Chronocidal

Go study engineering, manufacturing, and industrial design, get the degree, and do it yourself then. Simple as that. You're not going to convince a major corporation to make something the way you want it just because you think it'd be better. You'll eventually realize that there are trade-offs that must be made, and you'll hopefully understand why the existing toys are made like they are. Sorry to be blunt, but until you study this subject in more detail, you're not going to understand why certain things don't work, or in many cases, are just financially stupid to try. Read the topic on the $2000 SDF-1 for a good example of this. That being said, why make a new topic just to suggest this again? You're going to get the same responses as before, from the same people (that is, if they feel like responding at all).

It's got a macro setting, it's what I was using.. maybe just need better lighting and a steadier hand/tripod. Hopefully with the super packs, you'll have a bit more room to cram things in, since they add so much bulk to the valk. Regardless of where you put the pegs, the tricky part is making them line up. There's a bit of play in the joints, so you can't size the holes exactly for the pegs.. you just have to make the holes a little sloppy side to side, so you can adjust them. It's a lot of trial and error. Locator pins made of metal might do better actually. Given a second kit, I'd probably try that instead. The holes I made are rather messy, and smoothing them will make them bigger, and sloppier. I'm hoping painting will cover some of that up, and smooth over the area.

Oy, I need to figure out my camera.. trying to take a few better pics, and failing utterly. Or maybe the camera just sucks. Nothing really new about more attachment pegs, but I did discover that a big part of getting the upper fuselage to stay together with minimal gaps is just grabbing the fuselage at the hip joint, and squeezing the intakes inwards. The hips tend to pop out when they're moved, and squeezing them together pushes them all the way onto the hip pegs, and makes everything fit better. The hip guns are actually staying in place well, and the wings are completely level now.

I'm pretty sure someone here has a professionally made one of those jackets, it's probably somewhere in this thread. Try reading back a ways, you might find it. I think there were lots of pics of it.

Going by the varous comments, it looks REALLY similar to the treatment most of the characters got between SDFM and DYRL... as in, the focus shifted almost ENTIRELY to the triangle, with much less input from the other characters, even though they still fill out their roles. DYRL was essentially focused on Hikaru the entire time, and split the time half and half (roughly) between Minmay and Misa. This looks like it does the same, taking the events of the series, and tweaking them so that the focus becomes the main 3 again. What I hope DOESN'T happen here though.. I don't want Ozma/Kathy to get relegated to the Max/Milia role in DYRL. M&M got reduced to the bare bones in DYRL, and I think that worked, but O&K (or maybe just OK? lol) had bigger roles throughout the series, and both of them have bigger connections to the main plot than M&M did (I mean, Max wasn't Minmay's legal guardian or anything, and Milia wasn't related to Global ). The relationships between "minor" characters are a lot more fleshed out in MacF, and will need more coverage than in DYRL, since they're key elements of the plot. Fortunately, we've got two movies to do it in. And I REALLY want Klan to have a bigger role than just mourning Michael (which it already looks like she does fortunately). I haven't watched DYRL for a while, but I don't remember if Claudia even had lines.

I honestly don't see any reason why more of these need to be made. Yamato's flooding the market as is, and for a plane that size, 1/100 is tiny (assuming it IS 1/100, like the VF-19, and part of the same line). And I could care less about metal, it just means scratched paint. If this winds up being in the same price range as the VF-19 (if it's not significantly cheaper, Bandai's shooting themselves in the foot), I'll gladly put up the extra few bucks to get something almost twice as big.

So I finally got around to slapping together my VF-25G kit yesterday, after reading some of the build-up threads in here. When I got to the issue of the wings flipping up and the legs tending to droop, I know some people have used magnets. I've never liked the pseudo-sturdy feeling those give though, and decided to try something new. Essentially, I hacked up the kit. What I did amounted to drilling/filing out 4 rectangular holes, and shaping two custom shaped pegs to fit them. I found a nice flat surface where the wing gloves and lower legs meet, and carved out a matching set of holes. Finding a place on the leg to make a hole was a bit tricky. What I wound up modifying was the part that secures the forward hinge on the folding leg panels that hide the ventral fins. That panel has some empty space underneath, it's attached very solidly, and when the wings are folded down level, there's a good sized flat area it shares with the wings. Note, this does screw up the detail on the leg panel a bit, since it's got a hole through it now. The changes don't show at all in fighter (which is how I'll likely keep the model most of the time), but the hole does kill a bit of detail on the outer leg. It might be easy to disguise with paint later, but for now, it's kind of a gaping hole (and still a bit rough, I need to sand down the edges). Anyway, pictures are definitely worth more here. Legs are nice and high in fighter mode Wings aren't quite perfectly level, but close enough for me. Here's what I did, lemme know if anyone wants it highlighted and I can do that. The blue panel just below the knee has a small slot cut directly into it. It's not very deep, but it's plenty to keep the tab I made held in. The edge of the white portion on the wing glove section has a hole cut through it, and the rectangular tab is anchored deeply inside the wing glove. Here's how it lines up when the wings are folded down. The tab isn't much, but it solved two problems at once. The legs are held up tightly against the fuselage, and the wings are held level by the weight of the legs. It's sturdy too. I can hold up the entire model by the lower leg, and nothing moves anymore. The hardest part of this was making the custom pegs to glue into the wing gloves. It's a small piece that I filed to shape from some square scrap plastic, and the shape was hard to make at this size. I can put up a drawing of what it looks like if anyone wants, but it's basically a triangular prism with a tab on the wide end. Think something like this, just stretched a bit vertically: ..._ _| |_ |..../ |../ |/ It just lays against the inside of the wing glove underneath, and doesn't interfere at all with the wing. I can get measurements for where I cut if anyone wants, but the exact location and size isn't as important as just making sure the tabs line up with the holes on the legs. I'm thinking of adding similar tabs to hold on the shield in fighter mode, and maybe the hip guns. Hope someone finds this useful, I gotta clean my desk now, it's covered in sanding dust.

Stupid question.. is there any reason why those booster nozzles are asymmetrical? Frankly, they look retarded that way.. I dunno.. I like the design enough, but the decals look like they'll all have to be painted on to look decent (the ones in the photos look terrible.. looks like it was built in one sitting, and may well have been ), and I wouldn't use that color scheme to begin with. If I ever get one I'll probably wind up doing some sort of random custom.. maybe Milia retired her VF-22, and moved to one of these. Or maybe I'll use a set of Nora decals on it.. Oh well. At least it looks like they made the visor clear green this time.

Actually.. in terms of transformation, it's probably better that they didn't paint the metal. I know many people have done customs already, and they would probably know better than I would.. My thought is that if they really did pre-paint the metal parts, especially the chest plate, it could get rather nasty to keep the plane (or is it a model now?) transforming without problems. The tolerances on this design are so tight, I doubt things would work correctly with too many coats of paint. Yes, this is a disadvantage to people who want to decorate a white valk. But if you're not going to leave anything white, those extra layers of paint could have been a problem for customizers. Also, for the cockpit canopy.. I could care less about the coating, but there's also a good reason to leave the frame unpainted. Real aircraft often have different colors on the insides of their canopy frames, matching with the interior colors, while the exteriors match the exterior of the aircraft. With the canopy left entirely clear, you can do a base coat for the canopy frame interior, then do the outer coat over it, and have different colors inside and out. It's much easier than actually painting the frame on the smooth inside of the canopy glass. That's really no excuse for things like landing gear (which we haven't seen, and might be painted after all), but leaving the paint application entirely up to the owner has its advantages. They wanted to leave everything up to the owner, so what they've done is offer maximum flexibility, even if it does look a bit incomplete. Personally, I might be tempted to get at least one of these, maybe a few. I've always wanted to just do up a few VF-1s in pure late '70s navy markings (US insignia and all, just as a what-if), and while decals might get tricky on transforming ones, I'd rather do them on complete valks than hasegawa kits (don't really have the patience to build so many when I just want to decorate them ). Really, forget this whole "angel birds" mashup, I wanna see VF-1s in actual Blue Angels and Thunderbirds markings.

Ok, um.. holy crap? It seriously looks like they went and reanimated the show... Is this game such a high budget project that they'd do that? Or is there something else going on here, and this is only a glimpse of it? I know it's unrealistic.. but if these clips turn out to be tidbits of some kind of SDFM series revival... *dreams*

I was seriously tempted to get Gamlin this morning, and I coulda.. but I want M&M VF-22s more, and if I get a third I want a YF-21. I could probably afford them all, but I have other things to think about too.. like.. rent... and food.. you know. I just wish I could count on a sale like this for the M&Ms.. And I REALLY wish this sale applied to the Mac0 stuff, they still have the VF-0S in stock, but I don't want to pay that much for it.

Top no... Improve upon?

As much as I love a company as big as Bandai taking a swing at marketing Macross, I've got mixed thoughts. My only personal experience with any Frontier merchandise to this point has been one 1/72 model, and it's barely been started, so I have very little feedback on it (except... bandai screwed up the Michael version color scheme, and you have to paint it, regardless of what they say.. they just flat out forgot most of the white parts on his VF-25G. Not a huge issue, but still irritating). It's a beautiful kit though, and I have no problem making a model to get a nice display piece... I barely transform my Yammies as it is. I seriously hope they don't scrap that 1/48 VF-25 kit we saw a teaser for, I'll buy 10... maybe. The DX's? Gah. I'm a stickler for details, and what Bandai did with these is inexcusable to me. It's not really the shape, or the accuracy of the design that gets to me (although they could use work)... it's the lazyness factor. There is no excuse for the corners they cut. Sloppy imprecise molding, cheapo paint, short-bus landing gear, lousy joint design (seriously? no knee pivot??).. eh, it's all been said before. But it kills my interest in them pretty completely. I'm actually more interested in the VF100s line than the DX, but Bandai can't seem to decide what those are. I'd rather have more model kits than partsformers. The Hi-Metals may turn out better, but at that size/weight, there's really no reason for metal, and you could produce much cheaper and more detailed toys if you went with more plastic. More metal means more paint chipping from transforming.

Maybe this is more what you were thinking?

Actually, I'm a bit relieved Less pressure to buy them before Christmas, when I'll probably blow a bundle on presents for family.

I do want to get at least one VF-1D, but I'll get the trainer first. This'll look just like my Max 1J on the shelf (since they'll probably be displayed in fighter mode), so I'd rather have more unique valks. I may go completist one day, but for now I'm just picking up the iconic TV designs.

I'd have to go with a wig for just about anyone who isn't bald... my hair is pretty much gone at age 25. College worked it out of me. The one advantage it does give is that I have no qualms about cutting my hair incredibly short, and could use a wig with no complications. That, or I could do a pretty simple captain Picard costume.

Assuming you have the funds for it, go for it. I'm already planning on getting a VF-1D next month, and a VF-11C later... I'll get the M&Ms first I think. I'd love to wait for sales on them, but I dunno if these'll last that long. And I'm still debating getting a YF-19/YF-21 pair. I still really don't care for the YF-19 that much, but at the same time, I seriously doubt they'll redo it again, so this might be as good as it gets. I'll probably just have to scratch build one in 1/48 at some point.

Check the bottom right corner, decals 59 and 60 look good to me. They just didn't get stuck near the other pilot names.

I dunno, give a guy the right hair, and you could probably do it somehow.. might need a bit of makeup too though. Given how simple Alto's uniform is, I'm tempted to try it, provided I can find a wig that'll work well.

As much as I do kind of miss having a YF-21, I'm glad I held out on buying one. Makes it easier to justify buying two VF-22s. I love the original 21, but I still don't care for the YF-19 enough to get one, and I know I'd want a complete Mac+ set if I started. Now with the the Mac7 stuff, I can get the VF-22s and VF-11C and not feel the need to get a YF-19 to complete the set. I really can't wait for these... but I'm torn. I want to wait until around after Christmas, and get them both at once, but at the same time, I don't want to risk them running out. I've already spent enough in the past few weeks, so I probably should hold off a while anyway. Buying 7 valks in a little over a month has been a bit much, even if most of them were on clearance. Think the last VF-1 I'm getting is the classic Hikaru/Minmay VF-1D, then I'll be done with those, and move to the other series. The nice thing is, I managed to grab two SV-51s at good discounts, so I've got a pair of stands to use with the M&M VF-22s when I get them.

My guess would be that those decals were meant more like a display logo, something you'd see on a plaque for a display stand. You could probably apply them to the legs or tails somehow, but the animation was so bad in that episode you'd never see those markings anyway. You may want to check official lineart for the design, if any exists.. it may give clues as to whether those markings are actually official or not. They may have been based on doodles in the margins for the original lineart.

Overdrive seems like they had a bit of a backup in their notifications... I didn't get my notice that my M&Ms had been shipped until they were already past customs in San Francisco, and on the way here.

You know.. it's probably stupid, and beside the point.. but I'd actually love to see the "before" version of that, just to see how she looked with the armor on. That giant Sheryl wallpaper (the album cover one) is epic. I'm gonna put that on my lappy tonight. *sigh* All this art makes me wish someone would re-animate SDFM from scratch. I'd love to see it done with the same production quality as MacF, and with VF-1 animations based on those pachinko commercials. I don't care what the commercials are actually for, seeing how awesome they look gave me serious chills. Btw, is that MacF manga cover just a joke, or something related to what's in that issue?

Mmmm.... M&Ms...... </homervoice> Glad I had a break during my work day to check my mail, I was able to pick em up after lunch. Ok.. This is going to sound incredibly wrong, but I know of no other way to put this.. Milia is freaking tight. I mean seriously. I'm gonna have to be careful moving her about, or her parts might snap (yes, I know this is sounding dirtier with every word). Her tail section is so tight, I'm afraid something might break off... ok, I think you get my drift. Really though, I'm startled by how stiff some joints are.. her wings barely move, the tails take a serious effort to fold, and the tail section is scary in how hard it is to fold up. It's better than being too loose I suppose, but loose joints are easier to tweak. Seriously, I have no real complaints with either, but I think I got a pair of the funniest Yamato glitches yet. Nothing's broken, things are just kind of funny. 1: When I went to pull out Max's right landing gear, the tire popped off and flew across the room. Turns out the shaft wasn't widened quite enough to keep it on well. There's still a lip to hold it, so long as I don't pull on the tire, it's fine. 2: Milia somehow got a Super Double Plus Mega Ultraviolent canopy. It's like it got run through the coating machine a few extra times or something, and I can hardly see through it. It's giving me that kind of effect you get from mirrored sunglasses. No worries there, it'll probably peel off just like all the others are starting to. The one thing that kinda worries me is how utterly paranoid Yamato was with the packaging this time.. I mean, they covered ALL the paint. Wing sleeves, a sheet to cover the chest plate, even a plastic sleeve over the front landing gear to keep from scratching the doors up on the inside. Those backplate tabs.. I dunno if there's really anything we can do about those. They're a high-wear area on the VF-1, and only thing we can really do is keep touching those up if they get scratched. It might be worth trying to spray these with a clear coat to protect them, but the part tolerances are so tight, I'd be afraid it'd make things not fit quite right.