I have been kicking this around for awhile thinking about whether or not to share this story with you guys.At the risk of sounding like a loud mouth,I decided that because it is a positive story and is based on fact that you guys would take it in the right spirit.
Thirty years ago I picked up a book at the local hobby store "How to Build Dioramas" by Shep Paine.Immediately I was struck by the images in the book.I had never seen something that so appealed to my creativity.It was my lucky day!I was building HMS Victory in 1/72 scale at the time and decided that somehow I would make the ship into a diorama.
For the next twenty years I would leaf through that book until it became dog-eared over time.Something kept calling me but I didn't act on it until about ten years ago when I finally gave in,I would concentrate all my efforts on storyboard dioramas.From that day on things just seemed to fall into place for me like with no other art form that I had ever attempted.I knew that this was the niche that I felt most comfortable in and my creativity had finally found its true home.
I had always dreamed of doing the same quality of work that I had seen in Shep's book.I studied his work and read and re-read the text,learning something new all the time.I wanted the same creativity and quality in my own work but I wanted it to be different too.It was a fluke of luck that my hobby store happened to have 1/16th aircraft models and doll house stuff together in the same store.Why not take the dollhouse idea and make a slight change in subject matter and create something different?
Well I went with that idea and ten years later after working(playing) at it almost every day I have three almost finished dioramas and a fourth one underway.I have found a home for them at the Canada Aviation Museum of which I am very proud.They contacted me many years ago and I am still not sure how this came about.
Well now for the good part,remember Shep Paine ,I thought why not contact him and see if he would be interested in appraising my work for the museum.I did,he agreed and I couldn't believe it.Shep Paine appraising my work! So I waited for what seemed like an eternity while he looked at my stuff.Well this week I heard from him and I am still on a high that I have yet to come down from.Can you believe that he valued the Jenny diorama alone at $25,000 dollars.I was totally shocked as I had read in his latest book that he himself got $28,000 dollars(including inflation) for his largest dioramas back in the 70's.That he would even consider my stuff on a par with his own is beyond anything that I could ever have fantasized about .
Yes,artistic dreams do come true!

Beginnings
I would like to share the following with you.I found it shortly before starting my Nieuport 28 diorama many years ago.

Until one is committed,there is hesitancy,the chance to draw back,always ineffectiveness,concerning all acts of initiative(and creation).There is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans:that the moment one definitely commits oneself,then providence moves too.All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occured.A whole stream of events issues from the decision,raising in ones favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.Whatever you can do or dream you can,begin it.Boldness has genius,power,and magic in it.Begin it now.

Johann Wolfgang Von Gorthe

Cheers! John

Excellent read John. You never have to apologize here for giving us a clearer picture.

RAF commission.
Way back in this thread I mentioned an RAF Museum, London U.K. commission that was agreed upon.We never got down to pinpointing an exact storyline and I never heard from them again.It was to be a donation as well and they seemed happy and were supposed to send me research material, which I never got. Strange eh!
I mention this because I didn't want my buds here to think I was bullsh...ing them at the time.

I just noticed that this thread is a little messed up.Sorry guys ,I will straighten it out.

nother pic

More and more I have come to believe that photography and the way your stuff is presented is just as important as the diorama itself,especially dioramas of the storyboard type.The frame, painting and lighting are just as essential in 3D as 2D art.Even "how to..." pics are more interesting when properly presented.
I have been fooling around in photobucket and photoshop as you can see.
Layering is something that I am trying to learn now so that I can have just the frame saved and add different pictures and text to it.In the meantime the above is an example of what I mean.
When my building days are over,I plan to do an on-line book of pictures and "how to's......" for my modeling buds on the internet.The best part is that it will be free!
The way I look at it is this,prior to having the internet I spend a lot of time and money tracking all this information down(I have been modeling for over 60 years)now I have all this at my doorstep ,it is time to give something back!

The following are pics that I took for the Canada Aviation and Space Museum ,of the final assembly of the first three dioramas ,for their future reference purposes.They will be deciding how to display them with only a few suggestions from me.I think that all the lighting will have to be changed to LED's or out of the case lighting ,as the glass case can't be removed to change a bulb.Therefore the pics that I have already taken and am taking now is how the dioramas were originally intended to be displayed.When I started 10 years ago LED"s were not readily available to modelers.The Albatros lighting is the most complicated as I used RR type for this.The Jenny is regular doll house lighting and the N28 is the simplest of all, 2 Christmas bulbs that plug into the wall.
I will suggest to them that the best use of the N28 would be as a shadow box but as you will see there are alternatives available to them.

Pics added to CASM final assembly album in photobucket.
N28 diorama

CASM 013 front,no lighting
012 L/H side panel off
011 " " " on
010 R/h side panel off
009 " " " on
008 panel details
007 & 005 rear panel off
006 rear panels off
004 " " on
003 & 002 lighting arrangement
001 First 3 dioramas unlighted

This diorama was meant to be lit both inside and out that is why the boards have been painted black because the thin wood otherwise would allow light to shine through.A slight separation has been maintained between each board for an "iinside the barn "look which would be option one.Option two would be to leave the side and rear panels off so the dio could be viewed from all sides,Personally I would prefer a shadowbox type arrangement with the barn look.

11-1 put wax paper under both panels.

12-1 add more wax paper between the edges of the two panels and begin laying down your soil or sand.

13-1 continue filling until gap is filled and level,then spray with alcohol.

14-1 apply glue/water mix drop by drop.

15-1 fold over wax paper and fill the other side .

16-1 both sides should now be level,let dry overnight.

Some of you guys must be wondering why does he keep posting this stuff when hardly anyone ever responds ? Well in the beginning ten years ago I wondered the same thing myself and almost gave up.I build every day so I don't have a lot of time to socialize on the net, other than sharing my work and techniques with you guys, which I find extremely rewarding.So why is it I don't quit ? well my photobucket tells me a different story.Sometimes over a five month period I can get up to a million hits ! Recently it has been running around 600,000.I post my stuff on about 35 websites; aircraft ,RR,cars and ships, some more than others depending upon what I am working on at the time.It is very time consuming but I love the opportunity to do it.You see I am almost 70 years old and I remember how it used to be years ago when most modelers built in isolation from one another, except for the occasional phone call or snail mail.Now I can instant communicate with other modelers, on a day to day basis, and show my stuff in real time.Until now this was never possible, before the era of computers, digital cameras and photobucket etc....I show it, if you like it fine, if you don't that is fine too ,but at least the majority of the official gatekeepers, as I new them,are pretty much irrelevant today and thank goodness for that. Cheers! John.
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Sorry guys this was not meant to be posted here but only to some of the newer sites that I post to .I had gotten some inquires recently so I answered them.

I am beginning to add a new pics to the Jenny Canuck album.These will probably be the last pics of this diorama as I originally intended it to be.Unfortunately a lot of viewing angles will be lost once it goes in its case.The interior lighting will have to be changed for better maintenance purposes and I believe that the roof will be set on permanently although I did leave a large viewing hole in the roof over the carpenter shop.This diorama was actually built primarily for my own picture taking purposes which I am now taking full advantage of.

The Jenny diorama requires some minor seam fixing between landscaping modules.These are not large like the ones on the Albatros so I used an easier technique to cover them.Take a look in my photobucket album: Hangar dio 3 exterior.The pics are pretty much self explanatory and the methodology I covered earlier in the Albatros album.