Remora Noodle House - WIP

I have spent the past few weeks working on one of the Remora kits from Industria Mechanika, and let me say now that I recommend their kits without reservation. I have several now, and each of them is incredible. 

For this one I'm converting the ship into a flying noodle house, inspired by the movie "Fifth Element." There's a long way to go at this point, but it's all starting to come together. Once the kitchen is built out I'll start in on the heavy weathering. I will also be making polymer clay foods, using dollhouse techniques, that won't involve paint.

This kit represents a real stretch for me, as the polymer clay is new, and I'm not much of a scratch builder. But almost everything in the kitchen will be scratch built. In fact, everything in the photo at this point is - including the unfinished cooler cabinet on the back right. I need to space the shelves so you can see the food, which is why I haven't finished the build.

A lot of the little details, like weathering on the engine, or notes in the wheelhouse, will be fairly hard to see, but I've enjoyed putting them there.

Stay tuned....

 

Spotlight: Figure Painter Magazine

I am thrilled to be able to say that my 1966 Oldsmobile 442 got a two part, step-by-step write-up in Figure Painter Magazine issues 16-17.

More to come!

DAK Officer - FINAL

This was a fun, and reasonably quick paint up of the DAK Officer from Alpine Models. I really love their sculpts, and the quality of their resin is excellent -- something I don't say often about resin.

I look forward to painting more of these.

It was painted largely with P3 acrylics, and weathered with Secret Weapon pigments. The base is made up of natural soil, rocks, and pigments.

Landscaping Truck - Final

I'll add the bungee cords as soon as the elastic arrives, and work out some bumper stickers in the interim, but otherwise....

Rust - Two Versions - Video

When Secret Weapon Miniatures sponsors a "Best Weathering" category, I get to weather the trophies. We cast them in resin, and then I paint them, pigment them, and put them in a socket... which is why we don't sponsor a lot of "Best Weathering" categories!

This time, since I had two of them to make, I decided to make them distinctly different - and capture the process on video.

A quick review of videos also made me realize that I haven't done a live broadcast in more than a year... and while I don't know that I'll go back to the live format, I certainly do hope to start getting back to videos here shortly.

Landscaping Truck - WIP

I really enjoyed the "Pick Up w/Equipment" kit from Meng Models -- which I had used to make my Zombie Truck -- and quickly made plans to create another, more mundane version of the kit. Given my three year old son's obsession with yard work, "Misterjustin Lanscaping" was born.

The tool rack was scratch built from brass tube, the tool bin from plasticard, and the TOYOTA lettering is from Voyager and is intended for another one of the Meng truck kits.

Of course any landscaping truck is going to need tools... and so I'm having a set of them run through the 3D printer, with some extra water jugs that I will use on other projects.

1966 Oldsmobile 442 - Final

Until I spot the next thing that needs "fixing," this is it for the 442 kit.

It wasn't easy to close things up and hide all of the trash inside -- but there's enough going on that when you see the kit up-close you're drawn through the windows, so it's not all lost.

And now I need to not break it until the December IPMS event.....

1966 Oldsmobile 442 - WIP

This is the 1966 Oldsmobile 442 kit from AMT models. As cheap car kits go it's a nice one, although it suffers from a one piece window insert, as most kits in this category do. Otherwise I have no complaints, and as I didn't use the windows...

I'm doing this one as an abandoned junker, so the little interior details are going to add a lot to the story. In this case those include a plastic trash bag, a few old beer cans, some newspapers, and a handful of Playboy issues, all with appropriate 1976 labels or covers.

The windows were made by spreading out a thin layer of Realistic Water and then sprinkling on some crushed glass. Once that dried I cut it to shape and glued it to the frame with some Water Effects.

Wittmann's RC 007

I stopped doing commission work a long time ago, but sometimes you just can't say no. In this case I'm turning this 1/16 scale RC tank into Wittmann's 007. This thing has individually linked metal tracks, emits smoke from the exhaust, has a working suspension, and shoots airsoft pellets. Even the tow and stowage rings are workable. It's an incredible piece... and I'm only a little afraid of ruining it....

Tamiya 1/35 Sherman M4A3

This model was painted largely as an excuse to work with the flexible sandbags (THEY ARE AWESOME!) and try my hand at tying tiny, tiny knots.

The weathering was done using Secret Weapon Weathering Pigments as washes. This let me get a nice, rippled look of once wet dust. What you see in the picture, below, was largely washed away and only existed as a backdrop for the more recent dust.

Overall I'm very happy with the kit and how it came together. I've already found a couple of little things to tweak - like the misplaced rope under the bottom ditching log starboard side.

I'll take this with me to the Yuba City and Sacramento IPMS Regional shows this year.

This is a look at the color modulation, and forced focus, prior to weathering and filters. The finished effect is MUCH more subtle and really works as a whole.

CMON Voting Link

Zombie Truck - Nearly Finished

This is the "Pick Up w/Equipment" from Meng models - and I actually purchased the kit simply to get my hands on the stowage that comes with it. When PoweredPlay started offering ready to go lighting kits I decided I had to try one as soon as possible -- and so was born this fun little project!

I kept the cab empty so that I wouldn't have to worry about where to put the wires, but the module is so small it would have worked if I'd just left out the engine. The hood comes off so that I can fiddle with things, but I also put the battery under the stand so I can just disconnect it.

The lights are incredibly bright -- enough so that they're clearly visible despite the fact that I have two 100 watt daylight bulbs shining in these photos!

The kit, and the lighting, were a real treat to work with -- and I'll try to get some finished shots up in the near future. I still need to do a bit of weathering, and then hide those wires!

Crystal Brush - 2013

So I've been just a wee bit busy with the Tablescapes Kickstarter Campaign, but I did manage to make it to Adepticon this year and enter the Crystal Brush with five models... one of which took gold!

I have to say that if one of my models was going to win I'm thrilled that it was my historical vehicle entry.

As the sponsor of the "Best Weathering" category I also asked Roman and Raffa for their opinion (Roman was judging Crystal Brush - top photo) and their reply was, "There's a German tank that is very good. The open artillery piece." I got to smile, thank them, and ask for a second choice... because I couldn't win my own award. That's probably the best compliment I've ever received on my work.

Of course then I got home and managed to drop my Crystal Brush trophy. All six pieces are sitting in their box. I am a sad, sad panda.

And now the model just has to survive until the California IPMS regional event this year....

Marder III M Ausf. -- FINISHED!

The Marder is finally finished! Well, at least until I notice something obvious in the photos that I missed while looking at the model.

I used the Dragon 1/35 Smart Kit, a milled barrel and rounds, brass detailing for the helmets, and made the stowage rolls.

I will probably do a bit more pigmenting on the stowage but I do otherwise consider this complete. I'm very happy with the colour modulation and overall effect, but like any kit there are plenty of things I would have done differently now that it's finished.

I did manage to make the cracked leather seats more visible -- with a helmet and strap on one of them to help draw in the eye -- and added a family portrait to the wall of the fighting compartment.

The radio is fully detailed and includes a headset with tiny, tiny wiring. I don't think I'll ever do that again. Ever.

Marder III M - Continued

I'm finally working on the detailing and finishing... and there's nothing quite like a camera to help you find the spots that need to be touched-up. In particular the (unfinished) gun return, and the shell storage.

But I'm very happy with how the radio turned out, although you can't see the metallic sheen in these photos, and that I managed to get the tiny headset built and positioned without losing my mind. Of course none of this would be complete without cracked leather seats!

I still have a lot of finishing to do, more detailing, weathering, the road wheels and tracks, and a bit of stowage. I do hope to have it finished in the first week of February though.

VW Chicken Coop

Every now and then you find an unusual bit of inspiration. In this case... the Volkswagen chicken coop. A friend posted this photo to Facebook and I immediately knew that I had to model it. Within a couple of hours I had ordered all of the necessary components

Unfortunately my options were limited -- first in that I could only find a 1/48 VW that was the wrong model, not well detailed, and lacked the removable side panels. As I didn't want to do a lot of scratchbuilding I went with what I could find. Although I found 1/48 chickens the detail on them is laughable. They're chicken shaped but lack any hint of feathers or anything else. The smallest chicken wire I could find is too large -- although I think that the impact of that, visually, is very limited.

In the end I'm very pleased with the finished result and enjoyed this distraction a great deal.

Chaos - Heldrake

I was unable to meet the deadline for the 2012 charity project and so told the winner he could pick any one model for me to paint. This is that model. He wanted the classic black/bronze scheme but I took some liberties and went to town with the idea of weathered bronze. From assembly to this stage I'm probably 4 hours into the project.

And now a quick review of the kit itself. First, I'm not a fan of the concept. While the other Demon Engines look like they were designed to function and then stuffed full of demon - this looks like a jet fighter that turned into a duck. That just doesn't do it for me. It is, however, an INTERESTING model and I like it more now that when I first saw previews. But I still don't like it.

The model itself is very well engineered - but also very fragile and very limited. Assembly was incredibly easy but I'm disappointed that while Games Workshop has been giving us more posable, dynamic models this one is really a fixed position, banking to the port, demon duck.

It is also the most fragile plastic model I can remember working with. The wings and neck are fitted with ball joints - and even a liberal application of MEK over a scored surface left me having to re-glue the model several times after only light handling. While I would generally pin a model like this the body is hollow, and the walls thin, so there's not much to be done.

The most disappointing thing for me, however, is the big open cavity in the back where the jet engine would be. It really looks like a trussed turkey from the back. Because there are exhaust ports on the torso, top and bottom, you can also see completely through the model from several angles.

Love it or hate it I'm glad to have had a chance to paint this - but don't expect to add one to my collection for anything but a must-have army item... and I'll resist that if I can.