Re: "Resupply Day Shenanigans"
Well, I have a few photos of the beginnings of this project. Like most of my figures and dioramas, I come up with an idea and then try to figure out if I have any figures that might be close to some of the poses I want. I go to my vast collection of figure parts and try to piece things together to minimize the amount of sculpting that I will need to do yet still have some good animation in the poses. Here is a picture that is an example of what I mean (in reality, it encompassed our dining room table while I searched for the right parts...and I'm still making changes as I find better arms, etc.) by going through the figures and parts that I have to try to come up with poses that will work for the scene. Based on this photo, there will be some parts that I will use for this project and others that I won't. As far as the figures go, I may cut them to pieces to convert them to something totally different that what they were originally attended for when they were in kit form. This will become more apparent as this build progresses
I just happened to find a figure body that is going to work for one of the figures I plan on having in this diorama. The torso and legs are from the Hobby Fan 81mm Mortar Crew kit. The arm is from a Hobby Fan kit that was in the parts box. The head is from Hornet. The hand holding the can is from Verlinden.
In this photo, I have added a right arm to the figure (from the Hobby Fan 173rd Airborne Recon Attack kit) and have used Squadron Green Putty to fill in the gaps and air holes in the resin. Another figure that will be in the background of the diorama is from Armand Bayardi of a GI urinating. I added some detail to the top slanted pockets and will be sculpting the proper cargo pockets. I changed out the boots of the kit with some from Legend or Coree that contained more detail to them. The head is going to be a converted Hornet head.
This next photo is going to be the Soldier who the prank is being pulled upon. He is made up of all kinds of parts. His legs are from the Bravo 6 figure of SGT O'Neil which was in the lower left corner of the first photo. The torso is from teh Hobby Fan Mechanized Infantry kit, the head is from Hornet's sleeping heads, and the arms are from Hobby Fan kits. I still have to do the putty work and sculpting, but this gives me the pose that I want. A mound of shaving cream is going to be placed into the right hand of this figure and after I finish the sculpting of the uniform details, he will be placed on a air mattress that I will be fashioning out of Miliput.
In the following photo, I am planning out the placement of the figures around the sleeping Soldier. The legs are from some Hobby Fan figures (the figure kit of 5 Marines at Hue City) which I chose because they have the correct jungle boot sole for the time period I am depicting (1967). I'm actually going to place them in the opposite positions than shown in this photo. The guy on the left side of the picture is going to be spraying shaving cream into the sleeping Soldier's hand and the one on the right is ready with a branch with a leaf on it to tickle his face causing him to put a handfull of shaving cream into his face. The sleeping Soldier will be inside a poncho hootch, so the two jokesters will be half in and half out from under the poncho hootch. Everyone else in the diorama will be placed so they are conducting various resupply day activities, but are aware of the shenanigans that are about to occur.
I plan on most of the figures in this diorama to be laughing or at least smirking about the shenanigans being performed. Here are some of the Hornet heads that I may use. I'm going to paint all of them separate from the bodies and just choose the one's that turn out best.
Hopefully this diorama turns out well. We'll just have to wait and see how it progresses.