1/350 Enterprise Diorama

[danimalmagic]

And you thought it was the Aircraft Carrier, Suckers!!! 

 

Hi all, it’s been a while since I posted last but with good reason, for the last 14 weeks I have been working at this 1/350 Diorama and it has been quite a challenge but it is now finally done. The basics of the project were a bespoke internally lighted back box with a star field effect, 2 x 1/350 Klingon Birds of Prey (KBOP’s) and of course the rather huge 1/350 Enterprise Re Fit with a shuttle coming into land.

I started out with the Back Box, this is made from 2 sheets of Aluminium Sheet 2.5mm thick x 610mm wide x 2250mm long separated with an internal wooden frame to create the cavity for the lighting. I needed redundancy here so 2 x SMD Light Strips have been used, in the even one fails the DC supply jack can just be switched to the back-up rig. On top of this I have designed the ships so that they be removed from the Light Box at any time and the front of the Light box can be removed if it is ever required to change both LED strips.

This was the initial test of the light box, I have drilled various size holes and some have coloured clear filters on the inside so some of the starts are different colours, red, Blue etc.

Next up was the two KBOP, I have used varying lighting kits over the years and I tend to use Starling Technologies now whenever possible. He does a plug and play set for the KBOP which has really good light effects and a sound card with optional remote control FOB. I needed both KBOP to work off one remote FOB and after a few chats with Stan at Starling Technologies he had a simple solution for this, both kits are basically pre wired plug and play, there is some minimal soldering needed but for the most part they are ready to go, awesome.
Lots of paint filters, washes and dry brushing to make the KBOP look a bit rusty and beaten up.

First test of lights and RC.
https://1drv.ms/v/s!Aqom4v1uZi83hDspaNRG39XQxzk-
Next up was by far the biggest task, the Enterprise, I have built one of these before and lighting a kit adds all sorts of issues. To make the build as expedient as possible I used the pre wired Trek Modeller Kit as this quite simply saves a massive amount of time in wiring and soldering, the kit was excellent but had one snag no working weapons, sounds effects and RC Unit. I needed sounds and effects to match the KBOP’s to create the battle effects so it was back to Stan at Starling.
The easiest way around this was to install Stans Gen 3 Re Fit kit in the saucer and use that to just supply the 4 x working Lasers, the Photon Torpedo Launchers the Sound effects, Lighting effects for the Shuttle Bay,Impulse Engines, linked Impulse Crystal, Impulse Engines and the Warp Nacelles.
This would basically also give me some additional lighting redundancy but is primarily for the various light and sound effects, the Trek Modeller kit would supply the internally lighting and Shuttle Bay etc.
Shuttle Bay LIghts
https://1drv.ms/v/s!Aqom4v1uZi83hEdZoTmC8el1bxol
Enterprise Weapons Test
https://1drv.ms/v/s!Aqom4v1uZi83hEvPRvxIhK8ZkajM
The Astek decals for the Kit are a nice touch, very thin and delicate much like Cartograf quality just much bigger, the standard kit decals had some issues with breaking up, I had to get some spares from Polar Lights. My advice to anyone who builds this kit cover the standard kit decals with Microscale Liquid Decal Film first, it will save you some grief, I got the tip off a friend and it worked really well. I have had this issues with most of the standard Polar Lights kit decals i have used.

With that all done it was just getting it all connected and mounted then final testing.

 

Lights off and action.
https://1drv.ms/v/s!Aqom4v1uZi83hXOtNvsAOUFmlMNg

I know its not everybody's favourite subject but i have to say i enjoyed this project.

Thanks for Looking

 

Danny

 

 

Edited January 29, 2019 by danimalmagic

[BiggTim]

Wow, that is damn cool!

[rigor]

That is awesome think it's the first I've seen anyone do this 

[danimalmagic]

16 hours ago, rigor said:

That is awesome think it's the first I've seen anyone do this 

Yes, i do not recall seeing anything quite like it either and needless to say i will not be doing another, that was a long road.

 

 

[dodgem37]

This is FABULOUS!  Great effort.  Great show.

 

Sincerely,

Mark

[ScottsGT]

Amazing.  And I just wanted to build a shadow box with indirect lighting for mine.

[Shawn M]

WOW

that may be the most bad a*& thing I've seen in a while

[Out2gtcha]

Wow, that is COOOOOOL!

[Telepatu]

Very nice indeed!

 

Br, Jani

 

[SCRATCH BUILDER]

Where you going to display it, the wife would have a fit..

[Gazzas]

That's freaking awesome!

[danimalmagic]

7 hours ago, SCRATCH BUILDER said:

Where you going to display it, the wife would have a fit..

It's is not for me, a commission project.

[danimalmagic]

Thanks guys, just spent the day packaging for shipping, that's the last hurdle