Geara Zulu Angelo Sauper use - WIP 1

Hello strangers! Yes, Its been a little while, but i have been working on the Gera Zulu Angelo Super use. As you can see form the below, I have primed, base coated and in some cases highlighted, quite a bit to go though. 

The purple parts turned out a little strange, in mixing up a supposed "lighter" shade of purple to highlight with,  it somehow turned out darker, resulting on a quite bizarre 2-tone purple effect. The alclad turned out marvellous as it always does, and the blue on the shoulder pad parts and waist armour turned out pretty nifty too. My only drawback is the royal blue I was using for the torso and feet turned out no so royal blue.. more just blue in fact and not all that different from the normal blue I used for the shoulder armour.. perhaps I will highlight, not sure yet. Gunmetal and masking the weapons, as well as that tricky trim all to be done next weekend. 

Anyways, that's all from me. More soon. :)

Marasai Devastator 1/144 HG WIP Part 5

So, It's finally completed! 5 weekends of work done. Added another clearcoat, but as the model was still in a porous state paint wise, I decided to weather it to take advantage of the texture. Went relatively well, but made a crucial mistake by not remembering to add decals first! Decided it would probably be best to just leave them off in this case.. otherwise it would mean a ton of work adding a glossy coat to allow the decals to set.

So, all in all I am pretty pleased with the final result, another vid below showing off the final parts. a few pics too to show in more detail. Super thanks to everyone who has been supporting my endeavours as always, you are all individually awesome. More soon.

End of June update

As you can see from the below, have been mostly working on the Marasai devastator custom, which is turning out ok and has been a good learning experience, especially in terms of detailing and masking.

Have also been slowly snapping off parts, cleaning and sanding from the Zeta 2.0 MG kit I have decided to enter into the summer war competition being hosted by the gundam eclipse forums.

2 more runners to go and were ready to build.. err...baby.

A couple of purchases from the HLJ sale, a Geara Zulu HG and a Rick Dias MG. Both suits I am a big fan of, especially the Dias as it is simply so different from other MS'.

Looks like a fucking nazi death machine! I will not however be adding swastikas. That would make me a racist.  

Quattro Vajeena's AKA 4 Fannies Rick Dias. I have a cartoon man crush on him. 

In other news: Nothing much really! I am about 30 eps into Victory Gundam, which is turning out to be better than I thought it would be to be honest.. would be good to see more anime set around the UC 120 ish period. Although the BESPA MS' do look a little weird with their huge bug eyes.

On another note: I have has some difficulty of late with a very popular supplier of after-market decals. I received the complete wrong one's I ordered... To be nice, I decided to keep the ones sent, as I can use them for other projects as this supplier had only charged me for these particulars. The supplier, who I might add is on the other side of the planet to me, requested me to ship them back, and payup the difference for the ones I had actually ordered (which would work out about the same as the ones I incorrectly got int he first place!). I think that's out of order.. you don't ask your customers to pay up for your mistake right? I took the piss a little, but then (quite kindly I think) shook it off in good humour, and requested he send me a new invoice for the decals I wanted. That was 3 days ago without response.....I'll give it 3 more days at the most...

More soon.

Marasai Devastator 1/144 HG WIP Part 4

I can't believe I have spent 4 weeks building this.. although to be fair I did lose yesterday to tiredness and last Saturday I was doing other stuff, so realistically its been 5 straight days or so..

Continuing the video thing here you go:

Looking to complete this next week. All that remains is some final detailing, panel lining and top coating. Can't wait.

Marasai Devastator 1/144 HG WIP Part 3

Just a quick one to let you know my WIP for the devastator Marasai, gotta dash.. :)

Marasai Devastator 1/144 HG WIP Part 1

So many ideas for this one, but not quite got all the parts required as yet, so I made a start by assembling the kit, identifying the required seam and nub removal points, and setting to work with the putty and sanding...

Super thanks to my buddy Skeptical for letting me use his music in this vid. If you have not checked out his music already then do because you should do. :)

Next weekend I will finish off the puttied parts, get it all nice and smooth, add some more panel lines and set about finding parts for the "devastator" element of the Marasai.

Some decisions still to be made on this.. as well as colour scheme. All will become clearer towards the end of the week :)

1/100 MG Full Armour Unicorn

Finally, completed. I say completed, I omitted various dry-rub transfers from the final kit due to the fact they were infinitely irritating to apply. For this kit I used mostly Gun metal and white Tamiya acrylics - a little Alclad II for the thruster parts - mixed a little flat base clear with red to create the "ceramic" looking inner-thrusters in the base jabbers massive boosters. Several hours of decal marking.. a couple of topcoats to make it look more sparkly, some decidedly dodgy panel lining (yep, still need some work on building this skill, the main element being patience - rushing it really will yield crap results) and et viola. Pix below.

April Update

Hello! Been obsessively working on the full-armour Unicorn of late, and playing through half-life 2 at the moment (£6 on Steam! bargain..). Head and torso, waist and legs have all-in-all taken me 4 days to complete... factor in the 2 year old son and wife and were looking at a real figure of around 8 hours or solid work inclusive of dry time.

 One thing that really bugged me.. is Alclad II supposed to take frikkin over 24 hours to dry? for some bizarre reason, did the usual enamel gloss undercoat for the supplied 8 thrusters on the FAU (full armour unicorn, I will refer to it as the FAU cos I am tired of writing it.. ), applied the alclad in a nice, even coat, got a smashing metallic chrome finish, and upon fitting the thruster to one of the inner frame parts I found my thumb covered in grey shit - and a thumb print in the frikkin thruster. Left for a further 12 HOURS till totally dry. Another lesson learned I guess? (Only took around 6 hours till totally dry last time).

Looks like FAU is RIP here for some reason.. 

Have also received one HECK of a haul from HLJ.com I have been eagerly anticipating, here's what I gets:

Ahhh finally! the Palace Athene! Possibly, one of my most fave MS designs. Looks totally badass. 

The Zeta, second version Master grade. Liking this Gundam design too. Looks much better than the Mk.II Gundam, however I do have my eye on the upcoming RG of the Mk.II, looks awesome in the Titans colours. 

Look at the size of this mutha! Yep, its the Fazz.. or Fah-z, however you want to pronounce it.  A stupid, fat and ridiculously armoured Gundam from the double-zeta series. I love it! (but my wallet did not on the shipping.. this thing weighs!)

I actually like Gundam Seed. 

On another note, Gundam related.. I have found myself for the first time watching the Gundam seed series which for some reason I have always avoided - probably because its the series most people talk about and stuff but probably also because I unfortunately watched Gundam seed destiny prior to this - and it did not leave a very good impression. That aside, I am up to EP 31 or so now and I am actually really enjoying it, despite its weird faces. The plot line is actually quite intricate, and I find myself almost (almost..) feeling for Kira and his plight. Even though he's a pubescent, moody adolescent fanny boy. At least Athrun has the balls to point a gun. There is also a frightening amount of forward-swooped haircuts.

Once I have watched this series I only need see 8th MS team, Igloo, Victory and G Gundam and I have seen every god damn Gundam anime there has been.. 2 of these series I have.. the others I am working on..

Gun-discraceful. 

Would also like to point out - to those of you who are buying this insanely expensive and huge resin mobile suit from G-System at the moment, are you BLIND?

Monstrosity.

This, is the Nightingale - the alternative to the waaaay prettier Sazabi MS for Char Azanable in "Beltorchikas Children" (the original / alternative story to Chars Counter attack, gosh damn-itty I hate that name! "Beltorchika".. yach!). The Nightingale is by far, the worst, ever design for an MS. Its massively complicated, and looks like an overweight squashed cybernetic insect - yet people are raving about how awesome it is.. are you people actually looking at it? Its just... horrible... look at it damn you!

Nearly Mid-March update

Hey, me again. Well, I have been practising somewhat with the airbrush, and have completed the Buster Gundam only to cock it up in the final panel lining. Was looking OK at one point, but I think an incorrect thinner ratio was to blame for the horrible "dirtiness" of the completed model. I dislike the final result so much I am not even going to give it a completed models page! :) Instead I will post just one pic here in this near-mid-march update.

I hate it. I liked it at one point. Damn you enamel/thinner ratio!

The chrome parts on the guns, the hands and on the two plates on the chest were at one point looking fabulous. I then applied an enamel wash for the panel lining, and in cleaning it up with thinner it started to strip away the chrome! Must bear in mind.. Enamel thinner also works on lacquers! Shading turned out OK on the white parts, but the white turned out a little more grey than I wanted to - the original intention was to have a creamy off-white but layer after layer of white was being placed over just to cover the grey primer. 

So, all in all, many lessons learnt on this model - it also took me as much as twice as long to complete the model - a frightening prospect considering I am going to be doing the same thing with the full armour Unicorn next.. expect many WIPs from this point onwards. 

In other news: I have made some new purchases, of which I shall reveal when they arrive. I have spent a stupid amount of money having sold some of my music-making gear (sad). I am also making a... wait for it... UV LED lightning base for the Unicorn! Will be posting a WIP and how-to on this today. Its surprisingly easy... just hoping it works!

Febuary Update

What have I been up to then since completing the Jagd Doga? Well, as I previously mentioned I have now moved away from using Tamiya sprays exclusivly to using them concurrently with an airbrush. With the airbrush (cheapo one off ebay, thought I should not go all out and get an expensive one, especially if working with the airbrush turns out to me be my thing) I have been experimenting with a few techniques such as getting used to how to control the dual-action on the airbrush, learning about pressures, colour mixtures, thinning ratios and generally practising handling it. So far its working out OK with guidance from google and youtube, and am hoping to soon have my first airbrushed model completed.

Talking of models, have made a couple of purchases. First off, and the model I am currently experimenting with using the airbrush is the 1/144 High Grade Buster Gundam. Nope, this one is not a recent seed series rehash from Bandai, its the original one I got in the HLJ sale. Bargain at only £7!

Painting this one all in original-ish colours, hoping for a nice chrome on the barrels of those guns. You can see how its going below (although I recently found out I am supposed to use gloss enamel, not matt. oppsy) This'll probably look more like aluminium rather than chrome when covered in the arclad paint.

 

Also got this nifty no-grade 1/100 Regen duel Gundam, again in the HLJ sale. Was really digging the colouring on this one and fancied making something a little different. 

Also got a good 'ol trusty Hi-Nu Gundam, 1/144 HG. And why not, it looks bad ass. 

In the meantime I have also been working my way through the beats known as the full armour Unicorn MG. All 28 odd runners have now been cut loose, and each an every part has been sanded ready for first assembly which will probably commence today. I still cant get over the tiny miniatures you get with master grades. Check out the tiny Banagher!

Full Armour Unicorn Gundam MG, and a nearly completed cup of tea. 

Ha! Its a weeeee man!

That's about all really. Will be updating again soon with a proper WIP for the full armour and other stuff. I am also working on a new youtube vid for the Buster - although it it turns out no-so-good I wont bother with that and start filming on the next build :) I am hoping also to do a quick tut on using an airbrush - despite the wonderful power of the Internet you can never seem to find all your info on using an airbrush in Gunpla in one place, and simply covering the basics. Perhaps an article on here first.

Oh, and worth mentioning.. You may have noticed I have made up a whole load o f new graphics for this blog. Hope you like. I like green. It is nice.

Later.

Unicorn Lineart

Did a quick little vector PNG lineart drawing. You can download it by clicking here if you like.

MG Banshee on the way

Yep, had to post this as I am pretty chuffed to see the MG Banshee pix today (below, due out next month RRP 5500 Yen, around £45 with the crappy exchange rate). Will of course be getting one of these as I am sure many, many other people are just to re-create the Banshee / Unicorn final battle :) I don't care if everyone else is doing it, I'm happy to be a gunpla sheep :)

The unicorn has arrived!

Wohoo! At last.. the box is incredibly weighty and I am somewhat daunted by the sheer volume of runners in this kit.. its going to be a heck of a long build but I cant wait. WIP coming soon as I start this.