Getting ready for another mission: SSGN K-186 "Omsk"
Another project with a submarine, and this time I didn't want to place it with a surveillance plane or helicopter, nor just going on the surface. If making model ship presentations is hard, doing it with a submarine is twice has difficult, not because the model is a though job to do, but because we get the risk of having in the end a "emotionless" presentation. Studied a few books, search the web and some photos started to appear of Soviet/Russian SSGN's mostly docked. Started to play with the sub and base, to see how it would be the best way of making the presentation with a story... While checking the stash, for useful things to use, I caught attention on PitRoad's Modern Navy Equipment Set and the Mir Bathyscaphe - it would be the story behind the story. Converting a Aoshima tug to a more recent configuration was fairly easy (thought on using one of Battlefleet Models Tugs, but I think they deserve a WWII setting), as was scratch building the barge that would be carrying the Mir. The pier was also easy, although gluing all those vertical pylons at identical distance was a little... boring! To make things double sensed, I stole a couple of GMC's from an LST set (again by PitRoad) and made the needed conversion to make the pier busy.
A relatively easy diorama, named "Getting ready for another mission", where the viewer can always think it's the crew boarding the vegetables and other goodies, and/or, the Mir going to the mother ship and get ready, just in case!   Materials used to make this diorama 

Box sets:
- Tamiya's 1/700 SSGN Kursk
- Acu-Station 1/700 Kursk PE set
- Pitroad's 1/700 Equipment for Modern Soviet Ships (Mir bathyscaphe)
- Pitroad's 1/700 US Navy Landing Ship Tanks L.S.T MK2 (Two trucks - one heavily modified)
- Aoshima's 1/700 Tugger set (one tug heavily modified/upgraded)
- Eduard's 1/700 Aircraft Carrier Figures

Scratch built parts from plastic card and other materials from the spare box: 
- Barge
- Pier
- Air compressor and hoses
- Cables

Water base is Artists watercolor paper, painted with acrylics and with a couple of coats of transparent varnish