Category: Dioramas
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If You Build A Barber Shop, They Will Comb…

If you wish to give yourself a treat – for about $ 40 a throw – go down to the hobby shop and look at the OO/HO building kits. You’ll find them for British, North American, and European buildings, and there is hardly anything that you can imagine that cannot be bought. If you stray…
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Why The Devil Am I Writing This All Up?

You may find yourself asking this question when you read this column – or any of the other fine bits of sticky literature* I write. The humour column, the camera column, or the commercial photo column. The last named is, of course, written for money…I’m not ashamed to get paid for typing. But what of…
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I Don’t Think I’m Working Hard Enough At Being Lazy

I mean, procrastination starts with ” pro ” and you’ve gotta be dedicated for that, right? I’m typing this because there is a backlog in the Little Workshop – but it is a deliberate thing. I’ve been working on the A-20 Havoc, several P-39’s and a B-25 Mitchell. They’ve all got to the undercoat stage…
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North American Mitchell – Part One – The Lead Ship

The purchase of the Airfix B25 Mitchell was a bit of a coup – a local shop supplied it and I saved the cost of postage from the eastern states. But I did not realise until I opened it that it was a trap*. Oh, I knew the model itself was good – I do…
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OO, O, and N

You’ve often read me squawking about the disparity in scales that the makers of hobby items have foisted upon us over the years. There is no one universal scale or size for the little worlds we build. Some plastic modellers do not find this a hazard at all – all they look for is a…
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The Scale Of My Problem

I have a problem*. The scale of my model airplanes is 1:72 – and that is the general scale to which I wish to build my model airfields. I have been lucky so far – the British card kits from Superquick and Metcalf are mostly in 1:72 or 1:76 ( an acceptable compromise ) and…
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Good Morning, Walter – Part Three – Steel vs Wood vs Plastic
Walter, you and your Mum may have been wondering why I went off on a tangent about Meccano, Erector, and Dux sets last time we spoke. Let me explain. We live in a world of plastic. It’s a wonderful material and can be made to simulate nearly anything – from bricks to steel girders, to…
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Good Morning, Walter – Part Two – The Nuts And Bolts

Walter, last time we talked I told you about the Minibrix building set and suggested that there are modern equivalents – like LEGO – that will let you erect great buildings. Here are some of them at the Western Australian Model Railway Exhibition. Pretty cool, and also pretty complex and expensive. I admire the thinking…
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Sandown Park 2019 – Part Twelve – Three Laughs And One Sober Moment

So far my internet image searching has not turned up a plastic kit that has the exact characteristics of the flying shark seen at Sandown Park. I am undecided as to whether the builder cobbled it up out of other parts or just assembled a kit. In any case the painting is excellent and the…
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Sandown Park 2019 – Part Six – Before You Ask…
Back from my visit to the Victorian scale model exhibition, all my parcels have arrived, and I’ve reviewed the pictures taken on the day. Someone is bound to ask me which exhibit I thought best. After due consideration, here it is: Olympic Doughnuts in Footscray. A real model of a real place in real time.…
