Hi, guys!
It's been really a while.
What I've been doing was moving really far away from the noisy city for 10 days, to swim and fish in a lake, make meat on fire, sleep for 10 hours, breath fresh air and... right! to MODEL!
This time I turned to a subject, that has been calling for me for about three years. The mighty Imperial Star Destroyer "Avenger" - the flagship of the Empire in the years of the 4th episode and Darth Vader's personal destroyer before he moved to the complete SSD "Executor".
This is a fairy old AMT kit first released in November 1989 (guess they've tried for the fact of my birth, LoL). I'm sure that you've heard about it far not once, and know, that along with being the only ISD kit ever produced commercially, it is incredibly inaccurate. Guess it's possible to say, that the only thing they've engineered correctly was the overall wedge-like shape of the ship. Everything else is a catastrophe - the proportions are wrong, the paneling is wrong, the detailing is allmost nothing (the details are "painted" on the hull with tiny raised lines). Add to all these giand gaps, and you'd understand why I was waiting to turn to this project for so long.
What I really want is to make this indeed iconic ship of science-fiction a real candy, matching the original 1977 studio model as close as it is possible, add lighting of course, and, what is of the most importance - to have lot of FUN with this.
To help myself with the fun part and make it a little bit easier, I've bought a resign conversion set be Commander Models (also known once for Arvey Model Products). This is an excellent set, 500% worth its money. It includes all the side tranches, the bridge with it's neck, the main hanger bay, main turbolaser batteries and main engines. Tiny parts like turbolasers, engines and side hanger bays have an additional exemplar, just in case you lose one. The set also includes an inscale Blockade Runner and Mil. Falcon. I didn't know that, so have also bought a set of two separate blockade runners - can now start gathering a Rebel fleet All the parts had absolutely no bubbling and little but now flash - an excellent example of top level casting. All in all this set (being the only such complete kit of everything you need to build an AMT ISD now) is highly recommended to everyone planning to build "Avenger" (CM also make a "Devastator" set - they differ in bridges and turbolasers)
Ok, now after I've depicted the situation on my beginning of work, here is what I've done so far.
Overall view:
First, i took lots of different sandpaper and sanded down all the raised lines all over the hull
Here how it looked in the beginning
The main turbolaser's area has been glued in place over the cut off one that came with the kit
Glued together the near-the-bridge area, having sctratchbuilt the side-pylons from 1mm styrene sheet (the one from the kit featured a too thick "superstructure shelves")
Here are the corrected side tranches with all their superstructure in place
Both parts of the main hull where virtually broadened with the styrene strips, that covered the "steps" that where initially on this kit. With them together they've made a great additional area for side trenches detailing.
The ion-flow controlling brakers of the kit were cut away and changed to the new, screen accurate, I've also made from styrene strips. (yeah, Evergreen stuff is quite required to work on this ship)
Turning to the lower part of the hull, I've made the strange-shaped panels, missing on the kit, that are covering now the holes for the kit's stand.
The third hole was also covered same way. You can see that I've left the paneling on the main reactor's dome - there it looks ok.
What I'm working on now is the detailing around the main hanger, so it's not yet complete. I've also already cut the holes for lighting the hangar inside.
The engine area was so badly engineered, that it didn't fit at all not with the kit's side parts, nor with the ones from the correction set. So I had to cut it's sides off in order to scratchbild them again later.
At last, here are some more pics of what you get from CM:
With the tiny inscale ships
In order to light the bridge in future I've cut it in two parts
Well, that's what I have for now. Hope you like it - let me know what do you think about all this, guys
Later!
It's been really a while.
What I've been doing was moving really far away from the noisy city for 10 days, to swim and fish in a lake, make meat on fire, sleep for 10 hours, breath fresh air and... right! to MODEL!
This time I turned to a subject, that has been calling for me for about three years. The mighty Imperial Star Destroyer "Avenger" - the flagship of the Empire in the years of the 4th episode and Darth Vader's personal destroyer before he moved to the complete SSD "Executor".
This is a fairy old AMT kit first released in November 1989 (guess they've tried for the fact of my birth, LoL). I'm sure that you've heard about it far not once, and know, that along with being the only ISD kit ever produced commercially, it is incredibly inaccurate. Guess it's possible to say, that the only thing they've engineered correctly was the overall wedge-like shape of the ship. Everything else is a catastrophe - the proportions are wrong, the paneling is wrong, the detailing is allmost nothing (the details are "painted" on the hull with tiny raised lines). Add to all these giand gaps, and you'd understand why I was waiting to turn to this project for so long.
What I really want is to make this indeed iconic ship of science-fiction a real candy, matching the original 1977 studio model as close as it is possible, add lighting of course, and, what is of the most importance - to have lot of FUN with this.
To help myself with the fun part and make it a little bit easier, I've bought a resign conversion set be Commander Models (also known once for Arvey Model Products). This is an excellent set, 500% worth its money. It includes all the side tranches, the bridge with it's neck, the main hanger bay, main turbolaser batteries and main engines. Tiny parts like turbolasers, engines and side hanger bays have an additional exemplar, just in case you lose one. The set also includes an inscale Blockade Runner and Mil. Falcon. I didn't know that, so have also bought a set of two separate blockade runners - can now start gathering a Rebel fleet
All the parts had absolutely no bubbling and little but now flash - an excellent example of top level casting. All in all this set (being the only such complete kit of everything you need to build an AMT ISD now) is highly recommended to everyone planning to build "Avenger" (CM also make a "Devastator" set - they differ in bridges and turbolasers)Ok, now after I've depicted the situation on my beginning of work, here is what I've done so far.
Overall view:
First, i took lots of different sandpaper and sanded down all the raised lines all over the hull
Here how it looked in the beginning
The main turbolaser's area has been glued in place over the cut off one that came with the kit
Glued together the near-the-bridge area, having sctratchbuilt the side-pylons from 1mm styrene sheet (the one from the kit featured a too thick "superstructure shelves")
Here are the corrected side tranches with all their superstructure in place
Both parts of the main hull where virtually broadened with the styrene strips, that covered the "steps" that where initially on this kit. With them together they've made a great additional area for side trenches detailing.
The ion-flow controlling brakers of the kit were cut away and changed to the new, screen accurate, I've also made from styrene strips. (yeah, Evergreen stuff is quite required to work on this ship)
Turning to the lower part of the hull, I've made the strange-shaped panels, missing on the kit, that are covering now the holes for the kit's stand.
The third hole was also covered same way. You can see that I've left the paneling on the main reactor's dome - there it looks ok.
What I'm working on now is the detailing around the main hanger, so it's not yet complete. I've also already cut the holes for lighting the hangar inside.
The engine area was so badly engineered, that it didn't fit at all not with the kit's side parts, nor with the ones from the correction set. So I had to cut it's sides off in order to scratchbild them again later.
At last, here are some more pics of what you get from CM:
With the tiny inscale ships
In order to light the bridge in future I've cut it in two parts
Well, that's what I have for now. Hope you like it - let me know what do you think about all this, guys
Later!
