Finally some new work for India

Hello again everyone, after a long hiatus I am finally working on the dioramas again. It seemed to me to be years of not doing anything but making different trees and plants, either for myself or for others but I have done some work on the dioramas again. The project I am working on now is a big one, actually it is 2 separate projects, the first is to remove the tall green grass from the diorama and replace it with shorter patches. When the diorama was started it was just going to be the edge of a tropical forest with a large area for a herd of grazing chital deer and other scrub type animals. Now as you have seen it is a full on rainforest at the rivers edge. I have not begun to take the grass out yet, as I do I'll post photos of the new shorter grass along with the dead fall that will cover the forest floor.

The other project that I have begun is to work on the river bank. Here is a photo of the bank as it was up until a few days ago,
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You can see that the river bank is just some rocks that I made lined up along the edge. At one point I was just going to fill the river in so it covered the bottom of the rocks hiding the edge under the muddy water, well I now have a much better idea. Here is how the new rivers edge will look.
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The grass you see at the waters edge will be the same grass I use to replace the tall green grass in the few places where there will still be grass, and the water will flow into the reeds and grass a little just like a slow flowing river or stream would. I am going to put the lotus and reeds along with some cattails right at the water so they are growing out of the mud with the bases under water, maybe some of ones to the back will be above the water line. Instead of a fully rock bank there will be some places where large rocks are jutting out of the river but most of the bank will be mud with some rocks along the bank. This is a practice piece, it is about 8 inches by 4 inches but I did not want to try this on the big diorama and find out it doesn't look very good. I am really happy with the results so I will now start the mud and rockscaping of the edge to prepare it for the rest of the water.

It looks fabulous Phil, down to the smallest details! Don't stress yourself too much! It is already a stunning work of art!

It looks very very very very very very phantastic!!!!!!!!!!!!!

wow. wow. wow!
that's amazing!
Phil, where are your dioramas located? If they're here on the west coast, may I beg for an invitation to see them in person some day?

And I'm happy to finally know what is around the corner from your profile photo!

It is a very long time ago, that i saw something from this Asian diorama.
How much work you did in the passing time on this!
And how wonderfull and realistic it looks right now.
Since you made some techniques your skills, everything improves very much everytime i see this diorama.
Fantastic job Phil, keep on doing the good work!

Oh I love your new idea for the river bank, it looks really realistic Phil! And the new grass will look good too - it all looks so lovely.

That's already superb and realistic! But you want more, much harder much better, you are already very talented but you want always more and more! Go ahead and congratulations!

It is great Phil, I love your jungle, is is better and better everytime you share something with us . The new river banks are a great idea. I don't know when you will stop with it but I like with it growth... like a jungle, ever and ever

Looking great Phil. Well done :-)

That is SO life-like

It was beautyful before, but now it looks REAL !

I like the shorter grass for the jungle. You are right, the long grass was a bit more fit for open places. Probably it will also make it easier to make the trees " grow out of the ground", or so I think without having made anything like that..

Thankyou for sending the new photoes, it is always so exiting to see what new things you have made

it looks soooo brilliantly real!

You´re really talented! It´s very realistic :)

Phil, what can I say?..... WOW!!! You really did a great job on this one, love the rhino standing in the water.

Great work

Joe.

I just noticed one more detail, - the flower in the edge of the water, - doesn`t it have a flower that has turned brown and old ?
That is a fantastic realistic touch. On many flowering plants there will be both bulbs and flowers that have ended blossoming

SUSANNE wrote:

I just noticed one more detail, - the flower in the edge of the water, - doesn`t it have a flower that has turned brown and old ?
That is a fantastic realistic touch. On many flowering plants there will be both bulbs and flowers that have ended blossoming

Yes Susanne, there are all stages of growth on the diorama. In the first photo I couldn't tell because of the photo quality, but there are dead and fresh leaves growing on almost every plant on the diorama. Most of the foliage is mature, but on all of the flowering plants there are buds that are just coming up, half open flowers as well as maturing and dying flowers, same with all of the leaves, there are fresh, mature, and yellowing leaves on most plants.

That is just fantastic !!!

You would probably never see that on a "factury-made" plant

I keep seing new details whenever I look

SUSANNE wrote:

That is just fantastic !!!

You would probably never see that on a "factury-made" plant

I keep seing new details whenever I look

There is a company, Canyon Creek, that makes several trees that have damage, there are bug infested trees, lightning strike trees and fire damaged trees. I have some fully dead trees on each of the dioramas, and I have a couple of damaged trees, one with a storks nest on the top of a tall dead branch while the lower branches all have live foliage on them, but the bulk of India is a tropical forest and dead foliage is a big source of nutrients and minerals so it doesn't stay on the ground for very long.

Oh, yes, of course.
I have see that on your pictures, but I know I do not know the first thing about tree manufacturers
Better keep my mouth, - or fingers - shut

SUSANNE wrote:

Oh, yes, of course.
I have see that on your pictures, but I know I do not know the first thing about tree manufacturers
Better keep my mouth, - or fingers - shut

Don't keep quiet, that was a perfect question, of all of the manufacturers I know of only 2 that have dead or damaged trees, a few more have stumps or logs but no others have dead branches or older foliage mixed in with the fresh foliage. There are some military diorama companies that have trees damaged by artillery, Scale-A-Rama has a base with Palm trees that have been hit by shelling but they look like they are from a battle field, not appropriate for a diorama.

One thing I do for my diorama ideas is to look at model making, I use dollhouse miniatures, model railroad, wargaming and sculptures to find ideas for my dioramas. There are so many sites for all of these categories that there are endless ideas that I try to use in my work.