Small Scale Military Headquarters

Have any of you used 'forced perspective' in setting up your dispays?...ie using a smaller scale model with a 1/18 model, to make the smaller one look like it is further away than it is?

I'm thinking of setting up a dogfight between a 1/18 plane and a 1/32 plane but am unsure how it will look and would like to know if anyone has tried it and if so, their opinions, before i take the plunge and buy and build the 1/32 kit.

thanks for any and all guidance in this matter..

Shouldn't be a problem. Only thing I can think of is detail levels. As in the smaller the scale gets the less detailed it becomes - but since it's still a big 1/32 scale it should be fine. You could try blurring (out of focus) the smaller background plane to add "depth" which could also hide possible "scale defects".

Teamski did something like that a long time ago by hanging some flights of small scale B-17s (I believe) high on the ceiling to give the impression of multiple box formations at different altitudes. I subsequently did the same an think it looks pretty cool.

Hey AFERGUSON!!!! I took this pic awhile back with 1:18 MARINES and a 1:144 HELLCAT!!!! The HELLCAT is on a small wooden rod that I photo edited out of the pic!!! if you wanted to do a dio to put up on a table you could do this and hide the stick!!!As for hanging planes from the ceiling I dont know if it would look like you want it to----But you might beable to do some tweeking and make it look great!!!---RED--- [img][img]http://img262.imageshack.us/img262/456/ ... 78u5bi.jpg[/img][/img]

i guess i should have been more clear....this isn't for picture taking, it's for display in my room. I was wondering how it looks in real life, as opposed to on film.

Red, great picture btw.

I once had a setup (in my closet of all places) where I had some BBI paratroopers hanging. For a while, I hung a 1:144 Postage Stamp C-47 from the ceiling above the paratroops to create a sense of perspective. It worked OK, but naturally wasn't perfect. I've since taken the plane down.

aferguson wrote:i guess i should have been more clear....this isn't for picture taking, it's for display in my room. I was wondering how it looks in real life, as opposed to on film.

Red, great picture btw.

...oh....that changes things. I guess it depends if you are going to view it from one direction or from multiple view points. I dont know how it would work, but you could try hanging a "frame" that forces people to view it from a certain angle.

...............Oh and RED.........stop it, your making me feel bad with your trick dio's

As hinted at above, forced perspective only works when viewed from the proper angle. So it can work for photos or films as the shooter carefully directs the angle.

But if you started walking around the room, it would lose its effect at different points.

I could see it working relatively well, though, if you had a high cathedral ceiling, with few other reference points for size (no big light hanging from the ceiling). One could then get lost in the background of the ceiling more, and a small plane might always be believeable as a larger plane viewed at a greater distance. But as soon as the eye has enough reference points to identify it as a smaller plane, the mind kicks in and says "hey, that's not right..."

For LOTR fans, the behind-the-scenes footage on Fellowship of the Ring explains it pretty well. The trick is for the viewer to not be aware of the distance between the two objects that are supposed to be a particular size relative to one another. Once enough data is available for the mind to judge the distance better, then it can start to extrapolate out what the true relative size the two objects are to one another, and the gig is up. (Though in the case of LOTR, the trick was making two similarly-scaled objects looking to be different sizes, where in the case aferg is going for two different-scaled objects to look the same; but the principles are the same).

If not for photos then basically you will be displaying different scales as best you can to not show how obvious the difference. Basically, you are on your way to collecting multiples scales..

ok so i won't do it then.

thanks for the feedback all..

RED wrote:[/img]

Great job on the diorama RED!!!! That is really well done.

As mentioned above, I used Postage Stamp B-17s and B-24s on my ceiling. They look pretty convincing.....



-Ski

Awesome job Red!!!! That is too cool!

Actually now thinking about it, (and as is shown in teamski's photo) if the smaller scale plane was hung higher as apposed to hung at the same level but further back, it works.

Teamski, I thought you were pretty adamant about not collecting anything smaller than 1:18th! However, a picture is worth a thousand words

tmanthegreat wrote:Teamski, I thought you were pretty adamant about not collecting anything smaller than 1:18th! However, a picture is worth a thousand words

Low blow.....


Anyways, for your information, I bought those a couple years ago before my self-imposed limitations.....

-Ski

they are 1/18......he's just got really high ceilings.

After experimenting a bit i can say it's really not bad...you have to look at the piece from one isolated viewpoint, closing one eye helps and it only works viewing from the direction of the 1/18 model towards the smaller scale model but when you get it right, it's really not bad at all.

I have a few good ideas now that i may try eventually. One is, when (IF) the dauntlass comes out, to get a 1/400 scale model of a japanese carrier (i think it's the akagi) and set it on a watery backround on the floor below my diving dauntlass....i think getting up on a chair and looking down from behind the dauntlass is going to look pretty cool.

Disneyworld uses forced perspective to make their buildings and attractions seem taller than they really are. All of the structures have to be below 200 Ft tall so they don't require a light beacon for airplanes.

um...this seems very related to your other post about scale..

you know somehow, when i saw you'd posted here, i knew you were going to say something like that digger, old boy.

This is an old thread, i dug it up, it's not a new thread. And the topics while related are a bit different. So rather than summerize the content of this thread with a long post in the newer thread, it seemed simpler just to post in this thread, so it would pop to the top.

WOW RED GREAT JOB!!!!


Can you just start doing a regular diorama every 2 weeks make one and post.
I love them!

I once helped a local model shop put up a display on the ceiling of their store of a armada of ships and planes of various scale hung upside down at various depths with the ceiling painted like the ocean and cotton clouds ...looking up, you felt like you were in a fighter doing a roll & looking toward the ocean...

How tall are your ceilings?

Imagine doing the IJN attack fleet headed for Pearl Harbor with 1/700 ships, 1/72, 1/48, & 1/32 planes, crowned by a 1/18 BBI Sakai Zero all upside down...hmmmm ...the battle
Midway maybe? now where is that Admiral toys SBD dauntless...

i missed you post before, Yoxford; just saw it now. That must have been one cool display in the store.....i never considerd using mutlple scales, layered like that. A bit too grand for the room i have left, however. I like the Pearl Harbour idea too...and midway.

I do have a 1/18 catalina (r/c made by kyosho). I could paint it up to look like one of the catalinas that spotted the japanese fleet at Midway, with some 1/700 scale japanese ships on the floor beneath it.

aferguson wrote:with some 1/700 scale japanese ships on the floor beneath it.

Ceiling
I understand your confusion
EDIT: This is only if you were going with Yoxford's idea.

Edit: i'm not, i'm going to put them on the floor.