January 28, 2007: Valley con come and gone, I was
only able to finish two (sorta) kits new kits for this year's ValleyCon.
Red Haruhi and my semi finished Kampfer. I had alot of fun this year,
and got to talking to a couple of other modelers and a couple of professional
model builders. Always fun to compete against them.
Ships and Subs
The relateively large submarine below is a hollow resin
kit that only had the sub up from the waterline, so the rest of the hull
was scratch built. This took the builder 5 years to complete. On a side
note, the builder is a professional builder who works in the film industry,
he built the sub used in the model K-19 Widowmaker.
SciFi Hardware & Creatures
The SciFi category has grown considerably over the past
couple of years. The giant white, blue and yellow robots were built by
the same modeler that was noted about above. According to another modeler,
these were used for a FedEx commercial. The Battlestar Galactica Viper's
base was signed by Jamie Bamber the current "Apollo" in the
current running Galactica series. Robert J's stuff is always fun to see,
he normally builds in 1/144 scale and puts his own theme on his Gundam
kits. The Macross Battroid was built by a young lady who's the daughter
of a very experienced modeler that always wins at these events. Upon hearing
about this young lady's new found interest in mecha and scifi, Robert
handed over one of his nicely completed Zaku kits as a little gift. Very
cool. More modelers in scifi and Gundam in particular is always welcomed.
Aircraft
Figures
Since the SciFi category only had "Hardware"
and "Creatures" categories, I felt that the Haruhi w/Guitar
that I brought belonged in the "figures" catgeory. Brandon also
put his Quattro figure in this category. Funny that the two kits were
the only anime based figures in the entire figure category. I didn't expect
to win, but Brandon got the Gold and I got a special "Best Painter"
award in the category. Too funny.
Cars
The Skyline at the bottom of the grouping has a completely
scratch built engine and engine compartment. Very impressive.
Armor
By far, this category had the most entries. They ended
up adding another table and having some overflow placed in several other
tables amongst other categories. Very impressive works. I remember seeing
the "Here, Kitty Kitty" kit a few years ago at OrangeCon.
Awards
This year I got the gold prize for the SciFi Creatures
category for the Dark Elf. And the other awards had some interesting trophies.
Each general category had special prizes and for the Figures category,
I got Best Painter which resulted in a painter's palette with a litle
label; and for the SciFi category, I got the "Founder's Circle"
ribbon award for having "unique" out of the box type kit, which
went to my GM Veteran with sign. Brandon (Bhop) got a Bronze in the Figure
category for his Quattro. Very nicely done.
Valley Con 2007
