August’s Model Build Gathering

This past weekend was the model build gathering. This was at Funaka’s house this month, so I got some time to deal with errands and such that were unavoidable. I also got into a fun little accident a few houses from Dan’s, but all parties involved are fine, with the exception of my car. So out of the 4 years I’ve owned the damn thing, I’ve had it in the body shop 3 times, the week I got it, last year, and this year. That bloody Scion FRS can’t come out soon enough. I snapped a few shots when I got to the build gathering. Brandon’s working on his RC Tank, Sean’s in the spray booth spraying all the individual pieces for his MG Gouf 2.0 kit he’s been working on, and the house is full of people. Good thing I arrived when I did, Tony and his crew showed up and every chair and table I brought was put to use. I got a new figure kit pinned and later in the evening, a few of us worked on the base for the GM diorama.

Casval is chipping away at his Gouf mods, lots of people were working on things which is always good to see. The paint booth was in full use with Sean and Ed splitting their time at the booth. Sean was painting the Gouf armor pieces as separate parts, noticing this, I mentioned that it may be a better idea to paint in sub assemblies because it is too easy to get different paint tones when painting the kit in pieces. When Sean put his kit together, the different tonal values was very clear, so he went back to the booth to see about balancing things out. Learning step in terms of building gunpla. I used to paint all the parts separately as well. Sub-assemblies make things easier to paint, quicker to paint, and just better results.

Dan was working on his GM diorama components, fixing the seams for the Dom he had modified for the project. His GMs are in parts ready for some primer. A few of us are hoping that we’ll get the diorama project done by Orangecon as it should be a pretty impressive show piece. But the goal is still to have the thing done by SCGMC. I had a Black Rose figure kit from .Hack that I got pinned at the build gathering when I took a break from working on the GM diorama’s base.

After dinner, Dave, Terry, and I got some work on the foam structure for the GM Diorama. I made sure to ask the guys that we have contributing that they were still on track to finish their respective pieces for hte project. Everything seems to be on schedule. We started cutting the foam with a foam cutter I picked up earlier that day. We built up the walls for the base. The idea I had was to create a desert like mesa scene. The mesa will serve as a hidden entrance to an underground Zeon base that the GMs are assulting. The general idea for the mesa looks like the following picture.

We’re planing on having a hidden door on the top and one corner side of the base. We stacked and cut the foam, until the foam cutter gave out, either blowing a fuse or just burning up from the rather rough use we were putting it through. The hobby saws came out and we finished the rest of the cutting.

With the foam structures cut, we picked out the parts we each wanted, and labeled the other parts for the other folks that were not there or had already left the gathering. Dan and Dave kept their parts and I took the rest to my house. Angel came over the next day with some of his diorama components and we did some test poses to figure out placement and such. Just like playing army when I was young.

My original idea was to have my dead GM on his knees with the sword through his chest fallen into the mesa wall. But Angel recommended that I have him standing, so here are the options right now. I’m still debating the stance.

Late last week, I got some time in to mask and paint the kit. Going with an AOZ scheme, I swapped out the AOZ colors for the grays and red. Here’s what the GM team looks like now. I still have tons of detail work as well as the decals and weathering.

Some closer shots of the individual kits.

Work is moving along, and I should definitely have the GMs done soon and then focus on the base itself.