Author Topic: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design  (Read 126595 times)

Offline CHEWIE

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #225 on: March 6, 2007, 12:36 PM »
Any update on your thoughts Ryan?

BTW, I bought the insulation foam over the weekend, going to try and start working on the wall this weekend.  Of course my wife is all over me as I need to be working on our basement and baby room too.  I hope this will be an easy material to work with!

 :P

Offline Darth_Anton

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #226 on: March 7, 2007, 09:39 AM »
I just wanted to chime in and say how cool everything was looking so far. I finally got to get caught up and I love what I'm, seeing.
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Offline NiubNiub

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #227 on: March 7, 2007, 08:55 PM »
Daigo-bah rock entrance diorama is indeed awsome looking.
if it doesnt fit together with the rest of the dioramas, bring it for display seperately along with the other single smaller dioramas

too nice not to show off.

Niuib

Offline Daigo-Bah

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #228 on: March 9, 2007, 08:17 PM »
Thanks Frank!  Nice of you to say!
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Offline Phrubruh

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #229 on: March 12, 2007, 03:32 PM »
Things look like they are definately shaping up. Very cool stuff Daigo-Bah and Chewie.

How close are we on Patreek's Cliffs? Due date is in 5 days.  :o
« Last Edit: March 12, 2007, 03:35 PM by Master_Phruby »
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Offline CHEWIE

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #230 on: March 12, 2007, 04:52 PM »
Well things took over this weekend to where I couldn't work on the wall like I wanted.  To have the space I need to really cut it/measure it right, I need to do it on my driveway, and it was too wet out Saturday.  I'm sure when the neighbors see I'm out doing that, they'll think it's actually for my house. ;D

 :P

Offline BrentS

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #231 on: March 13, 2007, 09:13 AM »
I've got two of the trees sculpted and ready to be painted... I should be able to get them finished this weekend (I think).  My entire month of April is much much much better than Feb and Mar has been.  All of my free time will be devoted to UGP stuff.

I've got some good ideas on how to crank out the little 6" x 8" "shacks" as well. 

Offline CHEWIE

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #232 on: March 18, 2007, 02:56 PM »
I started on the wall today... it's not going to be easy at all.  It's probably going to look mostly like a stone wall, with bits of technology included in it.  I  just don't have know-how to use styrene for this (or the funds), have too many problems with foamcore in making things match up, etc.  So I am using the insulation foam for this. 

I've got it cut into 5 walled sections, and am seeing how bad this stuff frays up on the edges.  So I am attempting to smooth it out some... I'm thinking the tops of the walls will be somewhat rounded off like a smooth triangle instead of sharp angles.  Also I do have I think a pretty good idea for the gate that will be easy to do, and should look ok.

I'll try and have this finished up in the next week or so, that way if you guys don't like it hopefully there will be time to make another one or someone else who is better at this sort of thing can give it a shot.

 :P

Offline patreektherodian

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #233 on: March 18, 2007, 04:32 PM »
Keep it simple .  What about some vines from the dollar store?

Offline Ryan

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #234 on: March 18, 2007, 09:33 PM »
Ugh sorry about that delay. Midterms were last week so my brain was pretty much fried and I was running on very little sleep. Spring Break was this week, and I didn't really want to be around the computer much at all.


Anyways,

It actually would be possible to incorporate Greg's structure, fairly easily too. It would be fairly time consuming though. I had typed up a whole tutorial on how we would go about it if it were something we wanted to do, but it I think honestly would take too long, considering we only have a month and a half now. As far as the terrain goes, I have it covered. I was originally going to break it up, but because Brent and CHEWIE are the only other people with experience working with WS (that I know of that is) and both are too limited on time to really get a significant piece built. So I'm just going to tackle the whole base myself, with the exception of Patreek's cliffs and Brent's trees. Brent if you could just keep cranking out trees over the next month that'd be fantastic. Depending on the size/style you are making, we will need between 8 and 20. The thicker Dantooine type will take up more space so we won't need as many, but a nice little grove of them will really help cover some seams up. I liked the thin tree on your sample, maybe you could whip up a few of those too. If you are feeling like you are running out of time I may be able to make a few as well. Feel free to come up with some other kinds too as long as they aren't too wild and alien looking, IE not bright yellows, reds, pinks, blues, blacks, whites, etc. If anyone else would like to make a few trees you are more than welcomed to it. Just try and make at least two of the same kind so we don't have one lone tree of any certain variety amidst a bunch of others. Trees should be between 5" and 12" tall. They do need to be able to stand, we have glue on site but that may not be enough for some of the bigger trees. So if you want you can build in a peg to the bottom. A nail, screw, or a small dowel would work, don't make it much longer than 1" though. We can drill a small whole into the base at the setup and stick the peg in the whole for added support. And then we will touch up the base with WS turf products to blend them into the ground so they look like they are actually growing out of the ground. I've got the rest covered as far as prefab goes.  :)

Here is what I have so far. It is a rather crappy picture, I rushed them and they all came out blurry save for this one which was at a bad angle. This is the front 2' x 2' piece of the terrain. It is still incomplete and needs more layering, as well as bushes, and Brent's trees. I'm going to clean up the edges too, so the blue foam isn't visible and it looks more professional.


Other than the terrain we are of course left with the city. The city will be built on a platform of sorts. This will set it up to the level of the terrain. For the city floor we are going to be using 12" x 12" stone tiles from Lowe's or Home Depot. These should give us a nice uniform Imperial looking floor. We will also be able to return most of them to the store after we are done with them so they are essentially free. :) With the exception of the ones that will be cut in half of course. They are 1/4" thick however, so they won't be thick enough on their own. Underneath we are going to use two layers of 3/4" thick particle board. I guess Phruby or whoever you local put in charge of this can get some thing else, as long as the total thickness is 1.5” not including the tile. The seam between the terrain and the city will be covered by the city wall. The seam should sit right under the middle of it.  Here’s a quick cutaway of what I mean:


Glassman’s new layout looks great but for simplicity sake we are going to go with something more along the lines of mine, with a denser, more random city area, like in his mockup. The curved walls aren’t going to be easy to make, especially with the foam that Justin hasn’t settled on. That and I had already assigned Patreek his cliffs based off my design and started to design up the rest for myself. Curved tiles are not easy to make unless you have the right tools and plenty of experience cutting tile. I had wanted my city to have more density much like his, but it didn’t end up that way. Part of the reason mine had fewer buildings was because I wasn’t sure how many builders we would have who would be willing to build multiples. And I wanted to make sure we could at least fill up the space, even if the roads were fairly large.

As for the buildings I’ve decided on a concrete(ish) and steel mix for the color/design scheme. I say concrete(ish) because we need to add some kind of twist to it to make it interesting. The stone fleck paint Jesse suggested in the Concept thread could work. Against my better judgment here I’m going to give much more leeway than I had originally intended, in the way of individual construction and design of the buildings. If we had been guaranteed space back in October/November, we really could have done this right, and had a perfectly laid out city that was better designed and built. Since we don’t have that kind of time I’m going to allow more freedom in design of individual buildings, with the exception of some basic color standardization. You guys will have your choice of any material to build your buildings as long as it looks like concrete when it is painted. I think as far as paint regular paint. We need to make sure we have enough of each or it will look very unbalanced. When designing your buildings try and give them an old future look, i.e. having a technologically advanced door on and adobe type building. Be sure to look through the various sketches in the Concept thread for ideas on your buildings. Also look back through this thread for ideas too. Feel free to come up with your own ideas too as long as they fit the given size requirements.

I’ll have a complete assignment list in the next few days, hopefully tomorrow. If it isn’t up you all are welcome to start on a 6” x 8” shack, or a little vendor booth for the open-air market. The booths should be about 4.5" x 3" in size. These little booths will offer the most creative freedom as they don’t have to be built to match the rest of the town. They can be selling fruit, vegetables, trinkets, guns, or about anything else you can think of.

Let me know if anyone has any questions, or problems with anything I posted.
« Last Edit: March 18, 2007, 09:35 PM by Ryan »
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Offline BrentS

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #235 on: March 19, 2007, 12:38 AM »
Ryan,
I think your terrain looks outstanding.  I also think the cross-section of the diorama is a great idea to make sure people know what we are dealing with.

A few things from me.  I've started two trees so far.  These are BIG trees.  Here is a WIP shot:


I tried to model these after the trees that picture taht Chewie showed.  I need to clean up the trunks a little bit to hide some of the seams in the plastic cloth.  After that, the plan is to paint the trunks with various browns and add clump foliage to the upper branches and where the wires are still sticking out.  How does those look?  How many trees this style do you think you'd want?  I'll put a screw in the bottom of them so that they can be attached to through the mat and into the Polystyrene.  You may need to add some clump foliage around parts of it.

As far as buildings.  I've got a good idea for cranking out several of the 6" x 8" dwellings.  I'm going to use 2" thick Polystyerne and glue posterboard to the edges and spray with the textured paint.  Add some SW style doors and some technolgy and it should look outstanding. 

Now the downside, I've got another major project at home that will tie me up the next 2 weeks.  I've got all of April lined up for UGP stuff so I can certainly crank out as many trees and those 6 x 8 buildings as you want.  If you need me to do some other things too, I'll do my best.  However, we are really going to need to muster the troops and get some people making buildings!!

Offline CHEWIE

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #236 on: March 19, 2007, 12:48 AM »
You two ROCK!!! WOW!!!  I can really see things coming together, whoooooooo-hoooooooo!!!!!



Ryan, thank you for taking on the landscape.  I can't express how much nicer it will be with you doing that!  You're great at it, and now we lose the fear of there being an inconsistent base for it.  Wow!

Brent, I just about fell out of my chair when I saw those trees!  Those look great so far, very very impressive.

Patreek - good idea on vines... I might try to do something like that.  But, I did get a LOT done on the wall today.  I think I might need to make a few more sections that are shorter in lenth to give the "on site" team flexibility to move the walls around on site to see what really works best.  The gate, I think will look cool... it's very simple. but I think it will look like a logical type of gate.  I have a lot of painting to do on the wall, at least 5 coats of paint I'm thinking, and am going to seal it after each coat.  That should help keep it from chipping/breaking apart on the edges.


Great work guys... great work!

 :P


Offline patreektherodian

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #237 on: March 19, 2007, 08:10 AM »
Got the cliffs done. I just need to touch up the rock formations and figure how I'm going to ship it.

 here they are.




Offline PenDragon

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #238 on: March 19, 2007, 08:27 AM »
That is beautiful, Patreek!

Offline Smartypants1635

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Re: The Ultimate Group Project - Diorama Construction/Design
« Reply #239 on: March 19, 2007, 12:29 PM »
Nice job on the terrain so far Ryan! This stuff is really coming together.

Brent, those Baobab trees look amazing, a group of Baboons would look right at home in that if you ever did safari type dios.

Patreek, OMG those cliffs looks great, one thing I thing would look better is use that melt and pour plastic water stuff, to make that waterfall pop.