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