Bandai PG 1/60 Astray Red Frame

It's going to be quite lengthy for this one. These are few pictures that I managed to shot with the camera that I borrowed from my friend during the working hour where I've also shot the 4 VF-25 Messiahs together.

Overall View
















This is my second PG since the Strike Gundam that I did back in 2005. Back then, I was just started to pick up modeling again since coming over to KL for study in 2000.

My last PG I painted with Tamiya Color Spray, with emphasis on the metallic feel. This round however, I'd like to give it a little bit of a different feel, by having the color to be done without any metallic feel to it. I like my robot to be in metallic color if possible, but after looking at some of the Japanese pro did it on YouTube, even without metallic feel one could still make a good looking Gunpla, so I decided to give it a try.

Experimenting Technique
So what I did on this PG is to try to do shading. I've tried shading with my MG 1/100 RX-78-2 Gundam before and it turns out quite well. The color combination for the shading is as follow.

1. White section: Spray Neutral Gray as base -> Character White (with very little Midnight Blue) starting from the middle of the surface.
   
2. Red section: Spray Navy Blue as base -> Spray Red Madder starting from the middle of the surface.
   
3. Black section: Spray Midnight Blue as base -> Spray Midnight Blue + Character White starting from the middle of the surface.
   

I must say that I still need practice on this shading because when I was doing the shading on the red section (mostly the frame), spraying not enough color would cause the red to look too dull. I actually have to re-spray the surface again to bring out the red. By the way, I don't really know what's the term for spraying with airbrush, so I'll just use the word "spray" here to replace airbrushing.

Then, I tried to do something that I learned from the YouTube video as well on the gold plated and silver plated part. First, I tried to see if I could wash off the silver plated part by soaking them in alcohol (the YouTube video showing the pro using some kind of whitening agent) because I recalled that it can be done that way. But, although I could get the paint off, the plastic parts are deformed, so it is a big failure.

So I have no choice but to sand off the gold plated and silver plated part with a sponge file instead. Then, I spray the Mr Surfacer 1200 onto them, and finally the silver parts with Mr Color silver, and gold part with Mr Metallic Gold. The Mr Metallic series require the painted surface to be polished in order to bring out the metallic feel, which I did. Then, I tried to do like how the pro did by spraying a layer of clear yellow on top of the Gold to bring out the yellowish gold; which it doesn't turn out well. It might has something to do with the color that I used.

Then the 1/60 figurine of Lowe that comes with this kit, I did paint it as well before putting it into the cockpit. The following picture is the result of the painting. Painting this mini figure is much easier as compare to the 1/100 scale pilot figure that comes with all the MG Gunpla kit. But the hardest thing is not painting it, but to get rid of the parting line on the mini figure because if the line is not scrapped, the painting will look horrible.




Arms & Legs










This PG Astray is using the same inner frame as the PG Strike Gundam, so the articulation of this kit is supposed to be as superb as the PG Strike Gundam. It is true until the Astray specific armors are put on. Yes, it is still possible for it to pose decently, but the armors have restricted it to pose as flexible as PG Strike could achieve, i.e. the squatting pose.

The hand are also from the same mold that used for PG Strike Gundam. The only difference is that it is molded in 2 colors - white and red. The white section is made from something that contains rubber element, whereas the red is made molded with ABS plastic. It seems really cool, until I need to deal with the parting line on them because I wanted to paint it in unison with the color of the other section of the boy. The normal way of dealing with parting line just doesn't work on the rubbery section, so I resorted to use diamond file to get rid of it. It did the job, but at the expanses of resulting a rough surface on the fingers. Anyway, I didn't really amend it because I'm afraid that I might doing more damage to it instead, I decided to stick with what it is right now. The damage on the finger surface is hardly to be noticed from far, but that's a different case when it is look into closely.

Also, this kit also comes with the dry transfer decal as well. I applied them to this kit to make it looks more "macho". Applying dry transfer decal is not that easy on this one because there are a lot of uneven surface where the decal has to be applied to. I ended up with some of them in a distorted form.

Posing








The best part of this kit is that it comes with a Katana named Gerbera Straight. I bought the initial launch version, which came with clear parts, an extra Katana named Tiger Pearce, and a stand to hold the Katanas. Even though the articulation are somewhat restricted by the armors, it could still do some decent pose as I mentioned earlier. I like the fact that it could hold the 2 Katana - one in each hand - without falling off.

The actual size of the katana is shown in the following picture. The hand in the picture is my hand.



As for how big this kit stand, by doing a mathematics calculation of 1800cm(the documentation stated that it stands around 18 meter tall) divided by 60, its height would be around 30cm. The following picture is a comparison of its size with the 1/72 scale VF-25 Messiahs.



Conclusion
My first impression after I've finished building this kit is that it looks much more masculine/bulky as compare to the PG Strike Gundam. What I'm disappointed with is that it couldn't pose as good as PG Strike. Still, that doesn't really stop me from liking it because it does looks good. In contrast to the 1/72 VF-25 Messiah, I'd still want to do more PG in the future because some how rather I find that it's much easier to deal with Gunpla kit.

VF-25 Messiahs - Skull Squadron

I didn't really watch all the episodes of Macross Frontier; I only watch the last 2 episodes, so I figured that the Skull Squadron would consists of all the Messiahs appeared in the show.

Here are some pictures that I attempted to put all the VF-25 Messiahs together for a group shot. I must say that it doesn't really turn out that well because the lighting is not done properly and I'm not really good with a digital SLR camera yet.

Skull Squadron - Fighter Mode






Skull Squadron - Battroid Mode

Bandai 1/72 VF-25G Messiah Michael Unit

This is the last Macross kit that I have done. It is the VF-25G Messiah, which specializes in long range sniping.

Fighter Mode










The Fighter mode is basically the same as all 3 Messiahs that I did previously, since all of them are made from the same mold. Like the RVF-25, the shield for this kit could be connected to the body without much problem.

Gerwalk Mode






The form is basically the same as all previous Messiah that I did, so nothing much for me to say here.

Battroid Mode






The difference here again is the head. The head design is like the mass produced Valkyrie unit VF-1, but in the Macross Frontier universe, there's only 1 unit of Messiah with this head design - mono-eye with single antenna/vulcan gun on top. Like the RVF-25, the head design has the similar problem: the horn-like shape parts at the lower part of the head that would hinder it from re-positioning into the body with the risk of scratching it, and also the not-too-serious articulation problem much like RVF-25 head.

Experimented Techniques
Basically I tried the same things that I did on all 3 previous Messiah on this kit as well. This time I tried to do the dry brushing again, with this time only on the edge of the inner frame. It turns out quite well as compare to my previous attempt, but the coordination of the color doesn't seems to work that well.

Conclusion
I'm satisfied with the work on this one because not much problem arises. It is truly a conclusion for the Macross kit for now as I mentioned in my previous posting of the other 3 Messiahs because I don't really have the time and concentration to work on this type of model kit.

Bandai 1/72 RVF-25 Messiah Luca Unit

RVF-25 Messiah Luca unit. This is the reconnaissance variant, so it would have a huge satellite tracking disc on its back. This kit comes with 3 Ghost fighters as well. I didn't snap any pictures on the Ghost units because I haven't finish the work due to the fact that I'm lazy to work on it at that point.

Fighter Mode








Basically it's the same as the Alto unit and Ozma unit, except that it has a big satellite tracking disc on its back.

I did face problems on this one as well, and quite a few of them. Firstly, the lower body part contains a retractable plate in the middle, where during the transformation to Fighter mode or Gerwalk mode, the plate would retract inward, thus giving space for the head section to come down; when it is transforming into Battroid mode, the plate would retract outward to fill up the empty space. Due to the reason that I put the cement on a wrong side of the parts, the excess flows into the retractable plate, and as a result of that I could not have it to retract as it should be; it has to be stationed at one position to allow the transformation to take place.

The second problem that I faced is with the head. It has 2 horns-like parts at the bottom of the head that hindering it from folding downward into the body during transformation. It is very unlikely to not scratch them during transformation.

Thirdly is the join between the leg and the body. The join part is glued together with instant adhesive. I used to sand the excess of the glue before joining the parts together but I didn't to it this time. As a result of that, the movement of the leg become quite stiff to the point that if I forced it too much, I might break it.

Still, what I found amazed is with the shield. I could connect the shield to the body without much problem as compare to the previous 2 that I did.

Gerwalk Mode






Except for the back, it basically looks the same as the other 2 Valkyrie. As I mentioned previously, due to the excess of the glue that I didn't sand of from the join between the leg and the body, I have to be extra careful with the transformation related to the leg section.

Battroid Mode






Except for the head and the back, it looks basically the same as the previous 2 units. The head of this unit in my opinion suffered the same problem as the Ozma unit - not much articulation. Still, it doesn't suffer much to the point that it will always staring upwardly.

Because of the problem with the excess glue again, the transformation to Battroid mode really taking me a while to do it because it is during this transformation that the legs have to be rotated a few times before settling into its position.


Experimented Technique
I did basically the same thing as I did on both the Alto unit and Ozma unit. Apart from that, I did try to experiment a new thing here - dry brushing.

I tried to dry brushing on the frame with Tamiya Enamel silver color using a pointy brush. The result is not as good as what I would hope for, so it is considered as failed. In the end I did change the brush to the flat brush, and it turn out fairly better than my previous attempt. However, I must say that I don't really have a very imaginative vision on how to dry brush the unit yet so I couldn't really get it done like how the pro did: to give it a reality feel.


Conclusion
Basically the same conclusion as the previous 2.

Bandai 1/72 VF-25S Messiah Ozma Lee Unit

The second Bandai 1/72 Macross kit that I did last year. This is the Ozma Lee unit from Macross Frontier, the squad leader version.

Fighter Mode










The fighter mode is basically the same as the Alto unit. With the experience that I had with the previous Messiah unit, I was able to get the fighter mode done pretty quickly. Not to say that the problem that I faced with my previous kit is completely eliminated because this kit uses the same mold as well, so I'd expect the same problem i.e. connecting the shield to the body will still pose a problem.

The other problem that I have is the formation of the head. The head is much bigger in my opinion as compare to the Alto unit's head, thus making it quite difficult to get into its position. The thing that I need to pay attention to is not to force it because the head is connected to the body via a small piece of L-shape ABS connector, and if not careful, it could break.


Gerwalk Mode






The transformation process is identical with the Alto unit, so nothing much for me to say here.

Battroid Mode








As the transformation from Gerwalk to Battroid is the same as the Alto unit, I won't go into much detail about it. As I mentioned earlier that it is based on the same mold as the Alto unit, design is basically the same except for the head.

Like all previous Valkyrie, the design of the head would have 4 vulcan gun instead of 2 or 1. In my own opinion the design of this head is quite "unique". Unlike the Alto unit, which the head has to be turned around for the transformation, the head of this unit is just simply face-up, and head-down; no turning around is needed.

However, not all is well because the articulation of the head is not really as good as the Alto unit. The head of the Alto unit could at least move up and down, but this one would only allow up and down is totally impossible to achieve without lifting the whole head up a bit. So with this situation, the head will always looking upward in standing position, which I have to tweak the head join a bit to make the head look downward a bit so that it would not seen so awkward.

Experimented Technique
I did the same thing as I did for the Alto unit, except that the cleaning of the excess of the panel line is not as difficult as cleaning it on Alto unit because the excess could come out quite easily on this one. I wonder whether it has to do with the fact that white color surface are much more harder to deal with.

The other thing that I did on this kit is to have some of the easily crack part i.e. the lower part of the body to be glued with either cement or instant adhesive. I used instant adhesive only on ABS plastic because cement just doesn't do well on it. It might not help much, but at least it would prevent it from easily being cracked.

Conclusion
I must say that of all the Macross kit that I did, I'm satisfied with this the most simply because I need to work harder on this one to make sure that I don't make the same mistake as I did on the Alto unit. Even so, I'd still consider of not doing another Messiah kit again in near future because of the amount of work that involves in the making process.