Archive for the ‘Modeling’ Category

5 Model Kits I Want That Will Never Exist

I’ve only recently been reintroduced to plastic modeling; before the recent wave of kits that I’ve been working on, it’s been almost 15 years since my last X-acto knife injury or accidental glue euphoria. But despite not actively working on anything in that time, the interest has stayed with me. I’m kinda like a nerd sleeper agent in that way.

The nice thing about coming back to the hobby after so long is that the quality of the kits has really improved across the board. There must have been huge strides in injection molding since 1995 or something*. Anyway, along with the technological advances has come a lot of cool kits, and I’ve been lucky enough to grab up some of my faves. But there are some gaps in my kit lust that can never be filled. My full wish list is longer, but here are the top 5:

#5: UN VTOL Aircraft from NGE

"Fire ze missiles! Uh...again!"

This cool Osprey-like aircraft appears prominently in the first episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion, and once again in the Death/Rebirth and End of Evangelion movies. It’s kinda like an upside-down Hind with jets instead of rotors, except that’s not what it looks like at all. I may as well tell you it’s a cross between a Pontiac Aztek and a leprechaun.

But description-defying aside, it’s got a great, believable design while still appearing firmly entrenched in science fiction.

Why it won’t ever exist: The Evangelion series is pretty long in the tooth now by anime standards (it’s even been rebooted), with many different types of merchandise, and I’m not sure there’s any demand for a kit of a 3rd or 4th tier support aircraft that appears on screen for 45 seconds, especially if no one has made one by now. But please, Bandai or Hasegawa, prove me wrong.

#4 El Dorado Ultimate (Gun X Sword)

Also available: the Elbows of Minor Irritation

I may have mentioned it before, but I love Gun X Sword. I think it’s a great little show, and I have hardly any nitpicks with it. It’s got a nice blend of drama, comedy, and action, and the animation quality is very consistent across the episodes. Also, it has giant robots in it, and they call them “armors”, which is very cool.

The El Dorado is an homage to both super-sentai and super robot shows, and it’s quite adorable. And, uh, all tough and crap! Boobs! Explosions! Yeah. Manliness.

Anyway, I really dig the chunkiness of the contours. Not in small part because I had several Godaikin robots growing up, and the El Dorado is reminiscent of the Dancougar and GoLion/Voltron designs. My love for mecha started with the 1970s robot-design aesthetic, and I’ve never let it get too far out of my system.

Why it won’t ever exist: There isn’t a lot of merchandise for this show for some reason, save a couple statues of Carmen 99 and a fairly expensive Dann toy. I’m guessing it just isn’t as popular as some other series. If they haven’t made a kit of Dann, the main armor in the show (they haven’t), they’re not going to make a kit of the El Dorado. Frowny face.

#3 G.Kaiser/Kikaioh (Tech Romancer)

Hitting you so hard you see Japanese syllabary

I only got into Tech Romancer 10 years after it came out on the Dreamcast, but it is awesome. Turns out it’s one of my favorite titles on a system with a fantastic game library. Even if it was absolute crap, however, it is stuffed to the brim with awesome robot designs. This part is not a surprise: the mechanical designs were handled by Studio Nue, the same people responsible for the entire Macross series, and employer of Shoji Kawamori.

Also not  a surprise: my favorite is the one that looks like a super robot from the 70s.

I know this list is specifically about plastic model kits, but this is the one item in the list that I would want even if it was a completed figure. Having G.Kaiser appear in the Soul of Chogokin line of toys by Bandai would totally satisfy me. You can see more shots of the Soul of Chogokin toy line here at CollectionDX.

To be fair, there may be a kit related to this mecha, but I’m not sure if it actually exists, and, frankly, it sucks. This may warrant a list of the Top 5 Model Kits I Want to See Remade Because the Available One is Total Crap. But I digress.

Why it won’t ever exist: Well, outside of the little loophole above, it’s a design from an out-of-print game that didn’t spawn any sequels on a discontinued system, and I’m just not sure who else is clamoring for this to be realized in sweet, sweet plastic.

#2 Any Mecha from Gunbuster 2/Diebuster

My wife says, "Die, buster!" just before she attacks, though I'm not sure it's the same thing.

There does exist a Revoltech figure of Dix Neuf, my favorite mecha from this series, but that doesn’t count, no matter how cool it is. And though I would like to see someone make a nice injection kit of Dix Neuf, I am actually okay with ANY mecha from this series being produced in plastic form.

As an aside, if you haven’t watched this show, you need to pick it up. It’s even on Netflix if you’re not willing to commit to a full purchase. The animation is fantastic, and the overall production design is jaw-dropping.

Oh, and the story is enjoyable too, but pshh…story. Look at the robots!

Why it won’t ever exist: There is no good reason why not. Maybe I’ll actually luck out on this one.

#1 The ship from Galaga

pew pew

I don’t think it even has a name. I think it’s called “the ship from Galaga“. This little sprite is probably my favorite spaceship design in the universe. I don’t have anything else to say, really. I like it, and I want it.

Recently, another favorite spaceship of mine from an old game was realized in plastic, the Silpheed, so this may not be as far-fetched as I seem to think it is.

Why it won’t ever exist: I think the main problem is that it’s two-dimensional, and it’s probably 20 pixels wide. Any sculptor trying to tackle this would have to take some major liberties just to get it thicker than a cookie. And, of course, there is the constant threat that someone will eat it before you get to that point. Either way, it’s probably not gonna happen.

Great. And now not only do I lament not being able to get these kits, but I also want a cookie.

^{*And now I have a topic for my next blog entry: The Top 10 Least Interesting Things I’ve Ever Said.}

First attempts at scribing

I started building the Hasegawa Egg Plane F-16 that I referenced in this post.

I’m not an aircraft or military buff, but I’m a big fan of the F-16 design-wise; I might even want to build a 1/72 or a 1/48 scale one of these days just because it’s so cool-looking. I even played through 95% of Ace Combat 6 with it just because I didn’t want to fly an uglier, superior plane (I’m looking at you, F-22 Raptor).

I’m also a big fan of Galaga and cute things. Why did I tell you this last part, you may ask? Because my plan is to mildly mod this egg plane into a cutesy version of the ship from Galaga.

Anyway, major assembly and seam-fixing is done. One little thing about the egg planes: not a lot of surface detail. It’s a beautiful kit, especially for the price (fits together great), but it lacks panel lines. And I loves me some panel lines. It’s platonic.

After reading a bunch of posts on the subject, I decided to try and add panel lines to the model.

^{See that? Yeah. I made it.}

It’s actually not as hard as I was expecting, though my technique needs a lot of work. I have limited supplies and no templates, so I just basically attacked the thing with an X-acto knife and some modeling tape, and you can too.

At the time I decided to document this, I’d already completed the nose cone (more of a “rescribe” after seam-filling), a large bay on one side, and one access panel. I’m going to cover what I did to add the second access panel, but you can apply the same technique to any shape, including long straight lines.

First, I cut out a panel shape from my Tamiya masking tape and placed it on the body of the kit (this was the second of two identical pieces I cut before I began the first panel)

^{The tape in place. You can see another, larger panel I’d already scribed on this side. Not pictured: my shame at not having a brand-name X-acto knife.}

Once the tape was in place, I ran the back of the X-acto lightly across the edge of the tape. You have to do this with practically zero additional pressure, or your knife will skip, stray, or push your tape into an unrecognizable mess. I ran it across each side somewhere between 10-20 times. Again, apply no additional pressure: you’ll feel nothing for the first 4-5 strokes of the knife, then suddenly you’ll feel it “catch”. At that point it’s pretty easy to keep the knife from straying from the groove. Repeat the same method on each side of the tape, and then peel the tape off. You should see a faint etching of the shape on the model.

If I was really clever, I would’ve taken a photo of that step. Instead, you get this:

^{Above: Authenticity}

With the tape out of the way, I continued to scribe the lines with the back of my off-brand X-acto knife. Probably another 20 strokes per line or so. This inadvertently raises the edges of the cut, giving the surface of the plastic an uneven texture. With the panel lines being fairly deep at this point, it was safe to sand off the relief. This will also eliminate small scratches and deviations*. I used a 400-grit sanding stick at this stage, then went over it again with 600 or 800-grit to eliminate the larger scratches.

^{Small particles of plastic dust will fill your painstakingly etched lines. This is normal. The feelings of despair are also normal.}

That done, I used a modeling-dedicated toothbrush and some gentle scraping with the X-acto to remove the plastic dust from the newly scribed lines, and voila!

^{Above: What voila looks like}

I actually went back at it with the sandpaper to remove more scratches, but when I was done, I had two symmetrical(ish) access panels on the nose of my Egg Plane:

^{Factory-esque results. Depending on the crappiness of your factory.}

I did the same thing to deal with the raised lines on the wings, just sans-tape. The raised ridge in the original mold was enough to guide the knife.

Lack of failure by this time emboldened me enough to do the flaps as well.

^{Pictured: A surprising lack of sucking}

And that’s about it. I’m debating adding more actual panel lines as opposed to the hatches. I can already see how this can go terribly awry if you let yourself go crazy with the scribing, though, so I may quit while I’m ahead.

If you do try this out — particularly if you’re like me and have only a knife and some tape to guide you — go slow and press lightly. Hell, don’t press at all. I got fewer scratches and better results when I took a gentler approach. The instructions I read encouraged a light touch, too, but seriously, this cannot be overemphasized.

These posts and blogs were indispensable in giving me the courage to try this, so check them out for more detailed explanations and actual instructions:

http://nelman.blogspot.com/2008/09/poor-mans-gunpla-scribing-panel-lines.html
http://www.swannysmodels.com/Scribing.html
http://www.clubhyper.com/reference/rescribingda_1.htm

_{*To be clear, I mean deviations from your intended panel line. Your fetish for large-butted Asian librarians will remain intact. Mine did, anyway.}

Chemistry wins again

Ugh.

Okay, long story short, I have had zero luck building this little kit. It’s a BB Strike Noir Gundam by Bandai in my custom color scheme (Strike Blanc? Infinite Pinkness?). It was about $9 from Hobbytown, if memory serves. I like to go full-throttle even on these dinky models so I filled all the seams and glued all the fixed joints. I really wanted it to kick ass.

It didn’t.

Here’s the Cliff’s Notes timeline:

1 Preshaded the helmet way too early, forcing me to mask off large portions of the face that I’d already assembled and painted so that I could fill the seams and repaint. The masking tape pulled the paint right off those areas.

2 Had to repaint the shoulders due to bad planning (like the helmet), but did not fully strip the previous coat of paint. Left texture on the top edges where I fixed the seams. Sanded like a mofo*, repainted 3x, finally was satisfied.

3 It fell off the drying mount. The whole thing. Major dings to the torso and helmet.

4 Enamel panel line wash failed completely. Attempts to clean up actually stripped the basecoat in those areas. Had to bathe the entire torso and legs in a Simple Green bath and start from scratch.

5 2nd time around on the torso was great. Preshading went off without a hitch. This is arguably the best the model ever got, before –

6 It fell off the drying mount again. This time I made no effort to fix the nicks that the impact produced.

7 Coated it in Future in prep for the panel line wash (take 2). The wind blew over the drying mount, and I instinctively caught the model — embedding giant fingerprints in the gloss coat**. But by this point I was starting to get beyond caring, so I waited for it to dry and gently wet sanded the fingerprints out.

8 To avoid a repeat of #4, I used acrylics for the panel line wash. It didn’t work great, but it worked, so I was happy. Better than panel lining with Microns, anyway.

9 Applied ill-advised custom decals. The UN one looks okay, but the 99 is more like 9   9. Don’t know why I thought that was okay at the time.

10 Flat coated the model to seal the decals and kill the sheen. This was the crowning horror. When the laquer-based matte spray hit the panel lines, the wash ran everywhere(!)  covering the model in the large puddles you see in the annotated photo in the header.

I actually don’t understand why that happened — the wash had been dry for 24 hours. I guess I should’ve hit it with another coat of Future before I applied the matte spray. Or used ink instead of acrylic for the wash…or something. I dunno.

I could go back to square one at this point, but I’m not going to. I’m DONE with this model. I’ll keep it around to try new techniques (this is a great candidate for pastel weathering — something I’ve been dying to try), but otherwise I’m writing it off.

Goodbye, Strike. May flights of smudgy angels sing thee to thy rest… On my shelf.

^{Above: Paintjob #2, just before the 2nd panel line wash. The torso hadn’t hit the ground a second time by this point. Still a couple nicks on his face from the tape disaster and the first fall, but otherwise sitting pretty. You can see some of the subtle preshading here on the torso and wings.}

^{Above: Panel line wash#2 and post fall #2. Exposed plastic at the top edge of the left wing is visible. Acrylic is so fragile.}

^{Above: Panel line wash #2, and post fall #2. You can see several dings in the finish on the torso, and the tips of the wings are showing exposed plastic. Also some nasty pooling on the waist armor, but I was willing to live with it.}

^{Above: Flat coated! Oh, and ruined! Notice how the panel lines on the wing were exempt from the reaction? I don’t know what that means either.}

*Mofos being known for how much they love to sand.

**Because I was using my Giant Hands that day, you see.

I love you, Hobby Link

My new kits arrived!

I’ve been too busy with work and side projects to start on any of them, and I’m busy finishing up another SD Gundam (Strike Noir), but I’m psyched. I’m going straight into the Gurren Lagann kits the first moment I get. All the effort is in the painting on those; there are only 2 pages of instructions, and one of them is a picture of the completed model.

Pictured above: "Do this"

Anyway, we’ll see how that goes. My BB Strike Noir is turning out a lot better than my last model, but it’s still not that great. I’m hoping I’ll have some better methods down by the time I work my way up to the Valkyrie* and the Vic Viper.

*Yup! Got a replacement!

You gave me a Hobbyfrown

Dear Hobbytown,

Your employees told me that this kit, in a series of kits you currently carry, was discontinued. So I ordered it somewhere else. Magically, it was not only not discontinued, but cheaper through the other store.

The workers who helped me were very nice when they didn’t sell me anything; don’t get me wrong. But seriously, if you a) have things in your store that I want or b) you can get them, I will buy them from you before I go anywhere else. Scout’s honor.

And if I was a boy scout, that would actually mean something. Just know that if a Scout dies because I have to shop at another store it’s on your head, Hobbytown.