I'm very new to this and haven't acctually got anything thats why I'm asking for advice. I've done warhammer and stuff but it lost it's appeal after awhile and dug to deep into my pocket. and if you were wondering I'm 14. I've got a 4 by 2 board and'll buy another one to add the river, the scene I want to choose is the city of stalingrad. Can you lot tell us what to do and any links I'm on quite a tight budget. As it's in russia it's going to be white, I'm unsure how to do the texture of the ground as I have spare green turf. Heres a list on what I need help with and THANKS
1.texture of ground
2.river
3.trees and wooden fences for the farms
4.house and factories also them after a bombing raid. Thanks again.

Hi Nomad welcome to the sit, sounds like you wish to model the city of Stalingrad,what scale are we talking about.let the guys know then they can unload plenty of good advice. :-)

Nomad,
welcome aboard the best site around. I'm not an expert at all at dios but here there's more than one with outstanding specific skills. What I can suggest you is to go and have a look in the Features section to KF Magee's Digital Diamonds series, where you can access lots of tips and tricks. On top of that don't mind making posts with specific questions in the variuos forums on the site, you will find lots of people willing to help...
Ciao from Italy

Phew! You've given yourself a tall order filling that much space for a first time dio.
May I make a modest suggestion? Particularly since you are on a tight budget, you might want to try something more modest, perhaps a single bombed out building to see how it goes. You might pick up a railroad modeling small factory and practice with that, doing a partially collapsed wall, a broken away second story, some exposed plumbing and girders. While HO is technically 1/87 you could get this to "pass" with some 1/72 armor, especally if you don't show doors next to a figure.
A friend of mine is working on a 1/72 scale American Civil War Battle (Pickett's Charge at Gettysburg). Before he started on the main scene, he has done a couple smaller "trial" scenes to get his technique down and a feel for the placement of figures and landscape to make it interesting.
Good luck in your project.

Ola Nomad

First of all I like you to be welcome on this site. This site is a true goldmine of information and everything you like to know will be found or answered here

Here are some URL`s to sites that helped me out a lot when it`s about dio bases
First of all this excellent articlepage from www.docdio.com explaining everything from groundworks to figures and vehicles

The features section of Armorama is also a good spot for information. Indeed check out Keith Magees Digital diamonds all good tips for making simple things to do wich look really good.

this is a good tip for making your own trees https://armorama.kitmaker.net//features/135

This is an article I made. It`s a step by step article on how I did my dio DISTRACTION Greta`s Revenge In this article I describe how I did my bombed out Stalingrad ruin

More good articles can be found here in the Diorama features section of Armorama

There are more really valuable URL`s wich I will post here later but this is a nice start

yeah, welcome to our great community!

Welcome to the site. You have found the site that will produce all your answers

There are some Great tips in the previous posts - so I won't duplicate those.
Check out this article on resin. I have used this stuff a number of times to make water too.
https://armorama.kitmaker.net//features/150
For larger bodies of water, you should dam up any large areas before pouring resin. This resin does not affect ground work, or any plastic that I have used.

One idea I would suggest - do a small diorama such as the one in the DD section and focus on one of these techniques. Then put them all together into one comprehensive diorama. That way you test things build up your experience and then there you go....

One last thing - Ask - there are A LOT of great builders here and they will help out.

Thanks very much you guys, the scale is 1/35 your links were most helpful. Thanks again :-)