Whats Lying on your Workbench MK IV

[Gabe Q]

I think that must be the same mold Hasegawa uses in the Macross Zero F-14. The upcoming reissue will look like that so everyone beware. 

[arbit]

13 minutes ago, Gabe Q said:

I think that must be the same mold Hasegawa uses in the Macross Zero F-14. The upcoming reissue will look like that so everyone beware. 

[Urashiman]

1 hour ago, MacrossJunkie said:

Oof... That's pretty unusual for a Hasegawa kit...

Are you going to try to rescribe the panel lines?

I did some research. The mold actually is from the mid 70s.

And yes, probably have to rescribe the panel lines.

1 hour ago, Dobber said:

That’s their reboxed original mold. Always have to double check before you order to make sure it’s not their old mold.

Chris

I wish I would have known that before I ordered the kit...

 

1 hour ago, arbit said:

Those are the infamous raised panel lines. And I believe that the upper and lower fuselage will have part-fit issues as well.

Oh no for #§$%&!? sakes...

  

28 minutes ago, Gabe Q said:

I think that must be the same mold Hasegawa uses in the Macross Zero F-14. The upcoming reissue will look like that so everyone beware. 

Yes - this is the Macross Zero F-14 mold.

Why did they use this for a Macross kit? Quick and easy money probably right?

 

Edited October 9, 2020 by Urashiman

[arbit]

22 minutes ago, Urashiman said:

Yes - this is the Macross Zero F-14 mold.

Why did they use this for a Macross kit? Quick and easy money probably right?

I knew full well how sh***ity this was and ordered the MZero anyway.  It was so cheap I couldn't resist.  And heck no I am not going to rescribe that thing.

I also have ulterior motives: this is the only 1/72 F-14, that I am aware of, with retractable wings (because motors).  

Question: If you could take the MZero decals and put them on a better 1/72 F-14 kit, what would it be? 

Edited October 9, 2020 by arbit

[MechTech]

Looks like it is the same basic kit - from the 70's! The "new parts" are probably weapons, sensor pods, and the like. "New tooling" would be a new kit.  - MT

https://www.scalemates.com/kits/hasegawa-65761-f-14--1072239

[Urashiman]

8 hours ago, MechTech said:

Looks like it is the same basic kit - from the 70's! The "new parts" are probably weapons, sensor pods, and the like. "New tooling" would be a new kit.  - MT

https://www.scalemates.com/kits/hasegawa-65761-f-14--1072239

Yeah, the green line goes all back to the 1977 kit. It's not branching somewhere.

  

9 hours ago, arbit said:

I knew full well how sh***ity this was and ordered the MZero anyway.  It was so cheap I couldn't resist.  And heck no I am not going to rescribe that thing.

I also have ulterior motives: this is the only 1/72 F-14, that I am aware of, with retractable wings (because motors).  

Question: If you could take the MZero decals and put them on a better 1/72 F-14 kit, what would it be? 

Probably the newest Hasegawa mold or the Tamiya 1/72 F-14A. That'll be my guess. The Revell and Italeri kits are of inferior quality, even compared to the 1977 hasegawa mold (yes, even with rised panel lines).

 

Anyway - I'll have fun with that F-14A. My old F-14A looks horrible, so I'll replace it.

Edited October 10, 2020 by Urashiman

[MechTech]

If I was going to build another Tomcat, I would go with the Fine Molds kit. It looks absolutely AWESOME with hydraulic lines and several open panels including the gun magazine. - MT

]

 

[derex3592]

Primer and paint blocking day round here today for the Runabout 

[Lolicon]

35 minutes ago, derex3592 said:

Primer and paint blocking day round here today for the Runabout 

Coming along nicely! Are you installing lights in it?

[derex3592]

Yes I am. As far as the light blocking goes, I had this SEM high build primer from years ago when I unsuccessfully tried the clear Enterprise D. Two coats of this, it dries almost instantly, and light blocking is done! I was going to spray another coat of the RustOLeum gloss black over the primer but I just don't see th need. The pic below is the bottom part held up to a 250watt light buld. No bleed through. Also I HATE waiting for RustOLeum to dry. Takes 40 forevers. Unless one of you guys that does lighting has a reason I'm just gonna go with the black high build primer. 

[arbit]

20 minutes ago, derex3592 said:

Unless one of you guys that does lighting has a reason I'm just gonna go with the black high build primer. 

You're all good. 

[derex3592]

Great! Thanks Arbit!

[pengbuzz]

Okay, while I'm working on piecing together my latest self-designed valk, my wife found one of those wooden cigar boxes at a place she shops at:

 

As you can see, it was pretty beat up. But It looked like a good candidate for a storage container for my valk part (alt nose and other stuff for my 1/72 models).

So....

 

 

Of course, couldn't forget to do the original signage on the can with the "yo!"

 

And plenty of room inside, plus more if needed;

 

 

 

 

[MacrossJunkie]

Finished the hands and feet for my 0D. I was pretty pleased with how the feet turned out. I got the look I was basically going for. 

All that's left is some final touch ups and weathering the gunpod and I should be done with the 0D.

[wm cheng]

On 10/9/2020 at 6:39 PM, arbit said:

Question: If you could take the MZero decals and put them on a better 1/72 F-14 kit, what would it be? 

The one I just finished was G.W.H. (Great Wall Hobby) 1/72 F-14A and its one of the best detailed kits I've ever seen for the Tomcat.  Its not the easiest kit to build, but its got the best scribing details and got the most optional parts.  The landing gears are beautiful and has tailcones that rival the Aires resin aftermarket kits, the cockpit details and decals are better than the FineMolds kit as well.  I have both the F-14A & F-14D FineMolds kits and they were the best until the G.W.H. came out - however they look easier to build and does have all the optional panels that can be built open to display that GWH doesn't.  I also have another two of the Hasegawa newer tooling with recessed lines which are better than any other company, but still doesn't hold a candle to the FineMolds or Great Wall Hobby version - at least in 1/72 scale.  I think for 1/48, the Tamiya is king.

[wm cheng]

@MacrossJunkie  OMG!!!  They look absolutely fantastic.  I still remember when you started to paint the toys, my how you've progressed!!!  I am in awe.  I look at my old toys now and just shake my head... no time to revisit.  I have to live vicariously through you.  They are masterpieces!  By far the best VF-0D I've every seen, model or toy.  Congrats.

[MechTech]

@derex3592 Plastering primer on is a good idea. I might need it for my current project.

@pengbuzz That's a great idea and looks fantastically weathered!

@MacrossJunkie Awesome weathering!

He's probably blushing right now, but did you guys see that Arbit made the Fine Scale Modeler centerfold? Return to Kit Form (Brett) posted this photo in Arbit's thread. We're waiting to hear which issue. - MT

 

[MechTech]

And now for something completely different... One of our club builds are 1/144 F-86 Sabres to "fly" around a 1/144 scale Polar Lights Godzilla. I thought it would be cool to make one actually "fly" around a lighthouse as a tower on an arm. So here's the start of the lighthouse - the yellowed clear piece is just a place-holder. The lighthouse is a 2" styrene tube that had a slice taken out of it and then glued together again to make it conical. Heavy bulkheads were glued to the interior to make it sturdy. Two "D" batteries will fit in this for weight and to power it. - MT

[derex3592]

Got the Cat's Eye pilots painted and into the cockpit. I just picked colors at random.  Did my best. resin is hard for me to paint by hand with acrylics... clear cockpit pieces are still a problem. not sure how that's gonna get resolved. Hopefully next weekend I can get the plane repainted though! 

 

 

 

[arbit]

53 minutes ago, derex3592 said:

clear cockpit pieces are still a problem. not sure how that's gonna get resolved.

Can you show us close ups of how the canopy fits from all angles. Maybe someone can help you out.

[MacrossJunkie]

I'm curious about how the fitment issues look as well.

[derex3592]

Sure, I'll try to get some pics up this week. Crazy work week for a change this week which is a good thing! 

[MacrossJunkie]

On 10/11/2020 at 1:30 PM, MechTech said:

And now for something completely different... One of our club builds are 1/144 F-86 Sabres to "fly" around a 1/144 scale Polar Lights Godzilla. I thought it would be cool to make one actually "fly" around a lighthouse as a tower on an arm. So here's the start of the lighthouse - the yellowed clear piece is just a place-holder. The lighthouse is a 2" styrene tube that had a slice taken out of it and then glued together again to make it conical. Heavy bulkheads were glued to the interior to make it sturdy. Two "D" batteries will fit in this for weight and to power it. - MT

I thought it was snowing there for a second when I looked at the thumbnail. I'd love to see the finished thing in action. Perhaps you could take a quick vid when you're done?

 

On 10/10/2020 at 6:53 PM, wm cheng said:

@MacrossJunkie  OMG!!!  They look absolutely fantastic.  I still remember when you started to paint the toys, my how you've progressed!!!  I am in awe.  I look at my old toys now and just shake my head... no time to revisit.  I have to live vicariously through you.  They are masterpieces!  By far the best VF-0D I've every seen, model or toy.  Congrats.

Thank you! It doesn't feel like it, but I guess it's been some time when I started. Seeing your work on the models and people's custom VF-1 toys back in the day really inspired me to try my hand at weathering and in general just make my toys look less... toy-like. My few years' break from MW and from weathering my growing backlog of toys was for a couple reasons. I was burned out and felt like I wasn't doing anything new or improving and I was just churning crap out in a few days. Also, I was getting major neck tension headaches every time I worked on something. The break did me some good as I thought about how I wanted to approach doing weathering and customizing going forward. I had new ideas, new techniques I wanted to try, and new products to test.  I still get the headaches though...

I've finally finished my 0D and 0S (aside from the conformal FAST pack for the legs, that's still in progress).

I've taken some pics, but I'm waiting for the clear coat to cure before I do a full proper photo shoot. The wings on the 0S have already suffered some scratches because there are sharp scrape-y points inside the wing glove... Seems like a bad place to have such things. I sanded them down some so hopefully that won't be an issue anymore. 

I need to do that write up I promised you and will get to that after I finish up the super parts for the 0S.

 

 

Edited October 13, 2020 by MacrossJunkie
Added additional pics.

[derex3592]

Those are the two best Mac Zero Valks I've ever seen. Period.  Amazing! ... and I FULLY understand your pain with the neck strain headaches!

Edited October 13, 2020 by derex3592

[Thom]

Anyone could buy those for their shelves, but only yours will look as good as that!

[Dobber]

[MechTech]

@MacrossJunkie Thank you! It looked like it snowed in my shop too! It took as long as shoveling the sidewalks too.

Your valks are looking awesome!!! They just need a good background and some Photoshopping to bring them into a Macross scene. - MT 

[MacrossJunkie]

5 hours ago, MechTech said:

@MacrossJunkie Thank you! It looked like it snowed in my shop too! It took as long as shoveling the sidewalks too.

Your valks are looking awesome!!! They just need a good background and some Photoshopping to bring them into a Macross scene. - MT 

Anyone is welcome to give it a shot with putting in a background! 

I did it once with this old pic of my YF-25 Prophecy and it took me forever to do.

I didn't even do the lighting right. 

The worst part was trying to isolate the valkyrie and trying to blend any anti-aliased pixels that were a mix of the valk's colors and the original backdrop's so that it didn't show in the new background. I'm no expert with photo editing (I wouldn't even call myself an intermediate user) and there's probably much easier ways to do that than going magnified pixel by pixel, but I really have no idea what that would be or if there are tools that make it a lot easier.

I guess I could try getting a green chromakey backdrop and see if that makes it easier to isolate...

 

 

Edited October 14, 2020 by MacrossJunkie

[Lolicon]

22 hours ago, MacrossJunkie said:

I thought it was snowing there for a second when I looked at the thumbnail. I'd love to see the finished thing in action. Perhaps you could take a quick vid when you're done?

 

Thank you! It doesn't feel like it, but I guess it's been some time when I started. Seeing your work on the models and people's custom VF-1 toys back in the day really inspired me to try my hand at weathering and in general just make my toys look less... toy-like. My few years' break from MW and from weathering my growing backlog of toys was for a couple reasons. I was burned out and felt like I wasn't doing anything new or improving and I was just churning crap out in a few days. Also, I was getting major neck tension headaches every time I worked on something. The break did me some good as I thought about how I wanted to approach doing weathering and customizing going forward. I had new ideas, new techniques I wanted to try, and new products to test.  I still get the headaches though...

I've finally finished my 0D and 0S (aside from the conformal FAST pack for the legs, that's still in progress).

I've taken some pics, but I'm waiting for the clear coat to cure before I do a full proper photo shoot. The wings on the 0S have already suffered some scratches because there are sharp scrape-y points inside the wing glove... Seems like a bad place to have such things. I sanded them down some so hopefully that won't be an issue anymore. 

I need to do that write up I promised you and will get to that after I finish up the super parts for the 0S.

 

 

Beautiful! I'm with @wm cheng on this. Your earlier works were already stunning, but you've taken it to another level since! 

[Chronocidal]

I don't have many photos handy for pasting it into, but I can at least mask around the plane  

[electric indigo]

Christmas came early:

Now I'm prepped for the second lockdown...

[arbit]

46 minutes ago, electric indigo said:

Christmas came early:

Looks like a large endeavor. Is it just a bust, or a full figure?

I'm a big fan (of UC anyway), but I don't have every mobile suite memorized.

[electric indigo]

It's the one Gundam to rule them all...

Here's a pretty impressive gallery of the bust:

http://amethyst002.web.fc2.com/gallery/16/sgundam/rollout01/rollout01.html

[slide]

I can't not see this whenever I see the EX-S

[arbit]

1 hour ago, electric indigo said:

It's the one Gundam to rule them all...

Gundam Sentinel.  Hmmm... Never read that one.

Sounds perfect: UC timeline, Hajime Katoki, hard sci-fi sequel to Zeta... 

I'm doing a mega UC rewatch right now, so I will get on that after Z.

And weathering some Zakus while I'm at it (a dremel will be involved).

Edited October 14, 2020 by arbit