The Devil's Play Ground

Mark Chisholm returns with a powerful modern vignette.

- Mark Chisholm

All too often, modellers find themselves on a creative plateau; happy to settle for the comfort zone, rather than experimenting with new ideas and techniques. Of course, there is nothing wrong in finding a particular niche, and being happy to develop one’s work in that area. There are, however, modellers who have never experienced the delights of diorama building. Yes, it can be a fairly complex and time  consuming operation, often requiring the learning of totally new skills … but the results are usually well-worth the effort.

The diorama I created for this project evolved over a fairly long period, the main elements being dealt with quite separately. The Trumpeter BRDM-2 kit was originally planned as an out-of-the-box weekend venture, and the figures (from Sergey Traviansky’s Evolution Miniatures range) were bought specifically to allow me to practice my figure painting techniques. These were worked on well before construction of the vehicle kit.

The approach I used when painting the figures was very simple. It began with a coat of satin black primer, followed by a base coat made from a mix of Tamiya XF- 57 (Buff) and XF-59 (Desert Yellow). The basic shade for the flesh areas was now applied using Vallejo 70.843 (Cork Brown). Once this was dry, I continued with Vallejo’s Face Painting Set, following their very useful step-by-step guide. Here it was a case of carefully building up shading and highlights using almost transparent layers. A similar technique was used for the clothing, but with the addition of oil paint washes to add depth to the folds in the uniforms. While my approach would be unlikely to pass muster on a stand-alone figure, I find it perfectly adequate for diorama work.