Berlin - may 1945

[robwesterman]

Been busy with a little side project, to practise some figure painting.

I wanted to do a scene of the final days of WW2 in Berlin. I found a picture of the Oberwallstrasse in Berlin situated in may 1945 or just after the war. I recreated part of a building, which can be seen in  the picture, with Styrodur (or bluefoam). 

The building and base.






The Oberwallstrasse in Berlin somewhere in 1945. A scene of quite some fighting, that's for sure.


This is where I'm at right now. Al figures are from the Dragon range, except the left one, which is an old figure from Verlinden (going to repaint that one). The heads are from Hornet.





Next is reworking the figures a bit and than the fun part: painting!

Cheers,

Rob 

[adt70hk]

Rob

A VERY nice start! The building looks amazing! How long did it take to get to where it is now?

Thanks for sharing.

Andrew

[Leon]

Looking really good Rob! Nice work on the building.

[TRM]

Nice scene there Rob! Building looks fantastic as do the figs!! Looking forward to seeing this one come about!

[John Everett]

Beautiful work on the building! People don't often enough provide a powerful vertical element. It can bring a lot to an otherwise simple scene.

[armorguy]

Jan 25, 2016 1:17:45 GMT -5 John Everett said:

Beautiful work on the building! People don't often enough provide a powerful vertical element. It can bring a lot to an otherwise simple scene.

Correct, such a vertical element leads the eyes to the center of the diorama.

[dierk]

Building looks ace Rob! Loving the composition of the scene. Certainly deserves a karma point.
Now, I don't know how detail-obsessed you are Rob, but in Berlin they saved themselves the work of cutting paving slabs to fit the curve of the curb but instead filled them with fist-sized dice-shaped cobbles. Tried to find you a ref pic, but failed - however this is what the cobbles look like. Used to live in Berlin in the last millennium, and always found it a strage solution - every first of May there'd be riots and the cobbles were a favourite amongst the rioters to throw at police vans.

[panzerjager2]

Great start.......looking forward to see this completed

[robwesterman]

Thank you all for your kind replies! 

@andrew: the figures are more or less stock, that didn't take me too long. They just need a little reworking and updating! I got a nice Aber Photo Etch set for that!
The building was made of sheets from Styrodur, cut with a sharp knife (scalpel or xacto will do). This took some hours to draw and cut.

@ Dierk: Thank you for the info! Well, I like to build historicaly correct. More or less :-) I did some searching on Google Earth on the Oberwallstrasse. The you can see the direction of the tiles and cobble stones (also on the pic above). So that's the reason I did it in this way, and I thought Some paving slaps could be seen. But I will check again!


Cheers,

Rob.

[dierk]

You may be right Rob - after all, my memories are post-war (I'm not that old ) and they may have changed the way they do the paving?

[tobias5555]

Good start.

[deafpanzer]

Dig the vertical base... it will draw a lot of attention once it is done!

[robwesterman]

Small update on this project! Almost finished the construction on the building and figures.

Only have to add some windows to the building and the old Verlinden figure needs to be finished.



This Dragon figure is more or less stock, only reworked the coat a bit with Magic Sculpt. 




Made a new scarf on this one with Magic Sculpt, and added a belt made of aluminium foil and a grenade.




Also touched up the coat on this figure with Magic Sculpt. Also a new belt was added.




Legs and torso came from different Dragon sets on this figure. I reworked the legs with Magic Sculpt.








Next is some last construction work and then the fun part: painting!

Grtz,

Rob.

[Leon]

Nice rework on the figures Rob! Looking forward to seeing some paint.

[Deleted]

Think it would look good with a Trooper on the third floor, ready to drop a pineapple down on them:)

[deafpanzer]

Figures look great! Looking forward to more...

[panzerjager2]

WOW, cool concept, and NICE start......if I was smart enough to figure out how to "follow" a post I would....

[modsrule1976]

Great idea and good start to the build. I love all things "late war" so I'm going to be watching this one closely!

[Deleted]

Sweet already !

[nicusi]

I'll follow you too, great project!
Cheers,
Nicolae

[adt70hk]

Rob, that really is looking like it will turn out very nicely indeed!

Andrew

[dierk]

Feb 23, 2016 0:04:51 GMT -5 panzerjager2 said:

WOW, cool concept, and NICE start......if I was smart enough to figure out how to "follow" a post I would....

Click on 'Actions' at the top of the page, click 'Bookmark' = done

[robwesterman]

Thanks again for your kind reply's guys!
Finally finished the building and the old Verlinden figure.

I wanted an ammo belt rapped around this figure. So I used an ammo belt from a Dragon kit, cut all de rounds of and glued them one by one on a thin strip of paper which was attached first on the figure. Than to finish I again attached a strip of paper. Not totally accurate, but is was the best I could do 



Also sculpted a complete arm for the first time on this one.




Made some windows of strips of wood.




I decided to build some floors, because I wanted to place a figure inside.




A Russian soldier about to throw a grenade on the German troops. This is a really nice figure from Stalingrad. 




Maybe I'm going to use another figure from Stalingrad on the top of the roof. What do you think? Skip this one and only use the figure in the building, or would this one be a nice touch?




Hopefully soon I can start painting!

Cheers,

Rob.

[Leon]

Nice work on the ammo belt and building additions Rob! Tough call on the figures,I like the Russian with the grenade.

[panzerjager2]

FAN-DANG-TASTIC work on the ammo belt....... I use masking tape as opposed to paper....But yours looks awesome

[John Everett]

I would keep the Russian in the window but not the figure on the roof. The grenade through the window is the visual surprise. The viewer doesn't notice it first thing. The figure on the roof stands out too proud. The viewer sees it first and then it ruins the surprise of the Russian in the window.

[Biskup.]

Looks really cool. Can't wait for the paint job.

[tigrazor]

So little space and such a convincing scene! A lot of craftmanship involved too - the right way to go. Theres so much to learn here. For example the ammo belt thing, gonna keep that in mind for my Kharkov dio.

Karma 4 u.

[dierk]

Excellent work and brilliant composition - but I agree with John: the Russian on the roof is 'over-kill'

[Deleted]