A CHALLANGE to all of you Tread heads.
Well, here it goes. Im sure you all know me, and you all know what my main genre of building is, Scifi. That being said I have never shyed away from trying atleast one kit from every genre that I have come accross. I have monster kits, figure kits, armor, aircraft (wwii and wwi), ship kits, spaceship kits, Anime figures and Mecha kits. I have kits ranging from 1/700 to 1/144 to 1/100 to 1/60 to 1/42 to 1/35 to 1/32nd to 1/25th to 1/12th and to non scale.
With all that said, I get to the point of this post.
Plain and simple, I want to see what you guys could do with a kit outside of your genre. So here is my challange, I am going to post a few links to kits that I feel are good starter kits in the mecha/scifi genre (non expensive too) as well as places to buy AM parts, places for reference and reviews, and anything else you would need. The challange is to use all of the skills and techniques you would to build your best armor kit, and apply it to something that is completly different.
I post this for a few reasons, one... how the heck many Hetzers has Karl built... I want to see something new from you guys. Thats one, the second one being that most people in scifi and mecha modeling circles dont use the same techniques as tread heads or fly boys. It is honestly a shame, and to be perfectly honest, I want to see what some of our masters in this forum could do with a genre they normally dont, or never do.
Now I know what some of you are saying 'thats not my cup of tea' 'I only build what I am interested in' I know and I hear you, but sometimes its good to branch out. What is the WORST that could happen? You spend a bit of money on a nice kit, make something really nice out of it, and have something to really suprise the judges at the next IPMS contest you enter.
Be honest, how many of you ever see anything really worth while in the scifi section other then a monotone battle star galatica kit, or Tie fighter. When I went to Mosquito con I was suprised with the amount, there were a lot of scifi, alot of it was really good, but it was NOTHING compared to even the auto or figure category, and alot of it was monotone ships.
With all that said, here are a few choices that I know are good kits and I think you all could do amazing jobs with. Some of these are cheaper then others, all come from very good quality makers, some I can attest to personally that they are amazing kits.
Super Dimensional Fortress Macross:
(Brief summary-Space ship crashes, is reverse engineered, aliens come, destroy earth, last survivors are on the reverse engineered ship)
1/72 VF-25G Messiah Valkyrie Michael Custom
1/72 VF-25F Messiah Valkyrie Alto Custom
Maschinen Krieger:
(This story was never a show, it was published in Hobby Japan magazine as a serial, using the models which were imagined and created just for the strip. The plot was earth was destroyed in a nuclear war, after time it became a complete jungle/forest paradice again and was recolonised, criminals also came back to escape jail, and a war broke out)
1/20 Luna Pawn
1/20 AFS C.D. Type Polar Bear
1/20 A.F.S. Archelon
Dr. Who
(does this need any 'splainin?)
Mobile Suit Gundam
(A large group of space colonies declare independance from earth and drop a space colony on the planet starting a war using modified space construction vehichles as weapons)
Zaku Minelayer MS-06f 1/100th scale
http://www.gundamstoreandmore.com/ban953119.html
Ball '08th Ms Team version' 1/100th scale
http://www.gundamstoreandmore.com/ban934096.html
Hazel Custom RX121-1 TR-1 1/144th scale
http://www.gundamstoreandmore.com/uncehacuirxt.html (one of the nicest kits in this scale I ever purchased)
For after market parts I suggest
http://www.mechaskunk.com/store.htm (all kinds of metal part, scratch building parts, and resin weapons)
http://www.gundamstoreandmore.com/gumode.html (Gundam specific decals (alot can be cross used)
http://samueldecal.com/ (may load slow for some. Decal shop, all custom made, a relyable site, if you send him what you want he will also print up decals for you)
I doubt any of you will take me up on this challange, but I really hope you do.
For some inspiration, here is what some of our own modelers are working on in the scifi category with the types of kits I linked.
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For references, you can look
http://www.maschinenkrueger.com/index.html
http://www.mahq.net/mecha/gundam/index.htm
http://www.mahq.net/mecha/macross/macross.htm