Today's post comprises images of my remaining Japanese model buildings, built in about 1986. By the way, if anyone's not realised it, nearly all the images on this blog will blow up into much bigger, clearer ones if you click on them.
Firstly there's a wooden keep with a stone mound and stairway, very much inspired by the Kurosawa film "Ran". As with the original Japanese castle, it all comes apart floor by floor for gaming purposes, and there are one or two alternative ways the model can be assembled. Once again the figures are mainly sculpted by me, although I used heads from commercially available figures of the time. As you can see the flowing design of traditional Japanese clothing came out alright in some places, but defeated me in others!
The Linka cast stonework had been abandoned by this time and I made the stonework of the mound just by gluing on pieces of carboard and texturing them a bit with household filler. The result was totally robust, and I would never go back! The castle building is all from balsa, but I used plastic model railway fencing to surround the observation platform. Again this "drove out" the fragility problems.
Finally, here's a couple of pictures of a Samurai town mansion which I built. They only show the courtyard really. Some day I must take some proper photos of the detailed interior, which even has real sliding doors.
Lovely buildings
ReplyDeleteYep - amore stunning work - and according to you, this is early work, before you refined your skills - I cant imagine how good your models are now, if you think these are not as good as what you can do nowadays!
ReplyDeleteExactly my thoughts, Keith! Amazing work.
DeleteThankyou, guys. And yes, I am sure my models have got better since these efforts of 30-odd years ago! For one thing, I studied modelmaking at university, so I should hope that time wasn't entirely wasted. And then I worked professionally in this field for several years, which again I learned from. The reason I have ended up posting photos of my models in something like chronological order is that I am trying to show what I learned that made my models gradually better. I hope that will be of interest, and also helpful to those who want to have a go themselves.
ReplyDeleteJohn, what I am learning from your displays is that this level of craftsmanship is beyond my capabilities.
DeleteDon't say that Jonathon! I look at some people's figure painting (Kevin Dallimore, David Imrie say) and think I literally can't do that. But I can learn something from how those guys have gone about their work, especially when they share their techniques, and so I can achieve better work if I try.
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