Whats Lying on your Workbench MK IV

[slide]

3 hours ago, NZEOD said:

And... because I was bored and needed a distraction... I present Micheal Flattely's Vf1J River dance.

 

Ignore the face palming hater in the rear

Dance, then, wherever you may be, for I am the Dancing Valkyrie.

And I'll lead you all, wherever you may be, for I am the dancing Valkyrie

[electric indigo]

Just taking off from my workbench:

1/72 Italeri kit.

[derex3592]

Got off work early today and got some bench time in,  1/72 VF-31 today,  goin for a low vis look,  first step,  Winter Grey.  Looks good so far.  It will stay in fighter mode. 

Edited February 21, 2017 by derex3592

[slide]

1 hour ago, electric indigo said:

Just taking off from my workbench:

Very nice.

 

your 31 is coming along nicely Derex. 

 

Well... a $200 bill for paint and a couple odds-n-sods are on their way... soon my dig to the bottom of Mount 'Look at all these un-built kits!' shall commence

Edited February 21, 2017 by slide

[derex3592]

2 hours ago, electric indigo said:

Just taking off from my workbench:

1/72 Italeri kit.

Beautiful finish as always!

[pengbuzz]

23 hours ago, arbit said:

Or, it looks like some Glaugs were killed to develop it...

I would say both are accurate.

 

[spanner]

On 2/20/2017 at 1:07 PM, derex3592 said:

Some good detail work put in on the SDF-1 today,  if I'm not careful,  this thing might turn out ok.... LOL.. but that's a long ways off as I consider this kit my "Eleanor".. (Gone in 60 seconds reference) 

ohh... and I got engaged last night... so it's been a hectic weekend... hahaha! Thought I would share with you guys. :-) 

congrats on your engagement! good to finally put a face to the posts! though you may have already previously but I could've missed it.. 

23 hours ago, NZEOD said:

looking stunning my friend! 

[spanner]

10 hours ago, electric indigo said:

Just taking off from my workbench:

1/72 Italeri kit.

that Harrier looks amazing! 

[arbit]

10 hours ago, electric indigo said:

Just taking off from my workbench:

1/72 Italeri kit.

I need to learn how to paint... Do you sand the paint between layers, or use micro mesh?

[slide]

1 hour ago, arbit said:

I need to learn how to paint... Do you sand the paint between layers, or use micro mesh?

usually not.

If you were going for ultra-gloss like a car or candy finish maybe.

[electric indigo]

Thanks for all the Harrier appreciation! Harrier modelers should check out this place for inspiration:

http://www.britmodeller.com/forums/index.php?/topic/60571-harrier-send-off-show-us-your-models/

@arbit I use Tamiya flat acrylics with my trusty Badger 350 airbrush, no need for sanding if you thin the paint properly.

A cloudy overspray of thinned light grey was used to tie everything together (especially the vivid roundels) and to give some texture to the surface. Thinned watercolor for panel lines and dirt effects.

[Thom]

Great work on the Harrier.

And the VF-31 is coming along great.

[NZEOD]

The decaling begins, slowly.

Then its weathering time.

[MechTech]

Wow, I blinked and lots of cool stuff is made AND Derex gets engaged!  Congrats Derex!

If they EVER do a live Macross Movie, they'll have to include the River Dance scene! - MT

 

[NZEOD]

1 hour ago, MechTech said:

Wow, I blinked and lots of cool stuff is made AND Derex gets engaged!  Congrats Derex!

If they EVER do a live Macross Movie, they'll have to include the River Dance scene! - MT

 

Hey you DID ask for more Valkyrie love.

[pengbuzz]

1 hour ago, MechTech said:

Wow, I blinked and lots of cool stuff is made AND Derex gets engaged!  Congrats Derex!

If they EVER do a live Macross Movie, they'll have to include the River Dance scene! - MT

 

 

6 minutes ago, NZEOD said:

Hey you DID ask for more Valkyrie love.

Right on both counts, MT and NZEOD!

 

*Imagines an entire squadron of Valks landing and then breaking out into Irish dance!*

Speaking of valks, I'm putting the VF-1 to bed in my next post in the VF-1 topic....

[mickyg]

Been working on these little mecha-colle kits and posting the odd update or so there in the thread for them. Perhaps they're better placed here?

I've got all the VF-31s now so rather than doing them one at a time, I figured it might save time to do them assembly line fashion. 

There are a number of deficiencies in the kits, as I see them.  Firstly, the nacelles on the the VF-31 are all a dark metallic colour, but only one kit ships with them in this colour, Arad's VF-31S "Christmas Valk" as I like to call it.  The rest all come in the violet grey that seems to be a carry over from the super parts in Frontier.  So the nacelles get painted in Mr Color Metallic paints.  I've arrived at a final mix but was still experimenting with the VF-31E, hence the difference in shade you can see.

The Nacelles are also a fairly dark colour, so I pre-paint the "cuffs" white before applying that white sticker with the stripe on it.  The semi-translucent nature of the thin stickers benefits greatly from the white under coat.

The other annoyance is stickers, particularly the one for the canopy/fuselage.  They look OK from a few feet away, but it doesn't matter how meticulous I am when applying them, there's always a nasty wrinkle where the sticker has to wrap itself around the curves of the canopy.  My solution: paint it and trim the worst part of the sticker away.  So that's Mr Metal Color Gold, mixed with a touch of Chrome. It shines up nice when polished and certainly looks better than the sticker.

And finally, there are no stickers for the bottoms of these little kits at all, so I've been attempting to remedy that as well.  There's a lot there to see and Bandai's lack of markings is a real shame on these otherwise very well detailed kits.

I've also done a subtle panel line with a grey gundam panel line pen.  Helpful to do this before placing the stickers so you don't get ink bleeding under the stickers. It's also handy to do it before assembly of the parts.

Edited February 22, 2017 by mickyg
More info

[Thom]

Bridge turret of the Kirishima.

[pengbuzz]

Well, took some time tonight to make the canopy shield for my VF-1:

 

Step 1: cover canopy with several layers of masking tape. Peel off, reapply to get shape of canopy w/o adhering tape to it permanently. Then, Spread plastic welder over tape and let cure.

 

Step 2: before it gets too hot for the canopy (plastic welder heats up like epoxy does when ti cures), lift the tape off the canopy CAREFULLY.

 

Step 3: inspect when cured

 

Step 4: spread another layer on the canopy cover to further add bulk and stiffen it.

 

Step 5: when sufficiently built up (and cured), peel tape away from the bottom of it.

 

Step 6: sand the living daylights out of it with a dremel tool and sandpaper until smooth.

 

Step 7: do likewise for the inside, as it may need some extra space for the canopy.

 

Step 9: test fit continuously (or you may be wanting to smash it with a hammer when ya find out it doesn't quite fit!).

 

Step 11: mask off for scribing

Step 12: after scribing, prime.

Step 13:

A) Make sure camera is focused

B) Clear coat canopy cover and test fit one last time

C) Stuff your face with Garlic Bread

Step 14: Apply decal(s) and clearcoat again. You're done!

Edited February 25, 2017 by pengbuzz

[NZEOD]

Oh the joys of applying millions of tiny decals...

[Nyankodevice]

On 2/21/2017 at 5:06 AM, NZEOD said:

And this one is definitely a "You have a Hulk? Cute... we have an ABR-01-Mk IV ANNIHILATOR "

ABR?

 

[NZEOD]

ASSAULT BATTLE ROBOT

Monster is a Heavy Weight Robot - HWR

Defender is an Air Defence Robot - ADR

Spartan is a Main Battle Robot - MBR

Tomahawk is a Main Battle Robot - MBR

Phalanx is a Space Defence Robot - SDR

Looking at all the weapons and Defence systems your creation is rocking, and the size of it, it fits a few roles all at once, is bigger than the main battle models but smaller than a Monster and looks to be basically a one machine army on its one.

 

 

Edited February 25, 2017 by NZEOD

[Nyankodevice]

27 minutes ago, NZEOD said:

ASSAULT BATTLE ROBOT

Monster is a Heavy Weight Robot - HWR

Defender is an Air Defence Robot - ADR

Spartan is a Main Battle Robot - MBR

Tomahawk is a Main Battle Robot - MBR

Phalanx is a Space Defence Robot - SDR

Looking at all the weapons and Defence systems your creation is rocking, and the size of it, it fits a few roles all at once, is bigger than the main battle models but smaller than a Monster and looks to be basically a one machine army on its one.

 

 

Never actually thought about what those abrevations meant thx

Hmm robot.... My understanding of what a robot is, is either a autonomous machine or programmed, or a remote controlled one...?!

Edited February 25, 2017 by Nyankodevice

[Thom]

I'm dun.

[electric indigo]

Bring on some space dirt!

[Nyankodevice]

almost done with the decals, soon be starting with panel lines, highlights and dirt

 

[arbit]

Thom, The Kirishima looks perfect.

Nyanko, Were there any Zentraedi among those pirates?

Edited February 26, 2017 by arbit

[NZEOD]

well... as long as your clear coat comes out more successful than mine tonight... My Future gloss layer that SHOULD have sealed in my decals decided to crazy crack alittle... but I wouldn't find that out until the Florys Black wash hit it and found all the cracks! 

[Nyankodevice]

2 hours ago, arbit said:

Thom, The Kirishima looks perfect.

Nyanko, Were there any Zentraedi among those pirates?

Zentraedi?! Why..

 

[Thom]

20 hours ago, Nyankodevice said:

almost done with the decals, soon be starting with panel lines, highlights and dirt

One World of Hurt, coming right up!

[MechTech]

That looks great Thom!  Nice finish!

Your paint and scheme look great Nyankodevice!  The lines are a nice touch!

So far I seem to be doing more metal work than styrene work!  You know how cutting windows or square holes is a pain and they never seem to quite come out right or need a ton of clean-up?  What if you had to make a bunch of them?  I machined two steel punches.  I'm trying out two bridge designs.  One with the big punch and big windows, the other a smaller punch and smaller windows.  The test bridge is shown in the photos.  The smaller test bridge still needs to be drawn out and designed. - MT

[derex3592]

Couple of new quick projects to distract me from finishing other things.. LOL. 

[Grayson72]

On 2/26/2017 at 2:37 AM, NZEOD said:

well... as long as your clear coat comes out more successful than mine tonight... My Future gloss layer that SHOULD have sealed in my decals decided to crazy crack alittle... but I wouldn't find that out until the Florys Black wash hit it and found all the cracks! 

Did you happen to put it over a laquer finish? That happened to me once. 

[NZEOD]

Tamiya primer, Model Master and Tamiya acrylics, Model Master Gloss Clear, Decals with Microsol and Microset, Future... cracks

[pengbuzz]

Warning: I'm pretty grumpy today.... read on at your own risk:

What's on my workbench as of right now: recently, after showing my completed VF-1 on facebook, someone commented that "it looked like it was made of cake". Okay, I can take a comment or two that points out problems; that's part and parcel of showing your work in making models and such. But at a couple of other places I go to for sci-fi and whatnot (discussion groups), some yokels there not only said the same thing, but began making fun of me non-stop about it. At one in particular,  people began joining in on the stupidity and one in particular called me "a buffoon" and began making crude comments about my intellectual level (or lack thereof in his opinion)

That outright pissed me off.

In any event, after deep-sixing my membership (I'm pretty sure though after having their fun, they didn't think very well of me and wanted to ditch me anyways), I ended up scrubbing the entire thing back down to plastic, snapping off the tail fins in the process. So, this is where the project stands as of right now:

 

 

As usual, I have no money for anything like Super/ Strike armor, so I'm trying to make my own out of wood. This, on top of my digital camera just dying, so I'm using my wife's, and she and I both have really nasty cases of bronchitis that required the ER.

(Don't ya just love it when a whole ton of BS happens at once?)

In any event: sorry to sound so sour folks, but it's not been a good week for me at all.  Let me get onto some better news...

I think Skull-1 has pretty much been done to death in Macross (by now, Roy would have had an entire armada that could have easily taken out Boldolza's fleet!). That said, with 300 valks onboard the Macross, that makes for 25 whole squadrons (300 divided by 12 is 25). SO, I think I may have some leeway in sneaking in another squadron here.

My idea: make something a bit more unique, using another squadron-

(art by peter-pan03- DeviantArt ) 

 

I devised a basic color scheme, although I'm probably going to revise it:

The yellow is just a placeholder; the actual paintjob would be more akin to the golden color on the actual squadron callouts. We'll see how this one goes folks. Stay tuned...

Edited February 28, 2017 by pengbuzz