Galaxy_Stranger

What do you like best?

That's amazing.

I've been purchasing a lot of modeling supplies off of Amazon lately. Many of them just happen to be shipped from Japan and Hong Kong. My favorite packages are from these shops that come back with a note in the package thanking me for the order and mentioning the added gift of some shrimp hard candy or somesuch, (which I don't have the nerve to try), saying it was added as a gift from their little girl who is sitting next to them working at the shop. The notes in themselves are a source of great comedy as their English tends to be lacking - while still better than sub translations from the 80's! But my favorite came in today - I got a package of some Tamiya Cement with the orange cap. Thought I'd pick it up to try it out. 5 bucks is 5 bucks. I noticed on the customs declaration label, the description: "Tamiya Plastic Model Parts (No, Battelly)" I had ZERO idea that the Japanese are taught to spell these words Phonetically!

WOW, that's super interesting...

Interesting - is that the same model format as Quake's .mdl? Or is that just a coincidence?

Hey, what's the process to do what you're doing? What are you using to create the models and how do you get them into the game?

Yeah, some regular plastic sheets should do nicely. I'll go to Hobby Blobby and see what they've got if I can't dig up something around the house. As a matter of fact, I might be able to practice on this F-14 I've got. I didn't notice it was a snap-tite, so the quality is deplorable and it came with STICKERS! I bet I can make reusable stencils out of the stickers.

What thickness of plastic do you think would be needed to make templates of a stencil for permanent storage? I'm thinking you could do that just to have it, and then use the template to cut out whatever masking material you're going to use. So, hold it over Parafilm or masking tape to cut out the shape into the masking medium.

Thanks!

Awesome - what material did you use?

Well, what I'm going for is just a mask that I can re-use without destroying it, not necessarily mass-produce. Though, I'd love to be able to make many of them just so they're available to everyone. The classic "US Air Force" star with the stripes would be a good example. You would have to make two or three passes to do that one - and that's a simple design. I started looking at thin Mylar last night. Maybe that's a start. But I'm starting to think you begin with something thick and rigid - that you use as a template to cut detailing tape every time you want to spray. That sounds viable. And I'd do put up with it as often as I'd need to do it.

Hot. Interesting paint job.

You think that material would be good for 1/72 scale Valkyrie cockpits? Most other materials I've seen are too thick and/or can't squeeze enough detail out of them and/or too delicate for re-use. Would almost have to be some sort of transparent plastic.

Anybody have experience making stencils for airbrushing in order to replace some decals? The concept works and makes sense, but when you go to implement, that's when the problems crop up. I just find it hard to believe that, these days, we don't have any proper materials that could handle the abuse and detail.

Wow - yeah, I'm definitely going to pick up a couple of those. What an odd combination of endorsements - Star Wars and Macross??

Wow, that's small - even for a B-17.

I really like using airbrushes for things with large surface areas - like vehicles. That gives me a nice, smooth, professional finish. Then I use nice and small art brushes for the fine detail and touch-ups and I pick a brush that I only use for dry brushing, which isn't often on vehicles but I use CONSTANTLY on miniatures. Paint is also a gigantic pet peeve of mine because of the price. I don't like acrylics for most applications and they're too expensive for the volume, as are enamels. But you can get around that by finding paint brands that aren't specifically marketed toward model building. For example, I found some Rustoleum black and white enamels that are super cheap in comparison to traditional brands. Acrylics are generally easier to get your hands on as well, and tend to be easier to work with in terms of mess and giving you headaches. Enamels will take a beating better over time as the model is handled, but they're a little harder to get, a little more expensive, take longer to dry and cure and people don't like the fumes. Lacquer paints are another beast entirely and you'll probably want to avoid them until you're comfortable with the other stuff. Tamiya has acrylics and lacquers, Testors has enamels and acrylics and most other brands have just acrylics. Some other popular ones are Vallejo, Badger, Citadel - (bleeeeeh!), and Gunze.

Nice, I'll have to hit those up. I've gotten into this thing where I'm finding the real squadrons that the various Valkyries were inspired by - Jolly Rogers & Thunderbirds, etc. Makes me want to build a Valkyrie side-by-side with it's original counterpart with traditional paint scheme. Also want to do the Sundowners and the Wolfpack. I think the Thunderbirds will be real nice and not too difficult to translate. I think the less-flashy Air Force style markings would be interesting as well.

I know this is a bit off-topic as Academy makes no Macross related products, but has anybody had any experience with Academy? I like their 1/144 scale stuff, but I haven't seen anything else of theirs.

Oh forget that... I don't need to complicate things any more than they already are...

Yeah, it still looks great - I guess my brain is just trying to make it an F-14. And looking at them side-by-side, the F-14 is kinda starting to look like older, less efficient technology being so large in comparison.

Anybody ever heard of this? I just sat down to watch this and the first thing dude does is whip out a can of Dupli Color Adhesion Promoter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WWkuvCZl1A&list=PLF9nz5N6__BiyllmqPL_nm0PsHzlNZ0uN&index=1 Anybody feel the need to use this stuff? I'm rather reticent to because it just looks like one more thing to fill in the detail...

huehuehueh Has anybody compared the pilots to normal 1/72 scale pilots?

When I was in high school, I never had any problems mixing paints and finishes on my lead/tin alloy miniatures. In fact, I had some pretty weird stuff. I used Enamels, acrylics and some other stuff that was probably acrylic, but it kinda came out rubbery. And then I would apply Testors gloss cote. Never had any problems with one paint eating the other. Of course, most of the time I was painting acrylics on top of dried enamels. I've also seen good results from this stuff, which is also UV resistant so it shouldn't turn yellow: http://www.homedepot.com/p/Rust-Oleum-Painter-s-Touch-2X-12-oz-Gloss-Clear-General-Purpose-Spray-Paint-249117/100670438 Soon, I'm going to experiment with some automotive clear finish. In fact, I can tell you that using automotive lacquer paints is actually cheaper than just about anything else, (if you can find your colors), because they don't sell it in 1/2oz bottles for $5 a pop. Also, lacquers are much thinner than any other paint so it's much less likely to fill in the details of your model. So, I always try to get a hold of a can of lacquer primer as a base. To my knowledge, it'll take soaking in something like Automotive Degreaser to get it off.

Is there any particular reason they made the plane smaller? I would have thought they would just use the F-14 proportions.