, that being said, I did manage to get something done this week. I found a piece of MDF (medium density fiberboard) shelving laying about - I should have tossed it out a long time ago, now I'm glad I didn't - and it was pretty much right for what I wanted to accomplish.

This castle actually sits in the middle of a river on a rock. Some photos on the Web show the river exposing the rock and some show the rock nearly covered. I figured there were two basic ways to approach this diorama:

1.  Make a small base with just a hint of the rock showing and suggesting the water lapping up to the castle sides.
2. Model the exposed rock - along with the trees which had been planted on one end. This of course would require a larger diorama base.

The shelf piece I had found measures 11.25" (28.6cm) W x 28" (71.1cm) L and after looking at it, it appeared to be nicely suited for the larger diorama showing the exposed rock. Had it been shorter I probably would have cut it down even more and just gone with option 1.

  I printed photos of the castle  culled from the Web and used those to draw a rough outline of the rock on brown craft paper. It won't be exact, but I think it'll look OK when finished.

The pattern drawn on the paper was cut out and used as a template to cut pieces of .5" (1.3cm) thick Styrofoam. The Styrofoam was then glued to the shelf piece.

Hopefully we'll be able to get a little terraforming accomplished by next week. Until then - Enjoy!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 4

Well folks, the past several weeks has been interesting. I didn't know what I was about to get into when starting this project but it's finally finished. It's the most difficult paper model I've ever attempted, never having done more than simple four-walls-and-a-roof buildings. The project to-date has taken approx. 18 hours and the past few hours have really been a bear! The very last parts to assemble were 22 small dormers located around the perimeter of the structure and these were quite tricky for me as they were pretty small and required a little more agility than I have left at my age. To make matters worse I inadvertently sliced through a couple of what were supposed to be fold lines! Oh crud. Still, after a little repair work, everything finally went together and here are the photos of the finished castle. It measures 8 1/4" (20.3cm) L x 3 1/8" (7.9cm) W x 5 3/4" (14.6cm) H. Stay tuned because the next step is trying to put together a small diorama to display the model on. Enjoy!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 3

The "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" castle is nearly finished. This past week I worked on the central tower. It went almost without a hitch EXCEPT for the very top roof section. It's a little piece with eight sides that, when glued together, is supposed to have a somewhat rounded shape. That little booger gave me fits!!! It was probably a combination of unsteady fingers, poor eyesight, old age, the stars weren't aligned right - something. Prior to gluing, each of the sections were rounded/bent by rolling them over a small round object (I used my wife's crochet hook). That SHOULD have made it easier to glue-up but it was simply difficult for me holding two roof sections together in an arc waiting for the glue to set up so that I could get on to the next section. Tweezers helped somewhat but they're made for straight objects and didn't work very well on the small curved forms. Anyway, it finally went together and here's a couple of photos to show this week's progress. Enjoy!

Building A Memory - Schreiber-Bogen's "Pfalz im Rhein bei Kaub" Pt 2

I didn't spend a whole lot of time this week on the model, but did manage to get the roofs and towers around the wall perimeter finished. This was a fairly straight forward task. It starts by gluing in place a small tower, followed by a long roof, then another tower and so on. Total time now spent on the model: about 14+ hours. Here's a couple of progress photos and some tips. Enjoy!

Getting the roofs to hunker down into a good fit is covered below.

 I used a black felt-tip marker cover the exposed edges of all the roof sections as well as some other areas around the structure.