Hi everyone.
I had been a miniatures modeller for a couple of years and I was also a regular player at tournaments of the now discontinued Mageknight. Gunpla building is nothing new to me but Gunpla bulding AND painting is something I have not ventured into until now.
Boredom and stumbling onto modelling forums like fichtenfoo, sites like wonderexcellence, and work by Keita inspired me to take on more advanced Gunpla modelling. This is my first WIP for a Gundam kit and I appreciate all constructive criticism.
My first painted kit: Bandai's FA 010-A Full Armor Gundam ZZ Sentinel Type
** Sorry if the pics are fuzzy, I only have a camera phone. **
This kit's box is HUGE; maybe twice as large as the MG RX-78 box and a bit bigger than the MG RX-78 GP02-A box. Some of the parts have flash on the panels, especially on the leg armor. After checking that the parts were complete, I took all the sprues out of the wrapper and hung them from a metal rod using old shower curtain holders. This frees up my 3'x3' table so I can work more on the kit itself.
I built the FAZZ head first since I'm relatively new to this whole sand, putty, prime, sand, putty, prime, paint deal. Not to say I hate it, I just hadn't enough time or was too scared to try it back then. I first cleaned each piece with soapy water, placed them in the FAZZ box and replaced the cover. I think doing this will minimize dust particles sticking to the parts.
I took them out just so you guys could see them. I'm contemplating whether or not I'll prime everything first and then paint or prime and paint each part as I go along. Anyway, the head parts are primed now as you will see below:
When they dried, I sanded them with 1500 grit sandpaper and brushed of the dust that accumulated. I also took care not to take off the coat of primer. I applied putty to the visible seams. When dry, I sanded first with 250, 400, 600 and 1500 grit.
I painted the mouthpiece and the goatee (hehe) then attached them to the eye parts. I panel lined the mouthpiece by hand and tried to take a pic of my work but the cameraphone really isn't for Macro photography. *sigh* Here'a a pic of what has been done:
I mixed about 3 parts white to 1 part black and 1 part royal blue. After thinning with Tamiya acrylic thinner (smells a bit like denatured alcohol), I applied it to the head which i pre assembled without the V antenna and High Mega Particle Cannon (?). A bit of trouble arose with this method however; since I don't have an airbrush, the paint needed to be hand brushed. Since the head is practically a 1 inch cube, it was fairly easy to hide my brush strokes. So much more if i spray a coat or two of dull lacquer. the trouble with this method is that i have to really thin down the paint to cover large areas. This is going to increase the completion time by maybe twice.
You'll see my PG WZC in the background without its wings. hehe
As I said earlier, I'll try removing all the parts and prep them for puttying and priming before painting. hopefully by the time I'm done, I'll have my Tamiya airbrush and compressor.
I cut the first several parts for the shoulders off the sprue trees and sanded them down to remove traces of where my cutter made its mark. Initially I had decided to build according to the instruction manual's order. Now, building from the feet going up looks to be the order of the day.
Both ankles and toes are built including the lower legs. I had a couple of accidents when building them. the first was when I assembled one of the ankles incorrectly. I assembled and glued them backwards and had to pry them apart with my Xacto knife. The second was when I found that the top of the toes had melted after I put too much putty into them. This was more or less remedied by scooping out most of the putty and gluing a piece of sytrene on top. Sanding and puttying made the fix complete.
** As of this time, I was able to get a basic airbrush/compressor set from Tamiya **
I have finally done the hips and lower torso of the FAZZ. As you will see in the pic below, things are looking good. The upper torso has been airbrushed a flat blue and I'm planning to make it a bit darker in color later. Forward part of the torso is not yet painted but I'll get to that in time.
Next up, I am starting on the core block and re-priming the head as I realize I don't like the color I initially painted it. Shoulders and upper arm are ready for priming too; it's just that i forgot to include them in the picture.
That's it for now. Work has a nasty habit of interfering with a hobby like this but it's necessary to get finances for purchasing materials (paint, putty, etc) and new kits.
The backpack is now complete, puttied and primed.
Looking at my Holy Grail kit, the Core-Works MSZ 010-S Gundam ZZ Ver Ka Conversion kit, I noticed that the V-fin looks like the Sentinel V-fin which I have with this FAZZ kit. An added plus is when I discovered that the Sentinel FAZZ has extra parts to build the original ZZ Gundam head (woohoo!) I then decided to scrap the Sentinel head and use the original head combined with the High Mega Cannon (HMC) and Sentinel V-fin. Please take a look at the pic from the Core-works site:
Now a bit of a problem arose when putting the head, and HMC + Sentinel V-fin together: They were not made to fit!!! The original Gundam ZZ head has its own HMC+V-fin assembly but I wouldn't have the exact same look as the conversion kit. That V-fin is TOO SMALL. Feeling in the mood to experiment, I set to work. While the HMC I wanted to use has a socket for a peg to make an attachment, the Gundam ZZ head also had a hole for a peg. This wasn't going to allow both parts to be joined. Taking a steel paperclip, I cut 1 cm off with pliers which I then inserted into the assembled Gundam ZZ head and glued into place. Testing for fit was then done to see what else needed to be done. Another issue arose when I found there would be a BIG hole since the back of the HMC would protrude a bit. I remedied this with a bit of Tamiya Basic Putty. A lot of sanding, minor reapplication of the putty and priming resulted to a nice looking Gundam ZZ head, which I think isn't too bad for my first mod on a Gunpla kit. ;D
The rainy season has made it impossible for further priming so I'll proceed to building and sanding until a sunny day arrives.
Till the next Update. Cheers!!!
Delta's Depot: Gundam WIPs
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