My latest build is Bandai's B-Wing Starfighter as seen in Return of the Jedi (very briefly) and later in The Rise of Skywalker.  When I was a kid, I primarily built Monogram and Revell WWII aircraft, or Aurora monsters and dinosaurs, until 1977 came along and I was dragged (yes, dragged) to see this movie that I thought was going to be about the dumbest thing ever, Star Wars.  Seriously, the previews I'd seen of the original movie just looked awful to my then-9-year-old eyes.  I was one who's exposure to science fiction and fantasy by that time had been limited to movies like The Planet of the Apes series or the Ray Harryhausen-animated Sinbad movies, or TV series like Star Trek.

Star Wars blew me away by the time I finally did see it as a 10-year-old (the movie came out in May 1977, my birthday was less than a month later, so some time in either June or July I first saw it).  I remember coming home from the theater and setting about locating all the cardboard I could find, plus some scissors and tape, and soon thereafter, I had a couple of really crude X-Wings and TIE Fighters.  Some time in 1978, I discovered the MPC model kits of the X-Wing and Darth Vader's TIE Fighter, plus the droids, and built them all.  Science fiction kits soon became pretty much all I built for a time, from those original Star Wars releases to MPC's lighted Millennium Falcon to the U.S.S. Cygnus and robots of The Black Hole and a Klingon warship and Vulcan transport from Star Trek: The Motion Picture.  I would then move on to the Snowspeeder, Slave One, and Star Destroyer from The Empire Strikes Back, and then some smaller scale releases after Return of the Jedi to include the X-Wing, TIE Interceptor, A-Wing, and B-Wing.  Then, I not only quit building Star Wars/sci-fi kits, I largely quit building everything, as I was in high school, baseball and girls were far more interesting.

Maybe about a decade ago, I started acquiring all of the Fine Molds releases, of which I have built only the Jedi Starfighter.  Eventually I'll get to all of them, including that massive 1/72 Millennium Falcon.  Then along comes Bandai, who I believe got the contract from LucasFilm for these kits, and I did their Boba Fett and Sandtrooper figures before embarking on their 1/48 moveable edition X-Wing, right before the release of Rogue One in 2016.  I liked that X-Wing so much that I went out and grabbed an A-Wing and then, this special edition release of their B-Wing (special because it came with the little lighting unit).

I was really trying to hold out even starting this until September, as it has been quite hot here in the Houston area, but last weekend, the temperature was a bit more bearable than usual, and I launched into it.  And with the hurricane came some more tolerable temperature, so I was able to get right through this build.  Thankfully for me the hurricane turned away from Houston, although it would be nice if it had just never formed; having been through a number of hurricanes in my life, most recently Harvey in 2017, I know that the people of Louisiana are dealing with some awful realities right now.

This kit is simple.  It is technically a snap-together kit, but I did use a bit of liquid cement in a few places to ensure some surfaces stayed together.  Paint is a mix of AK Interactive Real Colors, MIG, PollyScale, Tamiya, and Vallejo.  First round of paint was AK dunklegrau sprayed as a mist coat prime, then did a pre-shade of the various panel lines.  Once that dried, I mixed up PollyScale light gull gray with Vallejo white 1:1 and put that down on all the exterior surfaces.  I let that sit overnight, then came back with a mixture of AK barley grey, Vallejo white, and Tamiya clear 1:2:1.  Following that, I masked off a few random panels, mixed up an equal ratio of Tamiya deck tan, Vallejo white, and Tamiya clear, and sprayed those panels.

Bandai provides decals and stickers for all the markings, including the blue stripes and panels, but I opted to paint the blue.  That was a mix of AK light blue, Tamiya medium blue, and Vallejo white 6:1:1.  The final painting was a mist coat of AK barley grey, Vallejo white, and Tamiya clear 6:1:3.  Note that this painting direction was one I found online of another modeler who had done this kit, so I didn't come up with all of this.  I also cut circle masks and painted the hinomarus, for lack of a better word, with MIG Pigments orange paint; I used some liquid masking agent to effect the chipped look of these markings.

I weathered with AK Interactive streaking grime applied directly with a fine-tipped brush, then feathered in with white spirits, and followed with some ground up charcoal pastels.

Finally, with the engine nozzles, I painted the interior chrome silver in the hope that it would reflect the engine lights, which I think it does to a certain extent.

And then this one photo of the placard I made for this build.  I recently did this for all the builds I have displayed around my house so that my wife can know what each model actually represents.

That's it for me with Star Wars for the time being.  It's likely that my next build from a galaxy far, far away will be Revell's big Republic Cruiser, but as with that one and any other Star Wars kits I have to build, I will need to acquire lights for them, and then for many, figure out exactly how to wire them.