Strike Freedom Construction - Day 19

So close... looks complete doesn't it? Actually there are still a few dragoons missing, but hard to tell from this pose.

2 posts back-to-back :)

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 18

Almost...

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 17

A quick follow-on to yesterday's post, the kit is very close to done now. In fact, this could very well be a pic of the completed kit since the dragoons are removable. Only 16 more pieces (2 per dragoon) to go :)

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 16

Happy Holidays! Once again I've been slacking off on my posts. I don't have as much motivition to post after the kit has been finished and sitting in my cabinet for over a month now. But fear not, I'll make my New Year's resolution to finish posting its progress ;)

The pics for this day shows the wings are nearly complete. Two more wings to complete then all that's left are the dragoons.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 15

Not a whole lot of different between this pic and last day's pic. Another wing stub is completed.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 14

Bet you thought I had stop blogging didn't you? Well it's really been a while since my last post. Here's the 14th day pic. Not that much progress, just another part of the wing is done. This part of the construction is quite tedious, since you have to essentially build 4 identical wings.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 13

More of the wings completed. I'm quite amazed at the inner mechanics of the wing assembly. When you rotate the rear assembly it causes the 4 "spokes" of the wing to spread apart slightly. And when you rotate in the opposite direction, the spokes will return to their original positions.

Indeed, quite a marvel of toy engineering.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 12

Haven't reported my progress in a while. That's because the model is actually completed and I've been occupying my time playing a free mmorpg recently :) Nonetheless, I'm determined to document each day of progress, so there will be quite a few post to go before you can see the finished product.

In today's picture, the backpack and wing stubs are finished. With painting, I always found darker parts are easier to paint; somehow the dark paint adheres and coats the parts more uniformly. With sanding, it is the opposite; sanding the darker parts is harder because if you over sand it or sand in random directions, it is easy to see the white scratch marks of the plastic. The reason I'm mentioning this is because I actually over sanded the wing stubs. However, you won't be able to see that in this picture because luckily, I had a pack of gundam markers which I used to cover up the unsightly scratch marks.

I never quite grasped how to use gundam markers, which is why all my kits so far do not have panel lining, or have attempts at panel lining that didn't quite turn out very well. So I was pleasantly surprised by how well using markers to cover up the scratch marks worked. Here is the procedure I used:

1. Apply the blue marker onto the surface with the scratches
2. Apply the clear marker onto the same surface (I think the clear marker is used to dissolve or thin out the ink--this is the part I never quite understood)
3. Take a q-tip and spread the ink evenly over the entire surface

It felt like I was applying polish onto a pair of leather shoes. The marker actually gave the surface back a bit of shine, but no where near the glossy finish that the unsanded plastic had.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 11

Look! Standing on its own two feet :) Finally 2/3 complete!

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 10

Wow, 10 days already. I never kept track of how many days it took to build my previous kits. Did it always take this long? I don't think I'm close to finishing this one yet. There are still many parts left for the wing assembly.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 9

Haven't updated in a few days, but not because I've stopped working on the kit. It's actually because I've been caught up working on it that I haven't updated my progress here.


Here's how the kit looks on the 9th day. Nice legs! But it's getting cold so let's put on a pair of shorts :)

Notice on the second pic one of the beam rifle is missing. That's because I'm making a modification to it. It may actually be my first time modding a kit.

As you can see in the pic below, the end of the beam rifle can open up and allow the other rifle to slide in to form a "mega" beam rifle. The problem I found is this part doesn't remain in the closed position very well. So after thinking about it for a long time, I decided to cut a small piece of soft rounded plastic from the "PC" runner (that's the gray piece) and super-glue it onto the end piece.



So now, the gray piece will fit into the open slot at the end of the rifle and thus keep the end piece in the closed position. To open, I'll need to apply a little bit of force and pull out the end piece so that I can rotate the gray piece out of the slot.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 8

Lots of progress on day 8 (it was actually on the labour day weekend). I worked on the model in two sessions on that day. The pic on the left shows what's done after the first session.

I included the shield in this pic, although there wasn't really much to work on, aside from taking it out of it's plastic bag :p It wasn't even attached to a runner, surprisingly.

On the beam saber, the 2 black stripes on the hilt are painted on.

And here on the right shows the final results of day 8. The entire hip cannon assembly is done :) Notice also that I now have the kit on the included stand. The stand is not sanded though, that would be too much work.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 7

Now there's a place to holster the beam rifles. And the tip of the day is, sometimes it's easier to sand a part while it is still attached to the runner. Especially for those small parts that would be hard to hold onto while sanding, you can let the runner do the holding for you. Then after removing the part from the runner, just remember to go back and sand down those few spots where the runner was attached.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 6

Day 6, didn't work on the body of the Gundam today. Instead, I assembled the two beam rifles. For this part, I actually did use some paint because was not molded in colour and some foil stickers were provided to put on instead. Can you tell which part is painted?

I only used those foil stickers for my first couple of kits back when I didn't know how to paint or sand. Those foil stickers would always start peeling off sooner or later and they don't look that great (makes the kit look cheap). Hence, I decided to never use them again. In fact, for those kits where I had used stickers, I eventually discarded all the stickers and give them a proper coat of paint.

On the other hand, the MG kits usually come with some dry transfer decals that I've always wanted to try out. I didn't attempt it before because I was afraid it wouldn't apply on my shoddy paint job very well. But since I'm not using paint on this kit, I think it's the perfect chance to give these dry transfer decals a try.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 5

As you can see from the photo, the upper body is complete now. I'd say the whole kit is about 1/3 done, as there are still the legs and the backpack to assemble.

I think I'm starting to get the hang of this sanding stuff now, so here are some tips I've discovered along the way...

I find that sanding under bright lights is always good idea, especially since it makes it easier to find spots which still have that glossy look. Also, and this is fairly obvious, is that sanding in one direction whenever possible will result in a better look at the end. Lastly, remember that sometimes it is easily to sand certain parts assembled together, so it's a good to get an idea on how the parts fit together before starting to sand (like dry fitting before painting, except there's no paint at all :)

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 4

Here's day 4 (short) progress report, added armor to the arms.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 3

Part of the arms are done. All that's missing is the outer armor. I didn't get to it yet as they require more sanding and I have done enough of that for one day. Below is a pic showing the look before and after sanding (maybe it's hard to tell from the photo).



Expanding on last post's comment about choosing which parts to sand, I've also found that selectively sanding specific surfaces of a part is also a good way to add some detail and shading to the model. It sure beats using different shades of paint to achieve the same effect.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 2

Not too much progress on day 2, only the head is completed. I mentioned in the last post that it's difficult to sand the small parts, and the head certainly took some patience and dexterity to get it sanded.

Speaking of small parts, master grade kits usually have an internal skeleton which is made up quite a number of small parts, and more importantly, there are a lot of nooks and crannies making it quite impossible to sand. Luckily, the skeleton would be covered by the outer armour so here's where I got a bit lazy and decided not to sand it.

Actually, for this particular kit it makes sense not to sand the internal skeleton since the Strike Freedom is supposed to have gold joints. The parts for the internal skeleton is molded in this "dirty" gold colour that probably wouldn't stand up well to sanding. Instead, sanding the parts other than the skeleton helps to enhance its shinny look. So it would seem that the no paint technique is well suited for this kit.

Strike Freedom Construction - Day 1

Ok, it's about time I resurrected this blog. And what better use of it than to chronicle the construction of that MG Strike Freedom Gundam model I have sitting in my closet collecting dust?

That's right, I'm finally going to build it. I have a picture to prove it. Here's how it looks after the first day:



As you can see, I've got the upper body assembled. What you might not see from the pic is the new technique I'm trying with this one--the no paint technique. What's special about this technique you ask? After all, anyone could build a model without applying paint on it. Well, the difference is that I'm sanding each part to get rid of the glossy outer layer. I read about this technique a while ago and I wanted to try it because I thought this would be less working than painting... silly me... It's actually turns out to be quite a bit of work, but there is less chance of messing up. So far I'm pretty pleased with the results.

That's it for today, stay tuned for day 2!

P.S. I just realized I talked about this sanding technique a couple posts ago (time-wise it was a long time ago!) I was experimenting on BB Gundam model at the time. Sadly that model is still incomplete, it was just too hard sanding all the small parts. I definitely wouldn't recommend this technique on models smaller than 1/100 scale.

Long time no update

*sigh* has it really been that long since I last updated? I'm really too lazy, this is turning into a quarterly column...

I'll just quickly update on what's been happening in the last few months...

1. Lots of snow! And some (4-5) ski trips :) Making good use of the equipment I got last October.


2. School's started. Yes, I am finally going for that next degree. Hope I can manage class (1 half day a week) and work at the same time.


3. Cram, cram, cram... SCBCD certification this Saturday. Why the heck did I ever sign up for this? This is torture.


4. My new toy...

Now if only that free 8GB mem card would arrive in the mail sooner...