A resourceful site

Hello everyone,

A short post before I fly home on Monday. I'll be back on June 26th and will spend a month with my "great" parents and my sibblings at home in Tours, France. I can't wait to enjoy my mum's and my friends' cuisine.

 I enjoy my life here in Thailand but going home is always all "expats" long for once a year.

When I studied Joachim du Bellay's poem in High School "Heureux qui comme Ulysse", I didn't imagine I would be like Ulysses one day.... That is the best translation I can think of...

Happy he who like Ulysses has returned successful from his travels,

Or like he who sought the Golden Fleece,
Then returned, wise to the world
Live amongst his family to the end of his age!

When shall I see again, alas, of my dear village,
Its chimney smoke, and in which season, ?
Will I see again that little, modest, plot of earth
That is a province to me, and far more than I draw here?

I’m drawn far more to my forefathers home,
Than to a Roman palace fine and proud,
More than hard marble I prefer fine slate:

My gaul Loir I prefer to latin Tiber,
My little Liré I prefer to Palatine,
And to sea air, soft climate Angevine.

Joachim du Bellay, Les Regrets, sonnet XXXI, 1558.

Today I am not going to speak about my project but about a website I have just discovered and I am sure many of you will like it too.

It has been created by David Neat. He is a British Art teacher and he must have spent hours and hours to create this valuable piece for us, amateur miniaturists, to use.

The site is divided into different units. 

I mainly focused of the section called methods which is divided into 8 units, making realistic models

recommended tools for small-scale making, 

white-cards models, 

common size of things, 

brickwork patterns, 

mould making and casting, 

working in scale.

Each unit is develloped in sub-parts, all detailed with pictures. Below is a picture by David Neat ( Don't worry I asked him if I could publish one his pictures and he agreed!)

If you, like me, haven't studied anything about building miniatures and techniques, you will adore his work. 

I have been doing miniatures for 2 or 3 years now and I can't get any help here from seminars or workshop so you can imagine that this site is of a great help.

This website is free and Mr Neat knows what he is talking about and how to teach about it.

That's why I want to share this with you today.

Here is the website's adress:

http://davidneat.wordpress.com/methods/making-realistic-models/main-construction/

The other very good news is that Madelva Fernandez will publish 4 double pages about my work in her June issue. It makes me so happy to be able to show other people what I can do in my free time with some Forex and a cutter (and many other tools, I know...) 

She has sent me the draft but I can't show you before the magazine is issued in Spain in early June.

The other good news is that I have ordered a Proxxon table saw with the money from my lasr order.I think that it will make my hobby much more professional with a saw like this.