Whats Lying on your Workbench MK IV

[arbit]

1 hour ago, peter said:

In person, it's definitely more subdued alike this photo:

That's what I thought. I knew the camera was picking up the pre-shading.

So generally we can add more base coat than we realize over the pre-shading, and it will still show through at different lighting angles.

[MechTech]

@peter Great looking models Peter! The finishes give them a nice touch. Can putting the Start Trek stuff and Yamato stuff in the same photo cause a rip in the space-time continuum? The lighting on the Yamato kits is cool. I like the way the engineered it.

@arbit You've brought kit-bashing to a whole new level - digital! That's a cool idea and came out great! I've gotta start doing the same myself. Time to get into 3D. Both for my job and hobby.

@Thom That's a cool kitbash; I like it! It doesn't look pieced-together.

 

I redid the heavy unit's muzzle brake. The original was the kit plastic with a HUGE alignment tab right where the muzzle should be. When I drilled it out, there it sat in all its glory looking like something was in the barrel. Plus the barrel hole was way out of scale. So I milled one out of steel. Here it is on the final stage before being parted on the lathe and then up close. Where did all those scratches come from!? I didn't see them.

As I was taking the last photos, the muzzle kept going out of focus. I thought my camera was messing up. Then when I looked at it, I realized the barrel was drooping downward. Yes, it's that heavy! I have to pose it so the frame can take the weight or it falls over!

 

Next, on to the lighter version's armament. 25 years ago when I originally started on this build, I bought Tamiya brass rounds for it on sale (I miss a local hobby shop). I wanted to work them into the build. So I thought an ammo chute would look cool. This is laminated styrene sheet that has been milled one out.

These are slots cut to make it more like the real ones that are segmented and flexible.

To keep the Tamiya brass ammo aligned, there is a spacer that slips into the chute with the rounds. And a cap loosely fit on to cover it.

That's it for now. Thanks for checking in guys! - MT

[peter]

6 hours ago, MechTech said:

@peter Great looking models Peter! The finishes give them a nice touch. Can putting the Start Trek stuff and Yamato stuff in the same photo cause a rip in the space-time continuum? The lighting on the Yamato kits is cool. I like the way the engineered it.

@arbit You've brought kit-bashing to a whole new level - digital! That's a cool idea and came out great! I've gotta start doing the same myself. Time to get into 3D. Both for my job and hobby.

@Thom That's a cool kitbash; I like it! It doesn't look pieced-together.

 

I redid the heavy unit's muzzle brake. The original was the kit plastic with a HUGE alignment tab right where the muzzle should be. When I drilled it out, there it sat in all its glory looking like something was in the barrel. Plus the barrel hole was way out of scale. So I milled one out of steel. Here it is on the final stage before being parted on the lathe and then up close. Where did all those scratches come from!? I didn't see them.

As I was taking the last photos, the muzzle kept going out of focus. I thought my camera was messing up. Then when I looked at it, I realized the barrel was drooping downward. Yes, it's that heavy! I have to pose it so the frame can take the weight or it falls over!

 

Next, on to the lighter version's armament. 25 years ago when I originally started on this build, I bought Tamiya brass rounds for it on sale (I miss a local hobby shop). I wanted to work them into the build. So I thought an ammo chute would look cool. This is laminated styrene sheet that has been milled one out.

These are slots cut to make it more like the real ones that are segmented and flexible.

To keep the Tamiya brass ammo aligned, there is a spacer that slips into the chute with the rounds. And a cap loosely fit on to cover it.

That's it for now. Thanks for checking in guys! - MT

That is an awesome looking brake.  

You could go into business making real muzzle brakes. 

Two different 50 Cal brakes... Mines on the left, buddy's on the right. 

 

[Thom]

8 hours ago, peter said:

 

 

That is a lovely pair of sisters. Nice work! And I'll second that your photos are awesome!

[Thom]

6 hours ago, MechTech said:

 

 

That is one bad-ass looking gun! 

[arbit]

I did some more work on the Hikaru Pilot. I think it's good to go.

I'm planning to post the STL, once I do a test print.  So you guys can print at home or at a local printer for your valks.

Edited June 14, 2021 by arbit

[Chronocidal]

I'm actually thinking about this a bit more, and I might need to see about getting spare pilots and instrument panels printed for the DX VF-1.  Finally got a spare Roy, and I'd like to convert it as much as possible to a DYRL version, but would rather not have to cannibalize another DYRL release.

So I caved and picked up the Discoprise to make good on that idea for a TOS repaint, and took a moment to perform a sanity check.

Yeah, I think the ships are still essentially the same size.  In fact, I think it actually is shorter by several decks, because the warp nacelle and saucer pylons were all squashed downward.  Either way, saucer looks to have two decks at the edge, about 2-3 above and below that, 3-4 decks in the saucer pylon (offset because they left room for the TMP style torpedo launcher, but didn't include them), four decks above centerline on the secondary hull, one at the level of the shuttle bay deck, and two below centerline.  Aside from a few oddball windows and lights between defined deck divisions (which the TOS design has too), it really looks like it just lines up as a nice mid-point between the TOS and TMP refit designs.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Chronocidal

[pengbuzz]

Currently working on my Transformers Activity Center:

I just put in the new med center, and redid the landing pad:

At least the gang seems happy with it:

 

[joscasle]

Hasegawa 1/48 YF-19 done!!!

 

 

Edited June 14, 2021 by joscasle

[Thom]

@pengbuzz Looking good Peng. Have you thought about recording any episode sounds and piping it through the Center?

@joscasle That is one good looking VF! Very cool.

[arbit]

The Hikaru pilot figure printed very easily. No problems at all. Seated next to Bandai 1/72 for comparison.

PM me if you want the file. But please do not distribute or monetize (we do not yet have permission for using the body).

Edited June 14, 2021 by arbit

[wm cheng]

Wow @arbit I love the hair peeking below the helmet.  This is amazing quality, love to see it primed to see if there are any print lines - I might have to look into one of these machines someday (is this a resin printer?).  Great work!

[arbit]

17 minutes ago, wm cheng said:

Wow @arbit I love the hair peeking below the helmet.  This is amazing quality, love to see it primed to see if there are any print lines - I might have to look into one of these machines someday (is this a resin printer?).  Great work!

Thanks. Yes this is a resin printer.  Doubt there will be any print lines. I printed at the highest resolution .01mm.  Its very tiny.

Edited June 14, 2021 by arbit

[Chronocidal]

35 minutes ago, arbit said:

Thanks. Yes this is a resin printer.  Doubt there will be any print lines. I printed at the highest resolution .01mm.  Its very tiny.

There is definitely a texture there if you zoom into the photo, but it's also something that might be fine enough that it will disappear under a coat of paint.

That's definitely a far better resolution than my FDM printer, think the max that one gets down to is 0.08mm   Might have to look into a resin one for some tinier parts modeling.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Chronocidal

[pengbuzz]

9 hours ago, Thom said:

@pengbuzz Looking good Peng. Have you thought about recording any episode sounds and piping it through the Center?

No... I'm a bit leery to put anything else in aside from lighting. I know I could use batteries, but those get expensive after a bit, and I'm not sure about trying for house current, as I'm no electrician, and I don't want to burn the base (and house) down. Otherwise, I'd love to put in much more lighting, sound effects, an electric motor for the elevator, screens to replay scenes from the cartoons, etc. I just don't know if I could do it in a way that wouldn't turn the cardboard into a fire hazard. Hence the solar powered light.

If anyone has ideas though (folks here should know more about this than I do), I'm all ears. There's a member on TFW2005 (Maximal prime) who's doing the entire Ark and Mt. St. Hillary and his work puts mine to shame!

https://www.tfw2005.com/boards/threads/w-i-p-g1-ark-diorama.1208935/

Seriously, check his stuff out; it absolutely ROCKS!!! He's nearly done with it!

Edited June 15, 2021 by pengbuzz

[Thom]

@pengbuzz Judging by your Macross factory, I'd say you could recreate the whole thing fairly well!

[arbit]

5 hours ago, pengbuzz said:

Seriously, check his stuff out; it absolutely ROCKS!!! He's nearly done with it!

Cool stuff. Starts as a mop bucket, and ends as a work of art!

[MechTech]

@peter Thank you! Your buddy's brake looks cool! It looks like a viper's head.

@Thom Thank you! That's what I'm going for

@arbit Your print is FAR BETTER than any of the other "stock" figures. GREAT sculpt and detail. He's got more hair peeking out the helmet than I have on my head! I think hand painting will cover up any bias marks.

@joscasle That's a great "minty fresh" build! Nice n clean.

@pengbuzz Your improvements look great! The landing pad is sharp! I did check out the other build and it DOES look cool. I've probably laminated hundreds of printed pieces to foam board and never thought of it for hobbies. It does dent easily though. - MT

[joscasle]

well, testing my new camara, I know I need to implement a good "photo boot", but I need to understand how to use the camara first, jejjeje

 

These is my recently almost finish Tamiya 1/48 F-14A VF-41 circa 1990.

 

 

[arbit]

2 hours ago, joscasle said:

well, testing my new camara, I know I need to implement a good "photo boot", but I need to understand how to use the camara first, jejjeje

Looking good.  It would be cool if you share your photos as you progress in the future. And explain your set up such as lighting and direct lighting with each photo, so we can figure out which makes the best photos.

I'm also trying to get better photos. I got tripods, Neewer camera lights, and a background cloth. 

But it's so frustrating.  My last dark room "photo shoot" was a disaster, no matter how low I set the tripod lighting, or how far away, they would saturate my image.

Then I gave up in defeat till further notice.

 

Edited June 16, 2021 by arbit

[peter]

On 6/13/2021 at 9:38 PM, joscasle said:

Hasegawa 1/48 YF-19 done!!!

 

 

Looks awesome, 1/48 must be massive.  I have a 1/72 in my pile I should probably get to one of these days. 

[peter]

On 6/14/2021 at 2:02 PM, arbit said:

The Hikaru pilot figure printed very easily. No problems at all. Seated next to Bandai 1/72 for comparison.

PM me if you want the file. But please do not distribute or monetize (we do not yet have permission for using the body).

I wish I had a 3d printer..... And the intelligence to operate one, lol! 

[peter]

3 hours ago, joscasle said:

well, testing my new camara, I know I need to implement a good "photo boot", but I need to understand how to use the camara first, jejjeje

 

These is my recently almost finish Tamiya 1/48 F-14A VF-41 circa 1990.

 

 

Nice Tomcat! 

[peter]

Well, it's a slow week at work, and a bunch of stuff ended up on my work bench, as well as some goodies in the mail that showed up (and probably won't get touched for a while. 

Window masks for a 747 kit I picked up on a whim.  Into the queue it goes. 

I couldn't decide what kit to build next.... Hummed and hawed between  a Star Trek 1/1000 kit or maybe one of the Mecha Collection Yamato kits. 

I decided to go with ST. 

Lots of flash. 

For a newer kit, it felt a bit messy.  $45 Polar Lights kit on the left, $5 Bandai on the right. 

Anyway, enough complaining, the kit went together. Lot easier than the nightmare AMT 537 kits.

Some gaps, but gave me a chance to try out this stuff.  Talk about easy to use, excess wipes right off with a wet qtip. 

While waiting to dry, I was curious about an Andromeda kit I had, whether it was the correct scale for the Yamato from the same series.  I was disappointed to find out hardly any ships from this series are the correct scale for each other. 

2199 version

2202 version.  There are actually a lot of differences between the 2199 and 2202 version. 

Anyway, since I unboxed them, I decided to start on them. 

I built both versions of the Yamato before, ended up giving both of them to my kids, who over a period of time broke off all the pointy bits. 

These ones will be for me and off limits from the kids.

Managed to get everything prepped and primer tonight

More to follow. 

Edited June 16, 2021 by peter
Edited for spelling

[arbit]

1 hour ago, peter said:

I wish I had a 3d printer..... And the intelligence to operate one, lol! 

Sorry to tell you, no intelligent life detected down here. If I can do it, anyone can (any hobbyest, I mean).

[MechTech]

@joscasle Great looking plane! Photography is tough. If you can't get the lighting and exposure right, you can always fix it in Photoshop (most of the time). The white back dropped Tomcat looks a little orange. You can filter that in Photoshop. Orange and blue are opposites. Blue will help filter that out. So will lightening it.

@arbit What are you using for a camera and settings? It sounds like you have too much exposure. I usually use my cellphone for here and find it like low light better than too much. Its weird.

@peter Looks like the shipyards are running smooth despite the whole shortage of materials across the globe How is that plastic putty? Is it thick enough to build with, or is it more of a gap filler?

[Chronocidal]

3 hours ago, peter said:

For a newer kit, it felt a bit messy.  $45 Polar Lights kit on the left, $5 Bandai on the right. 

Anyway, enough complaining, the kit went together. Lot easier than the nightmare AMT 537 kits.

Managed to get everything prepped and primer tonight

More to follow. 

Can't believe those have gotten that expensive now, I think they were $25 when I got my first version of that.

Two things I would recommend:
1. File off the locking wedge tabs on the clear parts for the deflector dish and warp nacelle grilles.  They are far too big, and will more than likely shatter the part when you try to press them into place.  The tabs will still work fine to hold them in place without any latches, even if you don't glue them.
2. Check the nacelle alignment before you get any further, if you didn't already.  Mine looked a bit droopy, and I did some interior jury-rigging to brace them better, but you're probably past the point where you'd want to do that.   You could probably still tweak the pylon alignment before final painting though.

Definitely a better kit than the old AMT, and a whole lot easier to display.

[joscasle]

9 hours ago, arbit said:

Looking good.  It would be cool if you share your photos as you progress in the future. And explain your set up such as lighting and direct lighting with each photo, so we can figure out which makes the best photos.

I'm also trying to get better photos. I got tripods, Neewer camera lights, and a background cloth. 

But it's so frustrating.  My last dark room "photo shoot" was a disaster, no matter how low I set the tripod lighting, or how far away, they would saturate my image.

Then I gave up in defeat till further notice.

 

 

5 hours ago, MechTech said:

@joscasle Great looking plane! Photography is tough. If you can't get the lighting and exposure right, you can always fix it in Photoshop (most of the time). The white back dropped Tomcat looks a little orange. You can filter that in Photoshop. Orange and blue are opposites. Blue will help filter that out. So will lightening it.

@arbit

@peter

Thanks guys, yep it is a learning expirience for sure. Thank you for your comments

[pengbuzz]

does anyone happn to have parts 117 and 118 fr the imai vf1 1/72 kit (slidrs for the chest)? tried fixng mine and the prts disintgrated

sorry nt doing too well, has seizur last nght.

[Thom]

@joscasle Your F-14 looks pot-on cool! Miss that old bird.

@peter Ah, the joys of box-scale. For them being different scales and so small is the reason I prefer /1000.  And very nice on the Enterprise, though I was surprised to see the amount of flash on the parts. Is that the newer boxing with the ST-II battle-damage decals?

[peter]

On 6/16/2021 at 3:26 PM, Thom said:

@joscasle Your F-14 looks pot-on cool! Miss that old bird.

@peter Ah, the joys of box-scale. For them being different scales and so small is the reason I prefer /1000.  And very nice on the Enterprise, though I was surprised to see the amount of flash on the parts. Is that the newer boxing with the ST-II battle-damage decals?

Yup.  Not sure I will battle damage this one... We'll see.  Already did a 537 auto destruct build, SO I sort of have it out of my system, but we'll see

[peter]

Mecha Collection build done, more or less. 

Tiny kits, packed with detail, had to build with magnification otherwise I couldn't see the damn things. 

Yamato 2202 version.  Completely different tooling than the not very old 2199 version.  Seemed more refined, panel lines were finer and more to scale with the size, but filled quickly with layers of paint. 

Painted IJN Gray, Kure Arsenal. 

So this is the 2199 version.  I painted this up with IJN Gray, Sasebo Arsenal, so in my head canon - Space Battleship Musashi.  I even painted the radar white as I often saw models of Musashi with a white radar.  Totally not screen accurate, lol! 

Andromeda......not to scale.  It should be bigger apparently, but oh well.  First time I built this ship, and the first time I actually looked into what the thing is supposed to look like on screen.  I got sort of close, but it's still pretty far off.  It came with Bandai's typical stickers instead of decals.  Tried one, decided to bin the markings.  

My first Yamato model from like 35+ years ago, lol! 

And this one I built a few years ago, minimal paint, basically the deck and engine nozzle.  Surprisingly close to what the anime colors are. 

That K'tinga is about to have a really bad day. 

[Thom]

@peter Despite their small size, they do come packed with detail. The few that I had bought looked good for that, despite the closed off barrels. Wondering if any of the after-market metal barrel sets, like for secondary guns on larger models, would be small enough to suit the main turrets on them?

[Thom]

Well, main paint is done for the Spit. I had to redo some paint, as I had some lift from masking. A little maddening, but that happens. Now all I have left to finish building are the gear, the exhaust and the prop.

Don't look too close at the paint job. It is my first NMF, and it shows!

 

[electric indigo]

Looks good enough in that photo . What paint did you use?