I'm still being inspired to look back to my childhood for ideas. Here is the precursor for "action figures", the plastic toy soldiers or army men. I used the dominoes to build forts, and marbles were cannonballs to knock them over. I used the same basic wooden floor as in my "Marbles" pic because the color design of the wood is my attempt to recreate the look of the floors in the house where I lived as a child. I sized the grain smaller and rotated the texture to make it look a little different. The poser "soldiers" are based on actual toy soldier poses I found on the web. I think I'm pretty close on the plastic textures of the soldiers.

You're more than close, you're almost there! Incredible pic, it stirs a lot of pleasant memories. And I couldn't help but thinking of the wonderful scene in "Toy Story" when the green soldiers go into their "mission" moving on those plastic pedestals. Very nice indeed, Tjohn, I really wait to see the final. Stefano

You might want to delete their bowties. LOL As double crash said you have it almost perfect as far as the plastic goes. If you could find Army uniforms instead of the tuxedos it'd be perfect. Oh and you need a guy kneeling with a bazooka on his shoulder, and can't forget the guy with the mortar. :)

I thought the bowties were used after a formal declaration of war... :) I think the plastic might be a tad bright, but that might just be because I never saw plastic soldiers until they'd been on several outdoor missions. ;) I loved Toy Story also. I distinctly remember several incidents involving my brothers, plastic soldiers, and firecracker and/or matches and/or magnifying glasses. Oh the humanity! Lin

I also like the way you put BRYCE on the backs of the dominos. Lin

Lin: what are you talking about? TJohn: Small point....I think you'll find the using negative spheres to create the domino 'spots' would look better. The 'plastic' effect is brilliant. I won't say a word about the 'uniforms', not one....except that one there when I said I won't say a word etc......I also don't remember them all having sniper rifles either....! Great work though.....despite the uniforms....oh sorry! I wasn't going to mention those was I? The Bryster

ok, great image, but heres a few tips: search 'osity freestuff for "BATF", noquotes. if u hav poser, then u can export them to bryce after posing. the BATF model has some guns, but u might want more: http://www.3dm-mc.com/modelsbank/categories.php?cat_id=14&s=85d3a3368842b445860946cfaac209dd the front of dominoes also hav a line down the center, separating the 2 sets of numbers. this should be fairly easy w/ textures, or ridiculously ez w/ just putting in a small stretched cube. srry bout all the nitpicking, i'm just in a very studious mood

another really cool pic! Thanks Tjohn!

Wow great pic. I cannot see Bryce on the dominos. I guess it's time to look into monitor calibration. Tuxedos on soldiers is a neat idea. Do you think it would make them act more civilized?

Thanks everyone, I used the tuxedo guy from Poser because he is cheap in terms of memory and how long he takes to render. The "bow tie" is the collar of his shirt. If I delete that, there would be a hole in his neck. I did delete the long tie that is part of the tuxedo. :^) The all-tuxedo army is probably the Cary Grant brigade, LOL. Bryster: Interesting that you should bring up booleaned spheres for the spots on the dominoes, because that's what they are. Why don't you think they look like negative spheres? :*) Speaking of the dominoes, has anyone ever tried to model something that is a flat black in color, but still shows some surface detail (like the word "Bryce")? It ain't easy to do without looking too light, grayish; I did a lot of tweaking to get this close. And I am planning to put a dividing line on the dominoes with spots showing, thanks for the suggestion, antevark. I'm probably not going to use new models, it took me so long to do the posing, and using the old poses on different models would take a lot of re-tweaking, poses never seem to transfer between different models very well. I'll post the final image later. Thanks again, all. Tjohn

This is a great picture tjohn all these posts have certainly brought memories flooding back. Second childhood is a good place to be. I also vote that the plastic is top notch, although the last time I saw my brothers plastic soldiers they were somewhat discolored and a bit melted.......now I wonder who could have done that...... 8) Catlin

My army men where more of the olive drab color, I love the tuxs though. Didn't some of them have gernades? Great pic! Some of my army men were missing arms and legs, from land mines..and I went throught a field surgeon phase...8P

Zhann: The guy in the middle is throwing a grenade. The grenade is little small, but I was trying to keep it from passing through his fingers. I'll enlarge it in the final version. As far as missing limbs, when I got older (12-13) I was allowed to use firecrackers, so... :^) I also discovered that plastic would burn, dripping and melting down to a lump before going out. Destructive, but cool fun at the time.

TJohn: Sorry, mate! They look like booleaned cylinders on my system.......

I see it... Wonderful! The first time I overlooked completely the BRYCE word on the dominos... this adds to the image, tjohn! :-)

Ahhhhh, I LOVE THIS....good work..Sharen

Very good picture - it really brings back memories. Two freinds and I had plastic soldiers in three colours - one for each of us. We also used marbles initially, but then I received Dinky tanks one Christmas and we used the tanks instead to try to knock down each others' armies. Gotta a tank or two? What about stacking playing cards in the background? The backs of the cards could also have "Bryce" on them. Perhaps a few marbles in different colours. Well done! I wish I was still a child...

Julian99 if you wish you were still a child you're in the right place. There are many members here with childlike qualities and for all of us who spend our days creating pretty pictures, well I think you must be a child at heart to do it. :} Catlin

And some of us buy action figures, claiming we 'collect' them when really we just want to play with them. Not that I do that. ;) Lin I also don't join my friends and their children at the playground because I like the slides and swings.

Looks cool,like the tuxes. Looks like they are gearing up for a "Civil" war.

Sorry tjohn, I thought the guy in the middle was singing "Swanee River"...:]

Ole man river, he jus keeps snipin along...