City fight diorama - A question of Scale

[NZEOD]

So using 1/72 Ground Troops, Armour, Destroids and Veritechs can I get away with the Yamato 1/60 Queadluun Rau at 330mm tall?

I need enemy units and am already sourcing Regult and Glaug Resin 1/72 units.

Edited January 25, 2016 by NZEOD

[VF-1A Grunt]

I have a grand vision for eventually modeling a 1/72 city scene from the SDFM Episodes 1-2 battle, with a Tomahawk (possibly damaged) calling in two CF VF-1As to target a Regult that he's spotted down the street. The Battroids would be building or two behind the Tomahawk, who is watching the Regult at the next intersection. Aside from this needing to be a larger scene (maybe 5-6 feet long), modeling all the structures would be a challenge. I think nearly all the 1/72 buildings that are commercially made are World War II era, so it would mean scratchbuilding. To get the look of the modern city as depicted in SDFM (which is now in the past for us, ironically) would mean a lot of concrete slab structures, which could be done with sheet styrene covered with flat concrete-color paint. A parking garage could be a good-sized example. The big challenge is that I would want to model at least one or two structures "rubbled" as if they had been hit by explosives or the enemy bombardment of the city. I'd love to have one of the Battroids crouched behind a huge pile of rubble and peering over the top. That would involve pouring and then smashing a lot of plaster into believable-looking chunks of concrete, with protruding rebar, etc. Maybe some cars smashed underneath too. This could actually probably serve as a large display case for mecha that I could periodically switch out or rearrange. With the amount of work involved, it would need up being my one and only diorama anyway!

[NZEOD]

no... I have found a source of modern and scifi buildings including highrises

[VF-1A Grunt]

Is that a source you can share? If you need to get yours first, I totally understand, but I'd love to see some buildings like that. However, I think I'd enjoy building some of my own too - just don't want to have to build all of them!

Edited January 25, 2016 by VF-1A Grunt

[NZEOD]

I'll post up some links when I get home from work, but I still need the topic question answered...

[VF-1A Grunt]

Sorry, I totally missed the question - reading it quickly, I thought it was a statement (no "?"). 330mm at 1/60 would be 19.8m tall, or 23.76m at 1/72 (if my rusty math is correct). The Mecha Manual says the QR is either 16.75m tall (SDFM) or 17.11m (DYRL), so the model is tall anyway, but it would be almost 50% taller than the manual states if you use the 1/60 toy in a 1/72 scale scene. Looking at it another way, 19.8m at 1/72 would be 275mm, so the model is 55mm taller than it should be at 1/72. For comparison, a Hasegawa Battroid is 176mm tall, so the QR will be twice as tall.

I personally think it will look a little too large. If it was a 1/60 Glaug or Regult, I think it might be ok, because I feel like models of those two seem to be a little undersized (see the current Tru Scale Regult discussion). That gets into the whole discussion of scale as represented in the animation and the manuals, but just based on the comparative size to the Battroid, I think it will look too big. Hope that helps.

Edited January 25, 2016 by VF-1A Grunt

[NZEOD]

given it houses a 8.5 to 10m tall Meltran warrior... I think its about right. Thats not including the freak of nature Klan Klang. Glaugs should tower over all of them, then the Nous, then the Rau, then the Regults in size.

Think I'll take a gamble and buy one to size up.

Edited January 25, 2016 by NZEOD

[vincemoto7]

Does anyone out there have a 1/60 Queadluun they can put next to 1/72 destroids or battroids, snap and post a pic.

[NZEOD]

or even next to an upright ruler and I can photoshop it next to a scaled Hasegawa Battroid. My scale theory is based on the idea the Battroids were developed to fight the supposed giant aliens crewing the SDF-1 before it crashed. So the VF-1 would have been around the size of a zentran and not the pods, which wouldnt have been known about at that time.

So the pods SHOULD tower over the Valks

Edited January 26, 2016 by NZEOD

[VF-1A Grunt]

I was always one of those who thought that Battroids and the giant aliens were supposed to be the same size, so a Battroid should be able to fit inside a Regult, for example. However, as I go through a lot of reading to catch up on what I've missed about Macross technical data over the past couple decades, I'm becoming convinced that the Zentran / Meltran should be a couple meters shorter than a Battroid. You've probably read this already, but I thought this Technical Manual article is a great piece on the subject:

http://www.macross2.net/m3/macrosstechman/tech-zentradiheight.html

I still think the Regult and Glaug models do tend to be undersized though. I'd have to take another look at DYRL since reading the article to see how the animation depicts the relative size of the QR and Battroid.

[NZEOD]

dont...lol the animation is all over the place. Its really just best guess at this point and how your minds eye sees things. I'm used to seeing vehicles and picturing the crew space (in order to best attack that point and determine what equipment and voids would be between my shot and my target location, especially given how much a Nato SS109 rd loves to deviate on passing through panel steel, lowered glass window, internal door lining, seat material then finally the target!) so when I look at the pods... they just HAVE to be bigger.

Afterall, Kamjin was suited up inside the Glaug in an F1 Racer seating position comfortably, not too cramped at all.

Heres are some images that mess with the theory of Valk vs Zentran heights...

And the Rau in this image is in the background behind the 10m tall Zentran...

That image puts the soldiers at the Raus knee, so its closer to 23m tall in this image which is about what it will be using a 1/60 one as 1/72 (330mm is about 23.7m tall)

... which then gets screwed up by the Rau off top the right side in the front of the troops knee only being shoulder height on the Zentran.

And a favorite...

Edited January 26, 2016 by NZEOD

[TehPW]

what episode is that from (the zent about to kill the Monster crew?)

[Jefuemon]

what episode is that from (the zent about to kill the Monster crew?)

That's Kamujin riding a Monster like a horse, not getting ready to kill the crew. It's one the the later, post war episodes of SDFM.

[wmkjr]

Found this pic on Flickr. Is this yours Jefuemon? You have a very nice collection. Both of these are 1/72 scale. Club M and Hasegawa kits I believe:

Edited January 26, 2016 by wmkjr

[Big s]

This question always makes for fun arguments. Most of the time in animation when a vf1 is in a scene with a zentraidi soldier or pilot they are more or less the same size, while sometimes the mecha will be a mix of the same height or will appear as a towering machine almost twice the height. The manual pics show the zentraidi being a mix of height from just over waist high to a vf1 for pilots and others like Breetai being closer to the same height and other characters being even bigger.

I guess you just have to choose the scale on personal taste. Personally I like the idea of the zentraidi being about the height of the valkyrie. It just makes them seem more menacing.

[MechTech]

Several of us scratch building have run into this problem also known as "anime magic." Stuff looks good in the book or in the anime, but the two don't work out right, not even in multi-viewed drawings side by side! I've attached one sample that I use to scale with (higher res available). The B/W drawing is official and the other is a fan compilation. As drawn in B/W, stuff works out - I've built several items in 1/350th using this scale to include a Spartan, a VF-1J GBP / fighter, Regult and a Monster. The real answer was mentioned earlier, the Zentraedi vary in size. Officially, soldiers are 10M tall.

One word of caution, the anime messes stuff up BAD and is inconsistent. Look at MANY screenshots for anything you want to reference including color because there will be inconsistencies. The newer CGI stuff may not be as bad, but the older hand drawn art is notorious for inconsistencies, some were on purpose as jokes by bored artists. According to the B/W drawing, Kamujin and the Monster are pretty close to scale in that screenshot. EXO and I have scaled them about the same too. Hope this helps! - MT

[Grayson72]

What is your source for modern buildings please?

[Jefuemon]

Found this pic on Flickr. Is this yours Jefuemon? You have a very nice collection. Both of these are 1/72 scale. Club M and Hasegawa kits I believe:

Yep, that's mine!

[NZEOD]

This is more the size differences between Zent/Meltrandi and Human machines I was thinking... Although the Regults need to be a bit bigger.

Edited February 14, 2016 by NZEOD

[Major Focker]

nice.

what scale are those?

[NZEOD]

Those are the figures from the abomination that is the tabletop wargame Robotech Tactics. Warhammer 40K figure sized.

Edited February 15, 2016 by NZEOD

[MechTech]

They don't look bad except for those "non-cannon" kits - MT

[Major Focker]

IIRC, Robotech Tactics is 1/270?

if the Regults are undersized, i wonder if they'll do for 1/350? hmmmm...

nah. i'll just wait for MechTech's awesome Regults. would be nice if they were also accompanied by N-Gers and QRs

anyway, i came across these diorama accessories series called Tiny City by an HK company called Tiny. They're 1/64 but probably can be fudged for 1/72

[NZEOD]

Got sidetracked tonight looking for some Ground vehicles to go with the Destroids and Valks in the city fights.

Short list is the Panard VBL as a recon unit with the UN Marines.

The Fennek as the alternative

The GTK Boxer as the IFV

[wmkjr]

That antitank version Panhard would be dope. And the Fennek with the observation mast up laying low somewhere would be cool.

[NZEOD]

I'll be up arming the IFVs with anti Mecha weapons like 30mm and up Autocannons, Missiles and M61 Gatling systems.

I've avoided Tank main guns as after watching the Jordan desert fight on Transformers you can see how slow and out matched a large calibre single shot weapon is vs Mecha.

So the Israeli/Russian led Anti UN forces will be fielding Merkavas, T90s and Terminators while the UN Marine and UN Spacy support units will use more high rate of fire weapons and faster vehicles like LAVs and pretty much nothing tracked. Given how the story goes that the Destroids are the new tank, they dont need any MBTs now.

I've gone with the idea the UN Marines are based off the Regiment Combat Teams and using more Euro equipment as the US and Asian UN Members were tied up with Overtech development. All the equipment with have similar euro style camo including the UN Marine Destroids and Valks as they will be primarily used to combat the Anti UN forces on Terra Firma while the UN Spacy/UN Navy units will be more USA/Japanese based in look and organization and be thinking towards whats expected to arrive soon from beyond the solar system.

Obviously the lack of info on the UN Marines would be down to the low survival rates of the units on the ground when the SDF-1 folded to Pluto. Any surviving units were absorbed into the UN Spacy forces.

No amount of training will have an IFV buttoned up and ready for instantaneous travel from down town Macross Island to High Orbit Pluto.

Edited February 17, 2016 by NZEOD

[charger69]

IIRC, Robotech Tactics is 1/270?

if the Regults are undersized, i wonder if they'll do for 1/350? hmmmm...

nah. i'll just wait for MechTech's awesome Regults. would be nice if they were also accompanied by N-Gers and QRs

anyway, i came across these diorama accessories series called Tiny City by an HK company called Tiny. They're 1/64 but probably can be fudged for 1/72

It will work great as a Bandai DX diorama with VF-25F in gerwalk mode!

[Major Focker]

damn, why didn't i think of that!

[VF-1A Grunt]

No amount of training will have an IFV buttoned up and ready for instantaneous travel from down town Macross Island to High Orbit Pluto.

Very few, if any, armored vehicles are actually airtight (maybe the Fox and other NBC detection vehicles). The Abrams tank, for example, uses positive pressure inside the crew compartment to continuously force air out of all the cracks and crevices to prevent anything "bad" from getting inside. The NBC system pulls in outside air and purifies it to create that positive pressure. That wouldn't work so well in space! I'm guessing you know all of this, but I thought I'd mention it for the rest of the group.

[NZEOD]

VBL, FENNK and BOXER are they are designed with NBC attacks in mind. Hence why I chose them. None of them will survive vacuum outside the vehicle though. They wont survive zero degrees kelvin either. And the worse oversight would be the Engines requiring oxygen to run. They stop so does the generators.

My background is as a Microbiologist before joining the NZ Army Ammo Techs and IEDD Unit

Edited February 20, 2016 by NZEOD

[NZEOD]

Need some advise on how to damage the outside of a Walthers Apartment Block building. Its Styrene with a Slab Concrete and Brickwork patterned exterior and Black Ali window frames.

I've gone down the route of building it and painting it complete then going back and damaging the parts that need it.

The type of damage will be from a VF-1 lending against it. A foot taking out the foyer doors and cracking the pavement, the shoulder and remaining Fast pack scraping the walls a few floors up and the hand gripping a brickwork corner.

Anyone tried this before?

Guessing the glass will need to be blown out on the foyer and maybe the windows behind the booster and shoulder and some fallen brickwork on the pavement.

Wondering if the windows on the side facing the street where the booster was blown off need to be blown out and curtains fluttering. The attack will be from a 120mm HEAT round or a LAHAT Tandem charge ATGM fired from a Merkava. So there would be some blast but most of it would have been directional down the street.

I've already chewed up the head laser, shoulder sensor and top portion of the FAST Pack and the FAST back will have a small fire burning in its remains. The Valk has a scorched head and shoulder.

Dremel the building face? open a wall to the room behind? I have a bent street light and damaged car that the Valk stepped/stumbled over

Edited March 13, 2016 by NZEOD

[MechTech]

For explosive rounds hitting stuff, the best recreative effect I've found is to drill a hole (all the way through if that's what you want and then cover the back with tape) and then fill it with match head scrapings. CAREFULLY hold a lighter next to it to set it off. Just do it last or your gloss/matt coatings will ruin the realism. No kiddos, I'm not condoning playing with matches - this is art

The busted up building pieces could be recreated with plaster or old busted up concrete (sand only). You may need to recreate breeze block or brick work under stucco work. Have fun with it - but not TOO much fun! - MT

[NZEOD]

its not shot damage, its 13tons leaning on it none to gently damage.

As an aside, the 13ton 12m tall Valk facing off against a 65ton Merkava III... its hard to reconcile the weights of those two...

Also smokeless powder would work better in your matchhead idea.

Edited March 14, 2016 by NZEOD

[NZEOD]

A hard lesson learnt. The Aoshima 1/72 JGMCV kit is NOT 1/72... more like 1/87 or something tiny.

It was meant to be my UN Spacy Wheeled MBT yet its smaller than the Boxer APC, the Fennek is the same height as it and my 1/72 ground troops are as tall as its top deck.

Time to rip off the Turret and 105mm and fit it to a Boxer APC and throw the rest away I think.