Akihabara Station » diorama

Airbrushing the Sidewalk

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 17:26:17 +0000

Well, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

During my most recent visit, my brother-in-law very generously gave me some of his tools he didn’t need anymore, including one of his airbrushes, a Paasche VL (whose past life is on display). And for Fathers’ Day, my delightful wife gave me a compressor to drive it.

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Street Access to the Taxi Stand

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 13:14:12 +0000

The Streets of Akiba

I’ve very nearly completed modeling the streets surrounding the north-west corner of Akihabara Station. The photo may not look like much, but the street outline—meticulously cut from scaled satellite imagery—is fringed with scale curbs and pedestrian ramps. I have still a bit of cleanup to do, and I also [...]

AKIba station PLAza—Facade

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 14:47:22 +0000

AkiPla circa 2006

Here’s my current target: A strip mall under Akihabara Station called Akiba Station Plaza, or AkiPla for short (note: Since my trip to Tokyo, it’s become an Ishimaru, a chain of electronics and home-appliance stores). You’ll need to click on the pathetically small thumbnail to see it clearly. It’s plastered [...]

A New Start

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 03:40:57 +0000

Station on printed plans

With Shogatsu in storage until November, my attention has returned to Akihabara Station. Here’s where we stand: I have some viaduct station, some paper mockups of buildings, and a plan for the streets and sidewalks. Doesn’t look so bad, for basically a few laserjet printouts. I’m a little disappointed [...]

Suigun Line—Diorama I, Take 2.5

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 04:14:18 +0000

Update 27 April 2008: I’ve added some more photos below.

Well, the static grass idea didn’t really work. Time to think of something new. Thankfully, static grass glued with PVA glue onto a glossy surface comes up really easy, so nothing was really lost—except a small amount of now used static grass, oh, and [...]

Suigun Line—Diorama I, Take 2

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 23:19:34 +0000

I never published anything about my first attempt at a Suigun Line diorama. That’s because it…it, uh. Well. Utter failure before it really got anywhere. But that’s why I did it: To learn. Here’s what I learned: You can’t use foamcore as a diorama base if you’re going to paint or glue things [...]

Shading Ballast

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 20:28:53 +0000

合格！ I have over the past couple of days learned some interesting things about Woodland Scenics ballast, and how to paint shadows into it. Tell me what you think.

Unshaded on the left, shaded on the right. As if you couldn’t tell. Yeah, it’s glossy, I know. The ballast was fixed with a mixture [...]

Model Shadows

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 01:07:19 +0000

I’m new to model railroading, but I’m not new to modeling generally. Most of my hours have been spent on wargaming, painting little tin soldiers—usually members of the Crimson Fist Chapter of Space Marines. Hello, my name is Geek.

Anyway, these figures are tiny and incredibly detailed. The thing is, when you’re standing on [...]

First Mock-Up

D.E. Goodman-Wilson — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 04:21:16 +0000

The model of Akihabara Station is going to be a kitbash of Tomix’s overhead station kit with quite a lot of scratchbuilt structure. Last week I started mocking up the flyover in carstock. This week I hope to flesh it out in styrene. This shot show my first rather sad attempt at painting [...]