Thanks for the compliments! Sorry I haven't replied earlier...
cgraham: I used foam to make the castle, and some sort of plaster to make the cliffs. Rest of the model is made out of wood. Well, it's not heavy, but I'm not sure it can leave my room
Soundtracks I used: Platform 9 3/4 (for the opening, it also includes vocal part), Fawkes the phoenix, Harry's wonderful world, Buckbeak's flight, and Leaving.
icanbuildthat: Dimensions of the whole model are 4 X 3.3 feet. Grand stairwell tower is 14 inches tall, and cliffs are 10 inches tall. Don't worry, I'm sure you model will look great too.
Now, for behind the scenes:
While I was watching all those photos of Hogwarts, I found that they can be really confusing sometimes. So I thought: If I wanted to make my model, I'm going to need a model for the reference. The one that is being sold in Noble Collection is pretty much overpriced, so I needed something more simple. And then I came up with an idea. I downloaded Hogwarts 3D model from the 3D Warehouse for Google SketchUp. That allowed me not only to see Hogwarts in 3D, but I could take measures for my model, so the scale would be perfect, and it's also
free. And I did it. It took me 3 weeks to draw blueprints. Then I bought some foam blocks and started carving. I was finished with carving in 10 days. Then I used styrofoam to make the cliff base, and then I made cliffs from plaster. When the plaster was still wet, I put the Covered bridge I made from wood, and the Viaduct. After I did paintwork on the cliffs and grass, I started finishing paintwork of the castle. And that was a bit complicated. First of all, you need to make base color that will look great after dry-brushing. Color I used is a bit darker from the human skin (for the walls) and gray for the roofs. Then I used brown and black for the dry-brushing. Trees are made out of wood and foam dust, pumpkins and Whoomping willow are made out FIMO (I also used cooper wires for Whoomping willow).
Total cost was half a prize of the castle from Noble Collection!!!
And that's it.
Photos:
3D model, and blueprints. To simplify my work, I disassembled 3D model into groups of buildings. Here is Grand stairwell tower and the Great Hall
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Making the castle out of the foam
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Protective layer of paint (on the Quidditch towers). It makes the foam more durable
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Base color
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Covered bridge (unfinished)
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Dry-brushing
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Styrofoam base
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Plasterwork
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Greenhouses (every greenhouse has a small table with "plants" on it, but they are not not visible when you look at them)
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Castle on the base
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Quidditch pitch
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-darthvader073