With a steady hand and a miniature soldier pinched between his thumb and forefinger, Omokoroa's Rob Hicks is busy choreographing a mini battle scene to mark 100 years since World War I.

Omokoroa's Rob Hicks carefully places his mini military soldiers on his Gallipoli model. Photo by Bruce Barnard.

Two dozen miniature soldiers, machine gunners, field guns – and a tiny figure of Jack Simpson Kirkpatrick and his donkey – are being judiciously placed on the two-storeyed replica of the Gallipoli battle.

The mini war is sitting safely behind a glass cabinet and will hopefully be displayed at Omokoroa Point School in honour of the commemoration on April 25.

The model will have WWI medals and photographs on the top shelf, with the battle scene on the bottom.

'I've got the Auckland Mounted Rifles Regiment as if they're in a charge at Gallipoli,” says Rob.

'I've got photos of the Monash Gully at Gallipoli, which I've blown up to cover the base, and I've coloured it with water colour.

'It's a beautiful, accurate model. It will hopefully look pretty terrific.”

It's a smaller model than his mini replica of the Battle of Gate Pa that's on display at the exhibition at Tauranga Moana Hall until the end of the month. It has about 150 miniature soldiers and Maori warriors on it.

Now Rob's expanding his collection, with more mini soldiers especially made in Greytown in the Wairarapa.

Rob thought it'd be ‘reasonably easy' creating a second model, since he's already collected some of the military models needed for the Gallipoli replica.

He's been collecting characters for his battle scenes for the last four years. His collection includes tiny replicas of real-life 18-pound field guns and 'very rare” machine gunners made by London toy company – Britains.

We look forward to seeing what Rob will create next.