7TP in September Campaign - 3rd Diorama in Life

Quite some times ago ( probably back in 2013 ), I sent my good friend and a very talented modeller Thanos [check out his Youtube channel] two copies ( or was it one? I cannot remember well) of extra weathering magazines I had lying around. Thanos was starting into weathering and I sent him the books so as to help him with weathering.

It was a very small gesture but Thanos was over-whelmed by it and he sent me a back a rather unique tank model. I call it unique because it's a kind of vehicle I would never buy by myself.

Thanos sent me a 1/35 Polish 7TP light tank with the twin turret from Mirage Hobby. I admit I am not into light tanks but since Thanos was kind enough to send me this, I decided to give this my best and decided to make a diorama out of it.

Yes, this is one of the last few models I finished before I had to leave the UK and return to this god forsaken country called Burma which I am still stuck even until now as I am figuring out my next move as in where to go and how to go so ( go as in migrate ).

This quite old yet lovely model was painted by a variety of paints and paint brands. I cannot remember exactly which paint exactly but here is a break down as much as I can remember, 
I used Olive Green mixed with a very small amount of tan to get a very light olive green. I also put on thin clear green on top once dried for some tonal variety. 
I used Red brown but I mixed with something which I cannot remember to get a different tone from the German three tone.
For the dark yellow base, I used Dark yellow BUT i put on a layer of thin Clear Yellow on top to give it more richness and make the colours more yellow.

For the weathering, I tried my best to keep with the summer period of Europe, a dry and dusty look with grasses and flowers. The dio idea is that the 7TP is coming up on an embankment to a forest road/path. I don't know if that even looks like that LOL. 

This is one of the few kits that I am absolutely happy with what I did. I did have to nitpick about some boo-boos but the enjoyment and seeing it finished far weight the boo-boos

It's time for the photos - 
(Just click on the smaller ones and they will pop out )

Some close ups on the vehicle itself -

Some close ups on the ground work -

And as usual, my show case photos from various angles -

 

Since this is a vehicle with two turrents and two guns, I cannot do my signature Gary Wintin shot ... how sad :(.....

The vehicle itself just looks lovely and I'm really happy with how this turns out. The only thing I am not happy about this build is the lack of track marks on the ground. I tried to make track marks but subsequent ground works and stuffs has rendered my works on the track marks null. I need to practice more.

 This is another milestone in my skills, especially in  making diorama and bases. 

This is one baby I will be proud to have on my shelf as this is a dear gift from Thanos and I will never sell any gift kits from my friends. Plus, this is one of the few kits I managed to finished before leaving the United Kingdom so this baby hold a special meaning to my heart. 

If you guys see anything that I need to improve with my diorama building skills, Please do leave some C&C. Thank you very much. 

Until next time. 

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A beaten down RX-78-5 (G05)

I have always liked how the Twins look; that G04 and G05 ( RX-78-4 and 5 respectively) and I have always wanted to do some decent works on them so I waited until I gained enough skills to paint them in to be presentable.

The idea behind this one is to show a suit that has done missions after missions on earth during the heavy fighting offensives periods of the One Year War.

As such, I decided to put it in a tropical climate where it can get dusty, muddy and lots of rain. You can see all those effects on this G05 along with some algae on some of the nooks and crannies water would pool. But no rust ... REMEMBER, Gundanium don't rust. 

For the colours, I used Vallejo Game Air Gory Red for the red and, Vallejo Model Air Black and Vallejo Model Air Whites. I cannot remember the auxiliary colours I used for the v-fins and joints and etc. My apologies. This is finished back in February and only now, I get a chance to write this post.

For the weathering, I used MIG production Vietnam earth for the mud, soil and dust. AMMO Wet effect is used to depict the rain splatters, rain drops and trickling down water (but it is quite difficult to see in the pictures, sadly ). 

I wanted to build this without any modification but I absolutely hate how the forearm guns are placed. I don't have a picture of the original location anymore but in human terms, it is like on the back side of the arm and not on the side. That way, if those guns are to be used, the arms have to be turn on their side ( just like the Hi-Nu Forearm gun is). That's one of the thing I hate most about some mobile suit designs. Therefore, I re-located them to the side of the forearms and I used my usual spare parts from my tanks on the now vacant space on the back of the forearms. Again, I used the spare parts from my tanks to put on some surface details to boost the general appearance of the kit as I did on my Jesta. 

Also, as you can see, I also attached a buster sword underneath the Gatling gun for close combat defence. The barrel length for the gun was too long for my taste so it was shortened about 5mm. 

Here's the all around view -

 

and here's some of the close up ( you will notice a lot of massive boo-boos I made) -

 

Per the norm from me, here's a number of poses -

 

 

 

 
This was the last model I ever made before I had to leave the UK for good ( no other way to extend my visa anymore). Nothing is perfect and neither is this one but this was good enough that one of the group member ( and a acquaintance I made ) from UK Gunpla Modellers offered me £110 for this. I accepted it but I had to leave before the deal was finalised so it is still with me. Due to these two facts, even though it's not perfect and maybe full of mistakes, I will cherish this alot. But if I could managed to get into UK again, I would just send it to him as a gift as his gesture was kind enough for me to want to give this as a gift to him.

For time time being, I will post the remaining kits I need to post and after that, until I can get out of this god forsaken country, I will figure out something else to post. Please don't go away. I will definitely keep this blog alive. I swear to god. Please just bear with me adjust to life back in this hell hole.

My sincerest thanks to these people for the continued support on my gunpla works and pushing me to finish this -
Simon Curry, Darren Ling , Derick Siu , Pawel Zynk, Marc Mayer, Fransiska, Thanos, Justin, Jeff and Paul Bicar. 

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