That should be the next diorama. Goblin on surfboard. Killer wave. Hawaiian shirt. Sunglasses. Giant sea serpent chasing goblin. That sort of thing.
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Didn’t one of the old brands do a similar figure once? Some goblin-like figure on a surfboard…
Aurora perhaps?
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“All we are is dust in the wind…”
The Santa María’s plight was looking pretty frightening so far, but there was something missing…
Terrified sailors!
A crew would definitely amp up the drama of the scene but, not surprisingly, there aren’t a lot of 1/150 scale Spanish sailor figures out there. Somebody at some point may come up with some great 3D printed options, but for now I’ll have to improvise.
Fortunately, there are a ton of model railroad scale people available; I figured these N Scale “Shootin’ Hoops” figures with their dynamic poses could be a good start.
The first was the blond guy in the white shirt and black shoes. The initial plan had been to cut apart and reposition the limbs for customized poses, but the semi-soft plastic of the Woodland Scenics figures doesn’t take glue well, so I just cleaned up the mold lines and repainted him as he was.
The only change on this guy was to turn his head a little and bulk out the shirt and trousers with thickened paint. I also trimmed down the footwear so he could be shown working barefoot – a common practice of European sailors of the period.
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The next sailor was even simpler than the first with no changes at all other than the new paint job. Not sure how effective it is, but I did give this one a beard to help him look a little less like a hoop-shooting teenager.
The poses were dynamic, but they were not quite ideally what I would have chosen – at the moment these guys look less like 15th century Spanish mariners than 1970s disco dancers!
The last two were better.
The kid dunking the basketball is now a panicked crewman diving from the doomed ship, and the African American defender in the muscle shirt and shorts is now a luckless Spaniard swimming for his life!
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Can there be a sea serpent? I want there to be a sea serpent eating some guy.
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Sky Warden
Sky Warden ended up looking similar to a Standard missile launcher. 
Oops.
All the design problems from last time are now solved. The MASERs rotate on independent axles. The detector array now rotates on an axle. The turret rotates on a big cylinder.
The entire project ended up too big. It is wider than a Panther tank and about 15 feet tall without locomotion.
A couple days ago I had the bright idea to turn this into a mobile flak tower so expect long, spindly legs to take shape over the next few weeks. Another option is to build a wheeled carrier. The wheeled carrier would be much easier to store.
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Hey, that looks really cool @Damraska! I really like how to scratchbuilt everything.
I did something similar way back in the 2000s with half the front of a Star Trek Runabout shuttle.
https://www.starshipmodeler.org/gallery12/po_091507_dodac1.jpg
As for my Sci-Fi Campaign status, I haven’t made any progress. Life has kept me busy and I’ve been working on the “Improving Your Figure” campaign which is due at the end of August.
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That is really cool. The colors and shapes are much more sophisticated than the simplistic and badly painted stuff I I keep producing. It reminds me of artwork from the Terran Trade Authority books.
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Thanks for the compliments! 
Yours is really cool. I can’t scratchbuild worth much at all, hence I tend to kitbash…
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Peter and Doug, looking great for both the current sky warden and the old gun turret.
Looking forward to see more of the sky warden! 
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Sky Warden
This project shall henceforth me known as the Vigilant Hair Clipper.
Turret components received lots of boxes and panels and bolts and welds. New additions are hard to see because everything is small and white. I cannot make this thing curvaceous but I can add lots of polygons.
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Before placing the figures aboard the ship, I went back and touched up the model with Testors Dullcote to kill the unrealistic shiny spots where some of the knots had been reinforced with super glue. The rigging also got some minor repairs with various lines that had become slack or disconnected being once again squared away.
The first sailor to come aboard is Disco Diego. He still looks pretty stylish, but I’m hoping that in this context he looks like he’s leaning aft against the angle of the ship and reaching his hand out for balance – rather than doing the Hustle!
White shirt guy and the young basketball dunker are better. The former looks to be crouching and balancing himself against the mast, and seaman Swandive definitely looks the part. Suspended a short distance from the hull on a small steel wire, he is unaltered except for the removal of the basketball originally molded in his hands and a new paint job. I appreciate that the “Shootin’ Hoops” teenage characters’ attire choices are all different – these worked out well in that they also conveniently reflect the casual, diverse appearance of European mariners of the Discovery period.
The swimming guy was next. I’m not sure where he thinks he’s going, but doing his best to get the hell out of there!
The crew were fun to do, even though when seen from normal viewing distances they almost disappear into the scene. Still, they provide little nuggets of human drama for the viewer who inspects more closely.
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Aloha All,
Some great work going on here.
Got the cockpit painted and installed. The pilot is painted up as well, but I couldn’t get the iPhone to focus on him well enough. I will try later to get better pics.
IMG_8006 by Zon Sullenberger, on Flickr
IMG_8012 by Zon Sullenberger, on Flickr
IMG_8005 by Zon Sullenberger, on Flickr
IMG_8004 by Zon Sullenberger, on Flickr
On to painting the rest of the ship.
Happy Modeling,
Zon
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The final figure to be added Santa to María is my favorite, the ship’s cat.
Based on my own cat Minnie, the Chief Mouser’s Mate is also a classic tuxedo cat.
I felt bad consigning her to the depths along with the rest of the ship’s company, but such were the dangers of 15th century nautical life. The arched back shows that she’s definitely not happy about it!
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That makes me wonder how many land animals have found themselves at the bottom of the ocean because we drag them along on our (mis)adventures.
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Some come along of their own accord and then screw up the ecology of wherever we call in… Sometimes we introduce stuff we find useful (or just for fun) that has the same effect. And sometimes we bring back critters (often for the most frivolous reasons) who screw up our native ecology. Such is the nature of human progress.
Cheers,
M
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I know. I teach that stuff to high schoolers.
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