New York bar Sandwich Board

[OldNYJim]

With Christmas coming I wanted to make a little gift for my friend who owns a bar in the city - so I figured a miniature of the sandwich board she pulls out the front every night and lists the specials on in chalk would be a fun little project (and gift).

A photo I found online of the real thing, for rough reference:

I want to make this thing sturdy enough that she can show it to people and have them handle it so I’m taking some liberties with the exact proportions and dimensions but it’ll look something like that anyway...

Made the two boards:

Primed, then painted tan, then brushed a little woodgrain detail on:

A little salt:

And black:

Next up, squared up that hand lettered chalkboard in Photoshop and printed it:

Glued in place with some Elmer’s:

Next, added some chipboard-looking card to represent the unpainted rear side of the chalkboard, and added some brass hinges:

I was going to add photoetched screw heads, but you can’t see back in there anyhow...

Added the chains that stop it doing the splits:

Made a little sidewalk-looking texture from some styrene sheet and attached to a wooden base (actually a lid from one of my wife’s fancy candles), and did some weathering with pastels and a black wash:

And all done - fun afternoon project!

[Tom Geiger]

Gotta love it! I’m sure your friend will be pleased ? 

[Danno]

Jim, That is bitchin'!!!  She'll love it. She's lucky to have such a thoughtful, generous, and talented friend.

That's a Merry Christmas story, right there!

?? 

[peteski]

I love it!

Miniatures of any kind are wicked cool!  Especially when is a replica of a real thing.

[Marcin M.]

Very professional. 

[TonyK]

Perfect replica of the real thing. Really like your base too.

[mustang1989]

This never would've crossed my mind to take on in scale but buddy.....this is freekin' COOL!!!! WAY TO GO!!! 

[chepp]

Thanks for the how-to. It looks great! Not many people would do wood graining then cover most of it but it really adds to the realism. Scale-looking hinges and chains are an added bonus for making it look convincing.

[Straightliner59]

What a great idea! Beautiful execution, as well. Nice work, Jim!

[misterNNL]

Great stuff there. Your fiend is lucky to have a talented modeler like yourself to create a unique miniature for them. I see a free of your libation coming your way very soon. Thanks for sharing this story with us. A random act of kindness is something more us should be sharing right now.

[OldNYJim]

Thanks for all the kind replies everyone - I always forget to look in this part of the forum so I’m just now seeing them!

My friend LOVED it - she showed it to EVERYONE, posted it on Facebook and had a hundred odd people comment on how cool it was...and, humorously, a bunch of replies from people who didn’t realise it wasn’t the real thing and wondered why she’d put it in front of a white background and had a photo shoot for it ?.  One of our mutual friends told me she’d been video-calling everyone she knew to show it to them, and it’s “all she’s been talking about for two weeks” ??❤️

Moral of the story - we’re all good at what we do, and sharing our talents can really make people happy!  

[peteski]

Praise and all those comments are well deserved.

When I want to show relative size of a model, I photograph it using a coin as a size reference.  In this case if a quarter was propped against one of the legs, would show how small that model was (or that you photographed the 1:1 item using a giant coin).

 

This is what I mean.

[Scale-Master]

That came out great!  The weathering and fine details are very convincing!

[OldNYJim]

On 2/17/2021 at 2:22 AM, peteski said:

Praise and all those comments are well deserved.

When I want to show relative size of a model, I photograph it using a coin as a size reference.  In this case if a quarter was propped against one of the legs, would show how small that model was (or that you photographed the 1:1 item using a giant coin).

 

This is what I mean.

I saw this online recently and thought of this post 

Someone actually made the big coin we always hear about! ??

On 2/24/2021 at 5:20 PM, Scale-Master said:

That came out great!  The weathering and fine details are very convincing!

Thank you sir!

[peteski]

That's pretty funny Jim. I love it!

[OldNYJim]

19 hours ago, peteski said:

That's pretty funny Jim. I love it!

Now I need to make a 25:1 scale quarter! ?