Hey mate - thats exactely where I will drive to, tomorrow...!








I will post some pics here...


Cheers

My 1st of May...


The classic car season is open - and traditionally, we members of the "Citroen Veterans Club" today in Bruchhausen-Vilsen (40 km south of Bremen) have come together for their traditional meeting!

And as always we had our reserved "family place"!









It was really fun to meet the brand family - and about 400 other old cars and about 200 old bikes around!





Every "Traction Avant" is different - but each one is beautiful!







This "Traction" was the oldest - and it belongs to Gunda, who really does everything herself! The beautiful old suitcases on the roof are not only props, but there are all her tools in them - and the devil knows how she managed to get the registration officer to approve her license plate ...:



Mine...:





You remember the grey one, Nap...?





My "Traction Avant" was the dirtiest of them all! Actually, I wanted to wash her one day before the meeting and polish her to a high gloss - but when I unpacked her "hibernating" after five months, I found a mouse nest in the back seat - and instead had to torture myself for hours with a vacuum cleaner, carpet foam and sponge to eliminate the "legacies" of the cocky rodent!



And not a hundred meters from the meeting then suddenly a gruesome scratching and grinding noise rattled through the car! Terrible, I still have that nasty sound in my ear!

In the first shock, I suspected, "Now the gearbox has burst!" - but there was already a countercommer next to me and said with a grin: "Your license plate hangs down at one side!"

Puuuh - so it was a beautiful meeting!
Enjoy the pics!

Cheers

39. Day, May 2, 2019


Where were we? Oh yes, the socle plate!

First of all, I painted my miniature record, with this picture here ...



... served as a template.

The colors ...:



The result...:




By the way, I have only painstakingly painted the part of the "record" that will be seen later ...


Then came the real plate, a record cover!

I chose this one here ...:




In the photo Vladimir Semyonovich is about the same age as the bust shows it, wearing the same haircut, the photo is written in Cyrillic and thus suggests that we have a Russian in front of us!

In addition, the photo shows him a downright typical pose - with a cigarette namely!

The thing I have me in miniatur form - matching with the "record" - on 180-gram paper (there seems nothing through!) printed and drawn a simple transaction ...:




Then it is cut out, folded ...



... and glued ...:




So - now I have everything together to finish the bust!

But I will do this next week - as long as the "record" may still dry ...


Cheers

Outstanding idea for the plinth. Looking forward to admire the finished piece.

40. Day, May 6, 2019

So - let's start assembling!

Due to previous bad experiences I will do this in several steps. In the past I was often too fast with it - damaging finished figures or otherwise putting me in trouble.

And Vladimir Sejonovich should be perfect - as far as I can!

First, I grabbed one of the two small speaker boxes, which will deliver the matching socle and carefully drilled two holes ...:



The back - big - hole will pick up the pin of the bust, the front - small - is for the microphone!




The distances and the appropriate height in which the bust must be mounted, of course, were previously determined exactly.

If the bust seems "too high", let it be remembered that Vladimir Semyonovich still holds his guitar in front of his stomach - and if I mount the body lower, the guitar with the body would sit on the pedestal!

Second step:

Vladimir Semyonovich's head is mounted on the body - fits!


Then I protect the pedestal with painter's crepe from uncontrolled smearing around with two-component adhesive - and Vladimir Semyonovich moves to the speaker- socle.

The biggest difficulty was to mount the bust exactly in the vertical, as the loudspeaker box tapers towards the back to something funnel-shaped.

The backlight photo shows what I mean ...:


So - and there he is now ...:




So much for today.
Cheers

41. Day, May 7, 2019


I just have mounted Vladimir Semyonovich's hands and his implement!

As always, when three adhesive dots have to be fixed together at the same time, the installation was a bit tricky - but quite contrary to my custom I managed it without malaise ...:









The good fittings of the bust - the angle of the hands is given by square passport holes! - have made things much easier.

Thank you "Legion"!

Three things make me happy:

I have measured the height of the pen of the bust correctly - it fits everything!

Secondly, when I painted the guitar, I defined the light and shadow zones correctly - lights and shadows are now where they should be ...:



And thirdly:

Now, so to speak, I can "bring in the harvest" for making so much effords assembling the strings, not simply glueing them to the fingerboard, but, as with the big role model, sticking to the lower bridge and the vocal screws - and to keep them movable.

Vladimir Semyonovich can now - just like the real one - strike a tone with his right hand ...



... and pick up a tone with the left one...:



I do not know if the tone is right - I consulted a photo.

My own guitar game never got beyond the first ten bars of the opening Rif of "Smoke On The Water" ...

Finally, I painted the pin black, to let it "disappear" visually a bit.

Now missing are the microphone, its cable and the base plate ...


Cheers

42. Day, May 8, 2019

I have just built the microphone on the pedestal - it fits **hurraaah!** true to scale ...:








Then I connected the cable - but I could forget my first idea to use the original cable of the mini-speaker, unfortunately. It is too thick!




But in the seemingly endless remnants of my previous life as a ship model maker, a matching cable from my then RC stuff found that fits exactly into the connection opening of the microphone ...:






Remains to me only to lay the cable and mount the socle plate ...


Cheers

This is an amazing creation Martin! Superb work.

Well done,
Ken

43. and last Day, May 9., 2019


Today is a good day..



...to complete my project "Vladimir Semyonovich Vissotsky"!

First, I have the cable laid as best as possible model - it is twice wrapped around the microphone stand and then runs straight down.

To secure it below, I have built a small clamp.

Then the cable was painted black...:




Next, I downloaded a photo from the www with an original label of a Vissotsky record ...




... scaled it down on a PC to 7 mm diameter and then glued to my miniature "vinyl record".

Although the writing is barely recognizable after that - the "record" now looks a bit more believable!

Then I put the "record" into my mini-cover in such a way that about half stands out.

The now finished miniature-record-socle-plate I fix with two-component adhesive on the socle ...:








And now I'm ready!


For the special occasion on this special day I play you my absolute favorite song of Vladimir Vissotsky ...:



In English it's called "In The Dark"...:




At the weekend I will show a few - hopefully good! - presentation pictures ...


Cheers - and many thanks for following!

Wow. Bravo. Great to see the finished article. That record in the sleeve is a genius addition, and really finishes the whole display off.

Martin....What I like about you is your dedication to quality,detail and creativity.
Great overall piece......look forward to the next one.
Wayne

Wonderful work Martin!

Cheers
Ken

The final pics...:























The next sbs will be here in autumn.

At the moment I have two nice projects in my mind:

A fighting Cossack officer of General Shkuro's "Wolves Division" from the Russian Civil War (Equestrian- / Horse Bust),

... and a couple (man and woman) who are suitable for a double bust, which I will call "Victory Day" or "The Winners". But then there is a conversion due ...

Maybe there will be more to come by the fall.

I let surprise me...


Cheers