1/60 Yamato VF-4G Web-Exclusive Toy

[slaginpit]

As great a toy as the VF-4 is, I've been growing increasingly dissatisfied with its appearance out of the box. The VF-X color scheme is just so godawful boring. Grey and baby blue? Who thought up that color combination? The nasty seam line across the nosecone was also a major eyesore. Not to mention mine had some gashes in it thanks to the Yamato factory worker being a bit too zealous with his plastic cutter.

So I decided to try customizing mine into the FB2012 colors. I was pretty reluctant at first, as I possess only some basic modeling skills, and I was afraid of ruining a $300 valkyrie. But my dissatisfaction got the better of me, and I decided to go for it.

Anyway, I just repainted a few parts, took a bunch of decals off a VF-1 kit, added a little weathering, and gave it a flat finish. And of course I sanded the nose and filled in the gashes.

Thanks to everyone who posted customizing tips and their kickass customs.

Fantastic Job. Can I commission you

[vf_1s]

Wicked customs, great jobs.

I'm almost finished with mine, trying my best to make as FB2012 as possible, debating on how the hell to mask the whole valk for 2 small red circles.

BTW, stupid thin panel lines <_<

Your decal sheet comes with a set of grey UN spacy logo that fits on top of the red ones. I would use those.

[Valkyrie Hunter D]

I finally got my hands on mine, and the VF-4G has quickly risen to the top of my favorite valk list. There's a lot of nostalgia behind that, but the chunky battroid mode along with the graceful, elegant lines of fighter mode also won me over. If this is Yamato's swan song with valks, they certainly went out on a fantastic note.

By the way, those Flashback and Focker customs look great!

[Sam]

my goodness those customs are amazing! Makes me want to do mine, but then I'll be too worried about the paint rub on the nose cone! but great work guys !

[plutoniumhunter]

Woah... The Focker schemes make Battroid look much better!

[M'Kyuun]

Great work on those customs.

[Valkyrie addict]

Finally done with my VF-4 Hikaru FB2012 theme, tried my best to do a full FB2012 scheme after looking at those 5 sec of VF-4 action on FB2012 a zillion times and a lot of lineart, gotta say I'm pretty happy with the results, really gives a lot of attitude to the VF-4. In resume, i painted THE nosecone tan, TOP tailfins black with red stripes and skull insignia, those legs things that were red, thrusters and top intake, chocolate (thought it would look weird, but looks rather good), the tail exhaust? tan with red stripe, yellow arrow decal on beam gun fuselage area, panel lined, remove the light blue on the fins and tampo "made in china/big west" tampo on wings, glued those f*cking missiles launchers.

Lots of pics incoming.

Stock VF-4G looks so plain now

Still have to add a little dulling coat to make everything more even, the chocolate ended a bit shiny.

Edited April 5, 2014 by Valkyrie addict

[Valkyrie addict]

And now, some fun with the VF-4!

^_^

Edited April 5, 2014 by Valkyrie addict

[treatment]

AWESOME!!! Put it all in one pic, dude!

edit:

frakk it. mwf rescales both.

Edited February 18, 2013 by treatment

[505thAirborne]

Love the comedy act and your VF-4 Flashback paint scheme is killer, love it!!

[xrentonx]

Very nice! I dig everything except the chocolate color though. Any reason you went with chocolate rather than something darker and less shiny?

[derex3592]

LOOOOOOL!

[charger69]

By MWers for MWers!

Single file for your ease of right click save as

Edited February 18, 2013 by charger69

[Kanedas Bike]

Love all the customs, if I could manage to snag one or two more (only have 1) then I'd be tempted to try a custom scheme too.

-b.

[plutoniumhunter]

LOL! XD

[Captain Jack]

You know I love this one in fighter mode, it’s really one of
the best looking fighter modes out there, but it starts to fall apart for me in
Gerwalk mode and Batteroid for me the
chest/shoulders piece is just way too big for it to make a nice looking profile.
So I’d only get this for the fighter mode, which is most excellent It has to be
said, though it really benefits from some paint and decals, and even just
running a pencil over it, it’s a bit plain straight out of the box.

Unfortunately the price is prohibitive for me, if you are talking half a grand on eBay
(cheaper on NY though) then you start to think ‘well what else can I get for
that kind of money’ and generally it’s something better value, so I think I’ll
chance it and wait and see if Yamato produce some more down the line and jump
in then, maybe with some different schemes if they can legally do that, if not,
well then I can live with that.

That or in a moment of weakness I might get this anyway:P

[Kurisama]

A WIP shot of my custom;

[Reïvaj]

A WIP shot of my custom;

IMAG1733.jpg

I love it.

[xrentonx]

Oh nice! It's got the new head and everything! I'm looking forward to the finished custom

[zzgundam010]

A WIP shot of my custom;

IMAG1733.jpg

What color/paint are you using for the new head?

[vf_1s]

A WIP shot of my custom;

IMAG1733.jpg

Look forward to seeing the new head!

lookin good!

[plutoniumhunter]

A WIP shot of my custom;

IMAG1733.jpg

Amazingly sleek.

[Kurisama]

I used Mr.Primer Surfacer 1000, a light sand then another coat.

[Valkyrie addict]

Very nice! I dig everything except the chocolate color though. Any reason you went with chocolate rather than something darker and less shiny?

Thanks everyone.

I saw several times FB2012 and the color of those parts were chocolate, I always thought it was dark gray until I had a closer look at FB2012 or maybe my copy is just bad quality, checked several sources and it did look chocolate, I wanted to make it as close to canon as possible.

I will add a dull coating to get rid of the shine that makes it stand out more than it should and make everything more even and flush.

Kurisama, that head is outstanding.

[xrentonx]

Yeah, I guess I can see it being a brownish grey. I always thought it was because the colors were washed out though and interpreted them as dark grey myself.

[aceoftherebellion]

That's not really how colors work. He's right, just went to look and it's definitely a chocolate tone. If it were a shift in color hues, the entire fighter would take on a warm-tones look. As in, the entire frame would have to be bathed in warm light for grey to appear as a brown, and in all of the frames we see the VF-4 appear, that's not the case. In fact, the background in those shows is mostly cool tones, a lot of blue and purple. If it was a case of the colors being 'washed out' (I.E., light oversaturation) if anything it would make the real thing MORE brown.

You gotta love color-matching for animated media, huh?

[xrentonx]

They work that way when you got really poor eyesight and are generally bad at colors like *this* guy.

[aceoftherebellion]

Touche, good sir!

On a whim I went over to look at the color lineart on the Macross Mecha Manual, and that uses the same colors in two out of three pictures (...but not gerwalk). I don't recall if that particular set was custom lineart or if it was official, but hey.

[jvmacross]

So Tenjin is wrong?

[Lightning]

So Tenjin is wrong?

in the over-photoshopping of the skulls yes.

Edited March 1, 2013 by Lightning

[whitestar]

The brown VF-1A cannon fodder (TV vers.) also has brownish feet, so you're not far off from an already established color scheme.

[Valkyrie addict]

I guess the definite color tones of the VF-4 will be like the TV version of the SDF-1.

[xrentonx]

Wrong but oh so right

[aceoftherebellion]

Tenjin's art is amazing but it's not the end-all be-all. He's just another artist offering an interpretation, after all. I'd go off of what I see in animation before I took production or promo-art into consideration personally, especially when building/painting models or toys.

[Chronocidal]

Yeah, that's definitely not one of his better works either. Some serious funkyness going on with the perspective and proportions.