Gunpla

Real Grade Zeong – Gundam Base Limited Clear
Posted in

Real Grade Zeong – Gundam Base Limited Clear

Well fuck, I guess I haven’t really painted anything in the better part of two years. The one kit I did paint in 2023 was this, the RG Zeong with the Gundam Base Limited clear colour armor.

In the grand scheme of things this is a pretty basic build. Gun Metal across everything, then various details made of gold, silver, and copper. I also used some third party effect pieces, as the Last Shooting official set is incredibly expensive. The pieces themselves had to be sanded quite a bit to get rid of the mold seams and were then painted including an orange clear wash to add some depth. Oh, and I forgot, I also added a bunch of metal effect pieces ’cause why not. read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Perfect Grade Unleashed RX-78-2 Gundam – Review
Posted in

Perfect Grade Unleashed RX-78-2 Gundam – Review

Alright, let me get this out of the way. The marketing surrounding this kit is pure bullshit. Take everything you’ve heard about this being the ‘next evolution of Perfect Grade kits’ and toss it out the window. What it really is a nice PG RX-78-2 2.0 release. It’s will built, well designed, and very accessible for folks who haven’t built a Perfect Grade kit yet.

I’m also going to get a bit of a tl;dr at the top of this article which I’ll detail out in a bit…

The Good

  • Good looking take on the classic design
  • Phased construction (really 3 phases, not 5) make for an approachable and fun to build kit
  • Good overlapping frame design
  • Strong amount of detail both on the inner frame and the outer armor
  • Photo etched metal details with a pre-applied adhesive backing
  • Coated silver and chrome elements of the frame look great
  • Snap-off runners
  • ‘Bout time we got some magnetic hard points up in this bitch

The Bad read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

The Great Gundam & Gunpla Census of 2020

Welcome to the results page for the Great Gunpla Census of 2020! This is a follow up to a census, of a similair title, from back in 2018. The 2018 census was a big success with a lot of interest and positive feedback. There was also a good amount of constructive feedback that I brought into this year’s survey. This time around there were more questions pertaining to the Gundam franchise in general for all the folks who’re into Gundam but not necessarily Gunpla. 

This year we got over 1400 respondents answering multiple questions, some open ended. Everyone who answered a simple question with a sentence, I hate what you made me do to my master spreadsheet, but some of your comments are provided great insight. It doesn’t help that everyone has 2-3 different ways of spelling the same kit name (looking at you, Mk-II, or was it MK-2, or MK-ii?). If you’re interested in the raw results from the survey you can find them here. For the 2022 census I’m thinking of slimming down some of the questions and creating some more comment oriented ones. Instead of just telling me what kit you hate, tell me why you hated it. read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

Archive Reference: What I need to know about chemical compatibility by Jack Jella

This an archive replica of a blog post What I need to know about chemical compatibility written by Jack Jella circa 2014, from the National Association of Scale Aeromodelers. It’s been referenced over on the Layman’s Gunpla Guide for many years and it appears that it has been pulled from the original site. I’m guessing it got left behind when they did a global site redesign. In order to preserve it better I’ve created this archive copy. For further reference here’s the original link, the Wayback Machine Archive, and the last Google search cache.  read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

The Great Gunpla Census of 2018

 

While I’m fairly opinionated about many things, including Gunpla, I always wondered what the general consensus was about the best and worst kits of the line. I can answer pretty easily for MG and PG kits, but because I’ve decided to focus my collection with those grades I can’t say much about HG while most of my RG thoughts are all second hand. Thus became the impetus behind the Great Gunpla Census of 2018. While planning things out I decided to add a few more questions to get a general idea of what the franchise fan base was thinking. After a few weeks of being called out on r/Gunpla and r/Gundam the census was completed as best possible by 839 fans. While parsing numbers and fixed answer questions is easy, trying to produce simple takeaways from open ended questions not so much, so I didn’t want to go crazy and find myself with a 15,000 collection of answers to sort through.  read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
BSC 1/35 Unicorn Gundam Bust
Posted in

BSC 1/35 Unicorn Gundam Bust

Did a quick, straight build, of my BSC 1/35 scale Unicorn Gundam bust. It went together over the course of three evenings with very little difficulty. There’s not too much I can say about the build that Great Lakes Gunpla hasn’t covered in two great video reviews. They’re highly recommended for anyone looking to build the kit.

For the most part the BSC Unicorn is essentially a sized up version of the Perfect Grade Unicorn with extra detail and some modifications. These modifications include external detail, additions to support an extensive LED network, more ways for the kit to flap open, and changes so that the kit is built from the ground up compared to the PG. A lot of the pieces are ripped right from the PG, you can even see vestigial connection points no longer used. Of course the mechanical looking stand is original (not sure if it’s pulled from any other busts) and has a lot of potential to look stunning with some added paint. read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

State of the Hanger: My model collection as 2016 comes to a close

[flickr-photo:id=32016457125,size=z]

To wrap up 2016 I want to take few minutes and share some details about my plamo/hobby collection, which is predominantly Gunpla based. I’ve had quite a few folks ask me for info about my collection, and display set up, but have been lacking any single place to point them. Before I start I’d like to thank all of the builders out there who whose simple and complex works have pushed my builds further and driven the Layman’s Gunpla Guide. In particular I’d like to thank those on r/Gunpla and (the now renamed) Gundam Complex on Facebook. Of course a shoutout to the place I’m most guilty about being absent from, Gundam Australia. Over all, the Gunpla and plamo communities are some of the best hobby groups out there.  read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

After the Cel Shading – Gundam Build Fighters Try

 

Go back to the beginning and Try again, show.

In the final episode of Gundam Build Fighters Try, there was a contest where the winner was chosen based on his or her peerless design and craftsmanship of their own Gundam plastic model (Gunpla). At the end, it came down to two finalists: one of the three protagonists and his rival. Their numbers were 6 and 9 respectively. Initially the victor was thought to be number 9, but it turns out that the card was upside down, and the protagonist was the true victor after all. read more

Juu-kuchiby Juu-kuchi•
Posted in

Layman’s Gunpla Guide – Gundam Line Art Collection

Line art? What do I need line art for? When planning out a custom colour scheme for your build the best way to plan is to take some line art and go to town with an image editor. Take a clean piece of line art, select some colours, and have fun with the fill tool. It’s a great way to get a general sense of what colour combinations look good, and depending on the detail level of the kit/line art, even plan for what pieces get what colour.

I want to call out that I didn’t make any of this line art. Well, some point in the past I’ve cleaned some up, but I couldn’t tell you what I did or when. In general it’s been a group sourced thing going back over a decade. Gunpla fans from all backgrounds have contributed toward this collection. At some point there was a Japanese Seeaa wiki page that had pretty much everything but that disappeared a few years back. What’s listed below is the combination of the collection I’ve saved up, plus others who’ve been archiving images like LightningBW, Gundaml1neart, and Tomo Wise (that’s a NSFW link btw). Some folks have labeled their additions over the years, and where possible I’ve made sure to use those. read more

Falldogby Falldog••0
Posted in

Falldog’s Gunpla Projects

Here’s a list of my completed projects in more-or-less order from the most recent completion to when I first got back into the hobby in 2007. You’ll notice various spurts of improvements and, if you’re like me, may cringe at some of my earlier works. Below are all of the projects that I’ve completed. The number of projects currently straight built or in mid-project state are too numerous to count. For a better list of those check out my Flickr gallery.

Don’t forget to check out my overall collect and the kit reviews I’ve done. read more

Falldogby Falldog••0