The Nightingale’s (finally) done!

It took cutting my own decals, but I can finally say this kit is complete.  There are a few things I don't like (namely the awful joining of the two shield parts and some of the roughness in the decal curves), but overall I think it turned out pretty well.

SD Nightingale: That last 1%

As you can see, the nightingale is pretty much done, except for a missing left skirt and shield.I've kind of hit a snag there and I'm not yet sure how I'm going to address it: the emblems for the Nightingale are typically yellow but my build requires white. I tried freehanding them but that was an awful failure and Samueldecal doesn't appear to have what I want. I think I'm going to have to shop around a bit but ultimately this kit may just go without.

Nightingale Progress for 3/10

I'm getting close now!  The major painting and shading is done.  All that remains is some minor detailing, clear coating of some parts and the final assembly.  I'm probably going to have to wait another 3 or 4 days before the paint is ready to be handled, but there's no reason not to share the parts that are ready to go.

Nightingale Progress for 3/6

It feels like I've been making baby steps, but the Nightingale is finally starting to near completion.  Parts are getting final touches and coatings, and parts are starting to be glued together.  There are still a few naggling problems; the resin doesn't seem to be cured in a few spots, so the paint won't take and I just don't have space for all those bells and funnels, but they'll be solved in time.

Some days are better than others.

With a few exceptions, I do most of my painting with enamels. I like the finish and range of color, the local availability and that they don't gas me out of the room. The tradeoff for this is that when you screw something up, they really take the screws to you.

A Small Teaser

Well, I haven't disappeared entirely but it seems that my first SD kit of February was a bit more ambitious than I had planned on.  It's still going to a be a week of final painting and detailing but hopefully I'll still be on target to get two models done by the end of the month.

Bandai Option Hands rundown

This was a gallery that I posted to Reddit some time ago, but I figured was worth republishing here.  It’s a rundown of various Hand/manipulator parts from Bandai and B-Club:

Bandai Builders Parts 1/100 EFSF Hands

Full Plate, kinda. It’s actually two. The armor on the left side are a separate plate that comes pegged into the main one. I assume this is so that they will be able to sell variations on these in the future. A package comes with 2 of these sets.