Nautical Research Journal 21


Water, water everywhere…HMS Swan on a starboard tack across the North Atlantic. All photographs by the author.


HMS Swan: “Crush those seditious rebels!”— A diorama, Part


3:


Making the North Atlantic Ocean for the diorama By Ron Neilson


T ere are dozens of online YouTube videos on how to create water dioramas for marine models. However, the overwhelming majority of these focus on ‘steel navy’ models and their appropriate settings; there is lots of iron, but little oak. Some of these instructional videos display superbly-craſt ed results—mostly in very small scales like 1:700—and many are even smaller. To my disappointment, I could not fi nd any


that dealt with larger sailing ship scales. Although one can fi nd photographs of sailing ship dioramas in larger scales such as mine (check Pinterest), I found no specifi c information on how these were created.


To begin my diorama, I consulted with modelmaker Justin Cammarata, a colleague in my ship model club. Justin is the author of Waterline Dioramas: A Modelbuilder’s Artform (SeaWatch Books, 2009), an excellent and well-respected reference work on the subject. I found his detailed techniques helpful; however the majority of his excellent explanations of


building techniques are focused on scales considerably smaller than my model ships.


Adriſt in a sea of little practical information, I sought out some additional advice from artist Michael


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68  |  Page 69  |  Page 70  |  Page 71  |  Page 72  |  Page 73  |  Page 74  |  Page 75  |  Page 76  |  Page 77  |  Page 78  |  Page 79  |  Page 80  |  Page 81  |  Page 82  |  Page 83  |  Page 84  |  Page 85  |  Page 86  |  Page 87  |  Page 88  |  Page 89  |  Page 90  |  Page 91  |  Page 92  |  Page 93  |  Page 94  |  Page 95  |  Page 96  |  Page 97  |  Page 98  |  Page 99  |  Page 100