SMA BSC #3 Redux: 1/72 F-117A Nighthawk pt3 DONE!

Woot woot! There were a few little things that I learned how to do differently for the 1/48…but as a quick build I’m satisfied.

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Airfix 1/72 MiG-29 Fulcrum new boxing pt5 DONE!!

Now an entry in Scale Model Addict’s Big Spring Contest!!

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SMA BSC #2: Timeslip Creations’ 1/350 Action VI Transport pt10.2

Just a quick little addendum. Figured this thing needs a stand so I went to the trusty Round 2 dome base. Also started placing the engine LED diffusers….which kind of look like the inside of volcano…

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1/4222 Utar Fleet ships

I just can’t STOP!!! AHHHAHAHA!!!

Well, these little guys were easy enough. Some cleaning, engine drilling, priming, base coating, MiG cool gray wash, engine light and Future. Boom. Seen here are 1/4222 Tartan Cruisers (3 color variants, 1 silver+1 light ghost gray+3 light gray), 1/4222 Lancer Frigates, 1/4222 Assassin-class Corvettes, 1/4222 Corellian Gunship and a 1/2256 Assassin-class Corvette.

Still need to finish up the detail paint on the Rebel ships in white and take some in-studio shots….stay tuned.

Boom. Fleet growing.

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SMA BSC #2: Timeslip Creations’ 1/350 Action VI Transport pt10

The battle continues! While I preshaded the Fulcrum I figured to go ahead and get going on this one, too. I decided to stick to the mock-up and go with Tamiya Light Blue for the base coat, a couple of different grays for the smaller areas and a mix of orange with a drop of red-brown for the highlights. The striping will be decals for sure but there are a TON of smaller areas that need better detailing in paint. It’s coming along but I’m trying to take my time and do it right.

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Airfix 1/72 MiG-29 Fulcrum new boxing pt4

Lots of updates on this guy, too.

Engines: Tamiya Gunmetal and Chrome Silver
Preshading
Underside: Testors Duck Egg Blue
Topside: Tamiya XF-18 Medium Blue and xF-19 Sky Grey
Vert fin tips: Tamiya X-5 Green
Tips and nose: Montana Light Gray

Most of the decals are kit supplied and MAN!!! Airfix’s new decals are NICE. They’re a little thin but they apply super easily. There are also TONS OF STENCILS!!! Great kit just for the decals alone. The only ones not included, which I cut from an Authentic Decals 9-13 sheet, are the shark mouth, eyes and numbers.

To begin the weathering process I did a sloppy pin wash of MiG Productions neutral wash. Clean up and top coat tonight hopefully and in-studio shots soon!

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SMA BSC #3 Redux: 1/72 F-117A Nighthawk pt2

Wow! Done in two parts! Final in-studio shots will come soon.

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SMA BSC #3 Redux: 1/72 F-117A Nighthawk

It looks like I’m not going to be able to finish up the Dominator ISD conversion by the end of the month. I’m just way too behind on even just the hull scribing. 2 weeks is just not enough time to do the build justice so it will work into a shelf-queen project.

In lieu of that build, and owing to my slightly A-D-D habits of building (and sometimes I just need a “break” from more intense builds) I dug out my older Hasegawa 1/72 F-117A Nighthawk. This was chosen because it really is a stupid easy build. Not Snap-Tite stupid, but easy nonetheless. I had also collected Eduard’s PE set and mask…which turns out is where the bulk of the work is being put in.

The first big mod to the kit was assembling the landing gear doors in closed position. For the most part they fit snugly but a little bit of shaving and trimming was necessary to get them flush with the belly surface. There was a little bit of super glue spillage so I will be going back over those areas with some micro-grain sandpaper. Cockpit wise, the whole thing is built up with the PE set, tub and all. A little bit of shaving was required to the kit part’s tub width and the instrument panel hood needed to be removed entirely. The only other bit of body work is the filling and sanding of the gaps at the main wing seams.

I’ll probably finish up the pilot and PE bits tonight and do the sanding. Hopefully painting tomorrow, then future and decals. Super quick process it would seem.

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SMA BSC #4: 1/1000 Olympic Carrier(s) pt7 DONE!!!

All done! I’ll tell ya, it’s a tremendous pain in the ass to get the lighting to show up nicely while maintaining image exposure balance…

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SMA BSC #4: 1/1000 Olympic Carrier(s) pt7: decals!

All the touch up painting and Futuring complete! So far the decals are a combination of the ones I originally designed for the kit (stripes, etc) and the digital silk versions supplied with the kit. The stripes are tad pale but I don’t mind. My plan is to do the decals in phases/layers. What you see now is layer 1…the next layer is the paneling (although in retrospect I should have done the paneling first) and then layer 3 will be all the little “stencil” data and whatever else. This is a  ”big” ship so it’s gotta have a ton of auxiliary markings and what not…

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SMA BSC #3: 1/4222 Dominator (ISD Conversion) pt2

All hope is not lost! I think I can still finish this up this month….I think….I’ve been slowly scribing away at the super structure pieces and even started assembly. A couple of the original pieces were missing so they were substituted with styrene. Easy.

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Next week I have a couple day’s off so I’ll be able to push through a lot on all these various projects….

SMA BSC #4: 1/1000 Olympic Carrier(s) pt6

Big update on the Carriers. All the detailing on #2 was wrapped up, including adding the rear fins. Less was needed because the seam on the bottom joined more cleanly. It of course got it’s coat of primer, too. The tails for both of them received their static discharge vanes. The masking on #1 was removed and peeled some of the black off with it. It’s really a happy accident because the black was way too dark and didn’t match the references. So I came back in with some Testors Gunship Gray and it looks TONS better. The rear “grill” area was painted with black on #1 and gunmetal on #2. Before going to far along I did some drybrushing and detailing with chrome on #1. This step still needs to be repeated on #2. A healthy coat of future was also applied to #1 in preparation for decals. Once those are on I’ll do some washes and heavy weathering…

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1/2256 Commission 1st May update!

So when I took off the liquid mask from the inside of the Dreadnaught it stuck way too much. SOO I ended up having to file the openings again and refill with the clear resin. Much cleaner look…I also got all the fibers on it threaded so now it’s ready to hook up all the LEDs. I’m hoping that I’ll be able to fill the interior with light evenly enough with wide angle LEDs so that those larger windows glow. Testing to follow.

As for the MC-80, one of the first steps was to thread the tail fibers and fill the channels. The hangar was also primed in preparation for LEDs. Moving along now!!

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Airfix 1/72 MiG-29 Fulcrum new boxing pt3

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And for the main event from the weekend! Got a lot of progress on the Fulcrum.

Picking up where I left off I assembled the intakes, which are split down the middle. The actual “tubing” section seam fits pretty well but the alignment on the intakes is nasty. It took some sharp blades and some putty to clean them up. Surprisingly, they attach to the fuselage cleanly leaving minimal gaps at the contact points.

I decided to go with the in-flight configuration so all the gear doors had to be closed. The forward bay doors weren’t too bad in terms of getting them to fit. However, they did need to be glued one corner at a time because there were more or less held in place by pressure. The side gear doors were a bit more complicated as NONE of the parts really fit each other. So there was some trimming and  filing and squeezing and gluing but it all seemed to work out ok. There were a couple of open spots here and there but more on that down the line.

There were also a bunch of smaller detail parts that are kind of blah. The intake vents, the antennas and the pitot are all big old blobs of soft plastic. Whatever. Practice build. Pylons, of course, too. The pitot though was bad enough to warrant the use of Dreammodel’s parts…and boy does it make a difference.

Here’s the “down the line” part: Aves. There were just too many little gaps here and there and I needed to blend the new pitot part into the nose so Aves was justly applied to specific locations, including wing gaps and the gear door areas. Not bad.

It was also the time to finish up the cockpit, which I had sprayed some black into. I didn’t want to fuss too much with it so I added a little greeblie behind the headrest and drybrushed the whole thing with silver. The pilot got the most detail. One issue is that with the replacement seat he sat a little too proud and bumped his helmet on the canopy so I had to shave his legs down and use a clamp to squeeze him in.

The canopy itself is a thick old bit of clear and takes decently to a couple of coats of Future. The inside seam was painted with desert khaki or some such color….hopefully it’ll look good when the mask comes off…

Lastly, I primed the whole bird with Mr Surfacer 1200 to retain all that rivet detail! Woot! Preshading next!3