The grandpa sprint!

Hi everyone! Welcome back. We’ve got a lot to update on today!

The Moon Gundam is done! You can see pictures of it and my thoughts about it over on it’s page! I wound up liking this kit a lot by the end of the build and have started reading the novel for it. It’s pretty enjoyable so far! I’m excited to see what happens as I get further in the story. It’s been a pretty long time since I read a Gundam series!

Longtime readers might recall my working on an RX-78-2 3.0 kit back around 2013! The initial concept for it was “Crimson Blitz” because I was listening to a song from the FF13: Lightning Returns soundtrack and just…really really liking it! Unfortunately, aside from painting the Gundam two shades of red in addition to the white I was never able to really come up with anything that made “Crimson Blitz” more than a moniker so I scrapped the idea and let the kit languish in my backlog.

It sat there for 7 years, and then I finally got a great idea for this thing. I got to work right after I finished up the Moon Gundam- the chest and arm parts were already cut out and a lot of the parts I had original intended to color red were already painted! Thankfully the coats were nice and light and I did the clean up properly all those years ago so there wasnt much to correct on those parts. I did some general surface prep (sanding with 800 and then 2000 grit sandpaper to make sure the surfaces were smooth) and got to work!

And I mean really got to work on it.

June 8th-June 16th WIP photos:

June 8th: Main body snapped together, all parts sanded. I’m getting in to the habit of just snap fitting my kits first to find out where there might be friction once things are painted and what gate marks will be visible on the final product.

June 9th: everything got primed! I’ve stopped priming pieces on at a time and instead now spray everything down by section. The general method is take the kit apart in sections and prime them still assembled. I break it down as such: the left arm/right arm, left/right shoulder, head, chest, waist, and left/right legs and the weapons. This stops me from putting too much paint on the undersides of parts or overspray making the kit harder to get apart/put together after painting. Priming the kits like this definitely feels much more efficient than doing everything individually.

June 10th-June 12th: Paint! Paint! and more paint! I had wanted to use this colorscheme on something for so long!! I love blues and purples together- it’s got such a nice feel to it, you know? Some of the parts were still drying and I needed to paint the gold for the arms and legs still….but I was able to test fit the waist together and oh my GOD I got so excited when I saw it all together. It really motivated me to get going on the gold parts so I could see this thing together.

June 13th-June 14th: Finished up the gold accent parts for the arms and legs and got the work done on the shield! The first pictures of this kit gloss coated turned out great!!

June 17th. You can see I took a day or two off from this thing to figure out the best way to bring the theme for this kit home. I flatcoated the kit with Mr. Color’s Super Smooth Clear paint and that flat top coat (used after a suggestion by Goodguydan) looks absolutely fantastic. This is definitely my go-to flat coat now and I’m stoked to pick up some gloss from the same line.

The ‘icing’ on the shield was done by mixing some Vallejo water effect mixed with some deep sky blue paint. I mixed it together it a little sandwich bag and then cut the tinest of corners off of it and squeezed it on to the shield. It’s not perfect but I think that’s one of the best things about it- it looks like it was iced like a pop tart! Perfect!

I felt very reminded of when I built, painted and decaled a master grade Banshee over the course of three days. It felt great to go on an absolute tear and rip right through building and painting this kit. The pictures are coming soon but I gotta flat coat the shield and get a few props for the pictures too. This kit came together so fast because I’m trying out this whole ‘hobby streak’ thing and we’re up to 13 whole days! The two day gap in the construction of the RX-78-2 was because, as you might’ve noticed, I picked up the MG Barbatos! The frame for that is all done and I definitely suggest following me over on Twitter to see that kit come together because I promise you it’s going to be one for the ages. 🙂

This kit was the first time I tried using a blend of shading techniques different from the ones I used for the Miria Rex (I haven’t forgotten about it, but I want it to be truly finished when I take pictures of it and that means YOU ALL GET TO WAIT FOR THE FINAL TOUCHES! and I have no idea when I’m gonna get around to that) and oh man, I’m so beyond sold. I don’t think I can go back to painting kits the way I used to, literally ever. The mixture of using preshading, MAX, and Saint-ism‘s technique of adding white to colors turned out some truly wonderful results. The blue and white parts are far and away my favorites to look at. Nazca blue fog white as the preshade color and nazca’s steel white over that will be the combo I use for almost any whit eon a mobile suit going forward. I could see myself picking up some of the warm gray as well! I’m really excited about the next project that I do where I get to use and refine these skills even more!

There are still a good number of things coming to the blog soon and I’m excited to tell everyone about them! Please be patient while I get all the ducks in a row but it’s gonna be pretty cool, especially if you’re a fan of my work!

‘Til next time!

FM Barbatos + Moon WIP & general update

Things sure are different now! Picked up a few supplies over the last month.

The eye shadow applicators were from Target and only cost 2$- I got them with the intent of using them to clean up panel line wash easily. It mostly works! It’s definitely better than using a q-tip even though I still plan on picking up some of the Gaia finish master swabs for cleaning washes up. Another handy purchase was some Tamiya measuring jars! 40ml of paint is overkill for most kits but the main goal here is just making sure I can measure my mixes. I can’t see myself mixing more than about 10-15ml of any given color at a time but in the cases of primers being able to mix a large batch consistently will be nice.

Last thing on the ‘different’ list is…paint!

After using Mr. Color reliably for…what, nine years? It’s time we branch out! Despite problems with their webstore, I managed to place an order with Volks and got a whole mess of new paints that I can’t wait to try. The coolest of all of them is a definite toss-up between the NAZCA primers and the metallic paint + metallic master thinner. The Nazca primers allegedly have better coverage to the point that only one coat is needed before painting. The mechanical surfacer primer also comes in four colors- light, heavy, super heavy and pink (for reds and yellows!)- which can be used as the internal frame colors of the mecha as well. The metallic master thinner is allegedly formulated to better break down the metal flakes that make metallic paint metallic so the finish is much smoother and shinier and I love shiny things.

These all just got here today so next update you’ll probably hear about how well these worked out.

Gunpla progress has been going good too! Progress is slow but the Moon Gundam’s main body is almost complete!

I have to redo all of the psycho plates though. I think I overthinned the Mr Color Iron because it dries too quickly and doesn’t have a glossy finish, even on a glossy black base. There’s some details on the upper thigh to do and general refining to do but I need a break from this one for minute while I rip all that old paint off of the titular parts of this kit.

What better for a break kit than the one I’ve been working on since February already? Bluefin recently announced their Bandai hobby open and while my first foray in to gunpla contests all the way back in 2009 left a sour taste in my mouth I think it’s high time to get over it and give it another shot. So, step one: No more waiting for these replacement parts. I bought a FM 1/100 Barbatos Lupus from across the street and swapped out a few bits to get started.

Finally did the detailing on the knees and tail blade. I was holding off on them for awhile because I wasn’t confident in my ability to paint them cleanly but it looks like I should believe in myself a little more.

One solid weekend of work later! The changes to the silhouette with the Lupus parts swapped in looks WAY better and really evokes the knightly vibe I was going for when I set out to theme this kit after my Monster Hunter character. I also picked up some black panel line wash and went over the blue parts with that instead of the dark gray. That change also looks a lot better which really doesn’t surprise anyone. But if I’m thinking of Monster Hunter, it’s not just monsters and hunters that define that game- the weapons do as well.

Pardon the rough cuts and bigtime WIP status of these changes! Things are still in the really early stages for creating a charge blade for the Miria Rex. For the uninitiated, the CB is a weapon in monster hunter that has two modes- a sword and shield mode that boasts high mobility or, by combining the sword and shield, an axe mode that has limited mobility but unleashes devastating attacks. If you’re curious about the weapon or what feeling I’m trying to evoke maybe I’ll make and post some clips from MHW: Iceborne or MHGU to explain it better. In any case the sword is turning out fantastic and I’m really excited to put more work in on it turning it in to a proper weapon.

The other big change is modifying the Rex’s backpack so it can still house the tail blade but has the left/right side’s from the Lupus’ backpack instead. Why? Well, initially I wanted to have it so the sub-arm from the Lupus could be used to hold the sword on the back of the kit with it’s new giant fuck-you sized handguard but the parts that are there for the tail blade get in the way and you know what? I just chopped apart a finished backpack for a last minute idea and sometimes you have to draw the line somewhere. So the subarms won’t function, but the aesthetics will still look great! The backpack still has a really look way to go because I need to figure out how to keep the center ‘wheel’ part that holds the tail blade where it goes and also to cover up the obvious gaps and such that are left by uh…totally obliterating the majority of the original backpack.

That’s all for today’s post! I wish I could say I’ll have another post before the month is out but who knows? Life is so crazy. To that end, I’m thinking about adding some sections to the blog that aren’t gunpla related so that way I have more things to update with. We’ll see what happens with any of that since I’d need to actually sit down and commit to typing them up.

Til next time!

FM 1/100 BLR WIP 8: Main body!

Twitter followers saw this already but I decided I didn’t want to wait for the new parts to show up.

In theory, it works great! In practice, not so much. The B17…or B25? whichever part the heel is, doesn’t quite have the room to accommodate the bamboo skewer. I tried to make a little extra room so it would fit better but there’s also the issue that the skewer and heel have no way to lock together like the parts proper do. I could probably rig something up that’d do the same thing or just wait a little bit longer.

The clear action base is doing most of the work holding this thing up. I have no idea where the other stand parts are though so there isn’t much I can do beyond this. There’s also a fair amount of detailing left to do on the frame, even though its going to be covered up. Still, I’m really happy with how this looks! I can’t get enough of this thing and really am looking forward to taking pictures of it with it’s weapon. I haven’t really started that part yet because it’s going to be awful(ly cool) to work on but I’m finishing up the Moon Gundam before I get in to anything else that I’m working on. Speaking of that kit, it’s also going great:

Still a ways to go, but with the psycho plates almost done it really feels like I’m just about finished with this kit. The build has been fairly enjoyable with only a few minor parts that I haven’t been overly fond of. Mostly the head, where doing the detail work is a royal pain in the butt. I’d kill for a green piece that goes under the two halves of the head to fill in that green detail but a paintbrush and toothpick will work just…fine.

Been focusing on the Moon a lot and I’m excited to finish up the legs…hopefully next weekend? The remainder of the waist parts, backpack and head parts only need a little more work and then it’s just the beam rifle and feet left to paint for this kit. Look forward to the next update where this thing will be standing on it’s own!

FM 1/100 BLR WIP 7: Leg day!

Aaaaand we’re back! I hope everyone is taking COVID-19 seriously and is staying safe for both themselves and vulnerable people out there. Since I’ve found myself with way more free time during the weekend and week, I’ve been really grinding away on my projects.

First up is the Miria Rex. The leg frames didn’t take too long to get done, makes me wonder why I waited so long to do them in the first place. Since doing those went so well I kept the momentum going:

Getting really really excited about this kit now- I’ve still gotta do the semi-gloss topcoat for the leg parts but as usual I am just too excited to see how it’s shaping up. I’ve got the feet parts up on skewers now for painting and I’ve drilled out holes for the feet parts that I accidentally ruined.

For those of you who don’t follow the twitter: I’m a dunce who, in the interest of getting the heel to stop falling off, glued it in place…which made it so the feet/ankles had zero rotation. Sigh.

So since I’m able to get model kits literally directly across the street from where I live, I figured it was a good time to try out Bluefin’s Replacement parts service. That was back on March 6th, so we’re still minimum 4 weeks or so away from seeing the replacement parts I ordered showing up. While it’s unfortunate, better nate than lever.

I also brainstormed the basic idea for the Ultra-Large mace…and I think y’all are gonna love it when it’s done. 😉 That’s all on the Barbatos for now.

This isn’t the only kit I’m working on though!

A friend asked if I’d build/paint a custom Moon Gundam for them and here we are- finished with a good chunk of the upper body! There’s still some touch up and tweaks to make on this kit but it’s coming along well and I’m excited to show off more of it.

Take care of yourselves til next time! Stay inside, wash your hands, and practice social distancing! Best of luck out there and be safe!