Irimali's Dioramas

[AcroSauroTaurus]

Very beautiful scene, I would love to see one with an Acrocanthosaurus. 

[irimali]

Diorama entry 2017! 

Here's the photo I ended up using:



and a few alternates that didn't make it:







Didn't get a lot of progress pics on account of time, but some of the details are easier to see in these pics anyway.  What I wanted to show was the very beginning of the Triassic period.  The forests of Glossopteris trees in the south of Pangea have only recently died.  Their leafless trunks haven't all toppled yet.  Shade loving tree ferns and understory plants have left only roots and dried stems.  Leaf litter and topsoil have been lost, but wind blown volcanic ash from half the world away still drifts down and fertilizes a few weedy plants in the newly opened space.  The smaller, burrowing species of Lystrosaurus have hung on by digging for plant roots and taking shelter in the most extreme weather.

[irimali]

Close-ups of Lystrosaurus:









I started with a more traditional looking lystrosaurus, but put more soft tissue on the face which changed the appearance a bit.  I gave them a little bump of a nose and some fleshed out cheeks.  The coloring on the face was inspired by wombats, to hint at their relationship to mammals, while the pattern on the body is kind of toad-like but not really based on any one thing.  Just a mud brown camouflage for forest floors and stream banks.  It makes them rather difficult to photograph on a mostly brown background.

[Jose S.M.]

Great work! I love your Lystrosaurus. The diorama was very beautiful, even the shots you didn't used are pretty great.

[Federreptil]

You are an great artist in every point of view. So many ideas and such a great plan. I'm always impressed how fundamental your working is. I like your details and admire the special atmospheres. So I liked the final entry a little bit more than the other shots, because here is the mood perfect. Nevertheless the other views are awesome.

So it's a shame, that your fantastic work and details of the older dioramas are now lost because of the photobucket botch. I will be very happy, if you can restore the lost links with a more friendly hosting service. I miss not every photo in the forum but these are lost odds-on favorites.

[irimali]

You are an great artist in every point of view. So many ideas and such a great plan. I'm always impressed how fundamental your working is. I like your details and admire the special atmospheres. So I liked the final entry a little bit more than the other shots, because here is the mood perfect. Nevertheless the other views are awesome.

So it's a shame, that your fantastic work and details of the older dioramas are now lost because of the photobucket botch. I will be very happy, if you can restore the lost links with a more friendly hosting service. I miss not every photo in the forum but these are lost odds-on favorites.

Thank you!  And thanks for letting me know about my old pics.  I knew some of them were on photobucket but hadn't realized how many.  I have finished diorama shots on flickr so I started replacing the links in those old posts.  Process pics may take a bit.  I have to find a new free hosting site or see how much flickr costs.  I have a free account on there now which limits me to 200 photos.

[Bokisaurus]

Congratulations! Yours is one of my favorite and glad it won. The level of craftsmanship is just impressive! Your attention to detail is something to strive for!
Thanks for sharing the process, it's one of my favorite part of the contest, seeing how everyone did theirs.

[postsaurischian]

Wonderful!! You're a worthy winner.
I would have voted for each of your alternative shots as well .

[acro-man]

Gorgeously made!
I love the second one best.
Btw, can you share how to make that misty effect?

[irimali]

Gorgeously made!
I love the second one best.
Btw, can you share how to make that misty effect?

Thank you!  For the misty i used a can of spray:

http://www.filmtools.com/diffusionincan.html

I sprayed the smoke between the painted bacxground and the diorama.  The background is pretty pale to begin with, and since it's out of focus in most of the shots it looks foggy.  I shot mostly at F5, so there's a real shallow depth of field.  Here's the background:



It helps too that the sky is mostly white and everything in the foreground is dark.  So in most of the shots the background is overexposed.

[irimali]

So, my Lystrosauruses have moved into their permanent home.

[irimali]

Here are some close-ups:



The horsetails are wire covered with a mix of acrylic molding paste and green paint.  Here's the molding paste i used:

http://www.dickblick.com/items/00628-1045/

I used the same mixture for the ferns as well.  For the horsetails i used a piping bag and a small writing tip:

http://www.wilton.com/2-round-piping-tip/402-2.html#q=2&start=14

Each leaf whorl was piped on a sheet of plastic.  When they were dry, I stuck the wire stem through them and painted a little bit more green underneath them to glue them in place.

Pleuromeia:





These are clubmosses, up to 6 feet tall.  Right at the beginning of the Triassic there was a huge spike in club moss populations.  Their spores drifted on the wind and colonized the devastated landscapes.  For these I used Spruce tree twigs as the stems and flower buds from a longleaf plantain(picked while still green and then dried) for the cones.  The leaves are all cut from paper, hand painted and glued on one by one.  Not sure how long the dead leafless stalks would remain upright but I thought it looked neat. 

[irimali]

And finally, the dead trunk of a glossopteris tree:



This was a wire frame wrapped in yarn and covered in a mix of gesso and sand.  The bark texture was done with a wet paintbrush before the gesso dried.  The little twigs on the branches are embroidery floss, dipped in a mix of white glue and water, and then dried flat with the individual threads spread apart.  The moss on the roots is just green chalk.  I rubbed it on sandpaper, brushed glue on the tree, and dusted the chalk powder over the glue.

[acro-man]

You freeze the time!

[Lanthanotus]

Gorgeous as always

[Kayakasaurus]

I like it even more now. The painting background worked great. So many cool effects to create depth, it really felt big, like the swamp went on for miles. Great work!

[ceratopsian]

The permanent home looks superb. The detail you give on creating the plants is quite amazing.

[Halichoeres]

I really admire the care you put into the plants, in addition to the obviously superb lystrosaurs. Wonderful work.

[Jose S.M.]

That permanent setting is wonderful!

[Daspletotyrannus]

You make very lovely dioramas.  I can't wait to see more from you.