Roktman

As soon as I read "short run" I was wondering how difficult it was. LOL 😉 You did a VERY nice job with it! Some, with a lot of work turn into nice models as you've shown.

For the foam out of the hose you could use clear caulking like whats done when making waterfalls on train layouts. Just don't flatten it. Lay out clear caulking on a piece of clear kitchen wrap. Measure out the distance and just run a bead that long. When dry you can peel it off the clear wrap. It should be flexible enuff to make it mimic water out of a fire hose. For the foam on the ground you could take some 2 part epoxy like Aves or Magic Sculpt, mix the two parts, and with a wide paint brush and water smooth out the epoxy until you like it. As long as you keep the stuff wet you'll be able to work with it. It'll air dry over a few hours when you're done getting it as you like. Don't know what to say re: the firefighters. But with the Aves you could always customize some figures that may be "close." HTH

Thank you sir! 😁 Was a fun lil kit.

This is another kit from deep in the stash. I'm guessing I saw it on FB somewhere, had to have it, and then buried it in The Pile. LOL 😉 It's a 1:24th scale kit from Modern Armies in Scale (MAiM). It's listed on their website under the category "What If '46." It's 3D printed and then I'm guessing cleaned, molded and cast as I don't see any grow lines. I'm guess whats supposed to be a fuel tank has a lot of edges rather than circular, but it's so obvious, it had to be on purpose. There's ~20 parts to this kit. The main body comes in 2 parts and gives you enough room to paint the highly detailed interior. Being that it was a What If '46, I went with olive green color interior, with a leather seat. I started out painting the jumpsuit of the figure a red metallic as it is sort of a futuristic design. But no matter what I did the Scale Color metallic paint just wouldn't go on smoothly. So the paint was stripped off and here it is in a red primer. While that was drying I went about trying a method for making smooth plastic exterior look like cast metal. I used some Mr. Dissolved Putty and tapped it on the body with an old brush - small areas at a time. When it dried, I sanded it down a bit with a Fine sanding sponge. Forgetting to take pics I have the finished machine and driver. The mechanical parts are just a dark gray with a Metallic steel dry-brush. The colors are RLM 70 and Vallejo's tan primer. Tamiya panel liner was used to outline all the panels. I used a technique shown in You Tuber "Nighshift's" videos for weathering the paint. Looked good while I was doing it. But stepping back and looking at it in it's entirety, I think I went a little overboard on such a small model... Aah well, next time... The arm and leg joints were balls and sockets, so it wasn't the easiest to line everything up so that the legs and base of gun rest squarely on the desk. Same with aligning the drivers arm (she actually has the cover handle in her hand) to the cover while lining up the cover where it belongs (the two small hinges broke off long ago...) while making her stand squarely on her feet. Take your time and everything lines up. Oh, I gave up on the metallics uniform. I went with a dark gray body suit, red leather straps, helmet and boots and the ray gun was chrome. Next is a Base. Check back for that and thanks for looking.

All sounds terrific. Looking fwd. to it! 🙂

Thanks. The Citadel paint for a tarnished copper look really makes a good ghostly color. 😉

Thanks. Basically just remembering what the cartoon kid wore. LOL ;) I like how these sculptors can turn a 2D illustration into a 3D statue.

WOW, nice get! That'll keep you busy thru the those Calif. "winters." 😉

This kit has been in my stash for a very long time. So long in fact that it outlasted the producer - Two Fat Guys. Sidebar: one of the guys went on to form JPG Productions. The 1:2256 scale model came in 7 or 8 parts (I forget now) and was very easy to clean up and get ready for building. The parts went together effortlessly. Looking at images from the Phantom Menace movie, it had this beige, almost rust looking color. What I decided to do was start dark and then mask off sections which would be panels. Then sprayed a lighter color. I did the masking and painting for a number of levels until I had my lightest color. Then removed all the masking tape. Thankfully no paint peeled off from this procedure. This made the wings look "busy." Then I weathered the ship. Then it sat and sat. I knew I wanted to do a little vignette of when the ships landed in the forests of Naboo. finally when I found time, I took an open ended box from Michaels which I turned over and used for a base. Then I took 3 different sized dowels (one size was wooden cotton buds) as the trees. I used cut up pieces of the fiber hanging basket liners as branches. When that was done I added two different times of ground foam as leaves and I finished it up by gluing the ship in place. Thanks for looking.

Being a bit older than you, my girlfriend (at the time) would have been jealous of me and the princess... 😉

Thanks!

Thanks for the kind words. They were both a fun paint up. Looking fwd to John Dennett releasing Cratchit next X-mas. 😉

Thanks! was a fun, quick paint-up.

Another excellent sculpt from John Dennett and Moondevil Studios. The 1:5th bust was cast in a light green odorless resin. The kit comes in 2 parts - the bust and the base. After washing with warm soapy water, and giving it a coat of primer I wanted to make Jacob the ghost he was when seen in his scene of A Christmas Carol. I had used Citadel's Nihilakh Oxide on the Ghost Lighthouse Keeper and decided Jacob needed the same treatment. But first he needed his earthly colors. As this movie (1952 film) was in B&W, I was free to use whatever I want. So I decided on a white shirt, black jacket, and maroon tie, pale flesh and auburn hair. Ol' Ebenezer looking on favorably From there I started his ghostly change - The purple is masking fluid to protect painted eyes I went back and forth with Jacob adding and subtracting the green and white, until I got a look I liked. The base was painted, and I added a little snow. Done. Thanks for looking.

Thanks. It's a fairly new kit from Troy, so he may have some on hand, or if not only a few days away with his caster. 🙂

I picked this one off the shelf as I saw it as a fast little build. Sculpted by Troy McDevitt, is a very nice caricature, with one two bubbles on two of the teeth, and seam lines that were nearly invisible. The part fit very well and only a little bit of Aves was used along the spines, and where the spines met his tail. After that it got a coat of Vallejo Air NATO Black as a primer. I like the NATO Black because to my eyes it looks like there a little green in it, and models don't just look black. After that it got a drybrush of a mid range gray. while that was drying I got out some Ivory and painted the teeth and eyes. Then some Gray Green for the toe and finger nails. I also mixed some of the Gray Green with the Ivory, and painted his gums. Liking the new Godzilla I had the idea to have his spines light up in that blue white coloring, so sprayed the edges a wide swath of dark blue. Leaving the blue to dry , I went back and gave the teeth a was of Nuln Oil. The eyes also got dots of Gory Red. From there I went back to the spines, and gave a smaller edging with a light blue. When that dried, I had an even lighter blue that went in a smaller strip along the spines. To finish it off a added dots of white to tallest spines. To finish him off, his teeth got a dry brushing of Ivory. Done, nice and easy. Thanks for looking.

With the table cleared it was time to dive into the pile again for some new kits to work on. This time I pulled out two, both from Gillman Productions. The first is Pepper from the series American Horror Story, and the Freakshow story. We find the kit is similar to Twisty from the same show with a sort of carnival base. The kit comes in only 3 parts - the head, bust, and base. Every so often you'll get a cool illustration from Mark Van Tine, the sculptor! Base colors added. except for the ice cream (at the time I was still researching that). ;) (EDIT: chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla) ;) First highlight added, and epoxied the bust to the base. Starting with the face this session, I gave the usual black eyes to start and also some Beige Red for a base to the skin. Some Reikland Fleshshade was added as the shadows and then some more speckled around the face. Then some Beige Red was speckled on top. A mix of that paint with some of Vs Basic Skin tone followed, and then a final of just the Basic Skin tone. Having a look the actress' blue eyes were left and I used Azure for the base color of the irises. With that I was done. Thanks for looking.

Thanks, Tony!

Today's subject is another from MoonDevil Studio. It's the Howling Man, from a 1060 episode of the Twilight Zone. From IMDB: Just looking at the sculpt you get to see how the story ends. The kit comes in the usually 2 parts, the bust and the base. The kit is typically well done and only the slightest seamline is seen across the slicked back hair. Looking at images of the actor, Robin Hughes, the first obvious thing is that it's all in B&W (Duh, it was 1960, Kev...). My first idea was to paint it up that way. But it was only a few days after JerseyFest (where I got the model) that someone else posted on the FB GK groups his version which was in B&W. So I decided to go with color. Next thing to think about was what is the coloring. Looking at the film still, it looks like the actor has no coloring makeup, and his shirt is black and his cape is alsodark with a light color stripes, and cowl. I remembered a movie memorabilia auction where Dracula's cape was up for bid. The cape as you would expect was black, but the inside was a salmon color satin! I decided that my devil will have the same. If it's good enuff for Bela, it's good enuff for the Howling Man... But first comes the primer. And then I decided to make him a red devil. It wqas at this point I decided that I would work on my OSL. Not show is I started by using my "red" paint set, and started at one end with a dark purple color. This will be my deepest shadow. I started with a flesh color which would give me the salmon color, but decided to add some pearlizing additive to make the cowl shone a bit. But the pearl flecks are in a white medium, not clear. This turned the salmon color a little beige. Hmmm do I want the pearl, or do I want the salmon color. I chose the shine so my cowl became this beige color. In retrospect I should have darkened the shadows of the cowl more as I was going, which would enhance the shine. I tried after 90% of it was done, but was afraid of ruining what I had done so far, and chickened out spraying the shadows darker. The cape was black, the shirt was German Gray, and the chain was brass, which IMHO looks more like gold and the gold paint does. The base was gray which Black Gray in the cracks, and the lettering was the same Scarlet that was the highest highlight of the face. With that I was calling this done. Thanks for looking.

Looks good to me! Re: the air spitter - I see you're using Vallejo. If the a/b is clean, I would suggest thinning the paint at least 50%, and bring the psi to under 20. I'm shooting Vallejo at about 12-15 psi and never get a clog (or spitting). HTH

Thanks guys! Wow a second in SciFi? Excellent! There are always so many good looking, well done models in the SciFi category.

Talk about a blast from the past. This is another that has been on my shelf since 2012! Sculpted by Chris Elizardo, and produced by "Teddy Novak". It came as a one piece bust approx 1:4 scale. With no eyes, It was also another easy one to do. Using the following image, I matched up the colors the best I could. First step, as usual was to get the base colors down - A few days later, I was able to get another session in and get the bust finished. I was thinking about added the snow and what not, but decided to keep it simple. Thanks for looking.

Thank you!

Think think there's a lot of talking past each other here. One needs do no more than to attend the "What the Judges Look For" seminar to learn all you need. The #1 thing is the Basics. As Nick said, can a blob of blue be seen? Are the wings of a plane level from sided to side? If you built a truck and the engine area has louvers, can you see right thru highlighting there's no engine? (Block it off.) Are all the wheels/treads of the vehicle sitting squarely on the ground? Is there cobwebs from being on the shelf too long in the cockpit? Those are the strikes right there. As far as details, unless it's changed in the last year or so, judges are not expected to be experts in the genres they are judging. Years a go there was a broo-haha when a judge eliminated an otherwise terrific model because the paint "wouldn't have faded to the color" that was on the model. Now they leave it up to the modeler to have done the research. But if you want to paint a plane pink, which would attract the attention of any judge. it would benefit you to have documentation showing the plane you modeled was pink. Same with the extra antenna that was mentioned. It costs almost no time to have an image printed out and have along side the entry showing that extra antenna. It had also been said in the seminar, the more you add, the more you will be judged. For example if one guy adds all the seat belts to a plane, but has them in wrong, or upside down, whatever... and it's noticed, that's a strike against the model. Where as the guy that didn't add seat belts and just built OOB, won't get a strike for not having them. The same goes for the guy who builds a tank and has it pristine like it just came out of the factory. There's no strikes for no dirt. But if someone else added the dirt, and it looks good that's one up for the guy that did the extra work. I can't say enuff about that "Look For" seminar. I think everyone should sit in on it at least every 3rd show or the like to refresh their memories. Plus the judges submit their own model flubs to the presentation, which shows that no one is always perfect.

After finishing the involved Charlie Brown model, I was in need of something simpler. Since it was new, I immediately thought of Good Fellas Resin's new offering- Ep. 4 Leia. Few colors, few parts = perfect. One thing you notice right away is the very good likeness. There was a while there where no kit/toy/action figure really looked like Carrie. This one is VERY good. Clean up was really quick. I found that MicroMarks Panel line Scriber works nicely for getting rid of any flash between the hairs. Base coating and first highlights done. Her costume ended up with 3 different layers of color as did her hair In the final session I was able to add two highlights to her hair. A coat of Satin went over it to give it a slight shine. Speaking of shine, I then used V's Metallics clear gloss, which in my opinion is the "glossiest" gloss out there, and gave the eyes two coats. Her arm nestles into position nicely without glue, so I just sat it there. This removal option will come in handy if and when I need to transport her. The final thing to do was to glue her head in place. With that, I was done. Thanks for looking.