She's kinda a radical departure (for me at least!) so post in with your comments! My photographer already hates her! Posted by Harry (Member # 265) on :
It's better than the original Chandley. Everything's better than the original Chandley Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
I love the old Chandley! It looks like a frog leaping and could never fit through the Spacedock doors, but man did it kick ass!
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
Wonky. But neet nonetheless.
Posted by SoundEffect (Member # 926) on :
Nice work Jason!
I also like the Blackheart. The Kitty Hawk is a very cool design. Probably my favorite from that batch of pics!
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Its truly a terrible photo of the Blackheart though (sigh). I'll snap some decent pics of those two ships next time...
Posted by Griffworks (Member # 1014) on :
Nice job, Jason, as always. Only thing I kinda don't like about it is that the main hull is too flat for a TNG/DS9/VOY Era ship. I like how you split the "pod" in two.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Thanks. I split the pod for more coverage than a standard Nebula pod would give and added phaser strips (like on the Merrimac) to the pod's sides. You would'nt recognize it but the saucer is built from an Ambassador: I took off the outermost three "rings" of the saucer prior to cutting the wedges from the rear of it. I also added many more round windows on the saucer's rim than the Ambassador's own vertical ones and built the B-C decks before attaching the modified Galaxy class bridge and shuttlebay. She's a weird ship, but I'm happy with her and I really needed more mid-range sized ships (frigates)in the fleet for balance. Once Ravenstar releases his New Orleans later this year, I'll have lots more frigates to go around....
Waiting sucks. Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
Nice work. I, too, love the original Chandley, but your take is a nice interpretation. Word(s) of criticism? Thomas Paine and Hokkaido. I hope I have my models finished before too much longer so I can slap pics of 'em up online and have everyone tell me what I did wrong.
--Jonah
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Ug. I'm planning on Re-Painting/ re-decaling the TM anyway.....
The Hokido is the lousy internet's fault! I looked it up on a travel site and everything! screw it: it's still a martial art by that spelling.
What scale are your models in?
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
"Hokey-do"? Wasn't that what Kirk employed...?
Most are in 1/1400. Some bigger, some smaller. Don't really feel like listing 'em all right now, though.
--Jonah
Posted by Phoenix (Member # 966) on :
I was thinking about starting to build models. Any tips?
And I'd like to have them all the same scale, if possible - what is the best one to choose?
Posted by Bernd (Member # 6) on :
That's the most original looking kitbash I have seen lately. I wouldn't have recognized the Ambasssador saucer.
Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Thanks! Coming from you that means a lot! I use your site as refrence on everything and could'ny have done the DS9 kitbashes without it.
Phoenix: I'd start by asking yourself what ships you want to build, what kind of time you want to put into a model and weither or not your want to display several ships. 2500th (my scale) is excellent for people with limited space and who like small detail work and don't like spending weeks or months just to build a "stock" Enterprise. Lots of ships are being made in 2500th this year and it's catching up to 1400th. 1400th currently has the most selection for ships (thanks mostly to Starcrafts models)and the kits have tons of excellent detail but cost usually upwards of $50-70 each for the larger ships.
If you're just starting to model and want an bueatiful ship with minimal work there is the new offerings from Bandai: A 850th Connie Refit and a 1700th Enterprise E. The Connie refit is available now for about $70-100 and comes pre-painted with lights. The "E" comes out later this year but nobody knows if it's lit for sure (I'd imagine so). http://www.starshipmodeler.com/trek/jr_enta.htm http://www.rakuten.co.jp/be-j/img1041490352.jpeg The only down side to these kits is that nothing else is in scale with them.
As Griffworks can attest, these is also 537th scale: The scale of the Ertl Connie Refit and Reliant kits and about a zillion aftermarket and accurizing parts and conversion kits for these. 537th is great if you want to super-detail your ship and see every darn marking and, as in Woozle's case, even make the interior! Check here for some great examples: http://hometown.aol.com/Griffworks/shipyards.html
If you decide to go with 1400th scale, I reccomend the Nova class: all one piece and all you need to do is wash it, paint it and decal it.
Pm me if you need anything or any tips on where to buy cheap kits. Posted by Phoenix (Member # 966) on :
Thanks a lot - that's very helpful.
I'd like (eventually of course) to have a large range of ships, and having looked at some of the models for sale it seems that most are 1:1400, so I think I'll go for that, and try the Nova.
Hopefully I can try bigger and bigger ships as I get better. Posted by Griffworks (Member # 1014) on :
I'll back Jason up with his comments about 1/1400 scale as being the easiest to find kits in. There is a dazzling array of available kits, tho the vast majority are made of resin, which is considerably different than working in plastic, as most folks are used to. It's a good compromise for detail and availability of kits, as well as for spacing. You won't have to do much in the way accurizing (only a very limited number of subjects need this, most by ERTL) and there is also a wide variety of decals available, as well as the fact it's easy to get custom decals done in 1/1400 scale. Starcraft Models builds the bulk of the 1/1400 scale ships available and the majority you'll find is from the TNG Era.
My favorite scale is 1/537 (or thereabouts) as Jason already mentioned. You can get most excellent detail and while most kits for this scale are no longer in product, you can still get them on eBay and for close to the same prices as the resin cast 1/1400 scale kits - sometimes cheaper, as in the case of the ERTL Reliant kit! Downsides are that these kits are no longer being produced, most are highly inaccurate, necessitating accurizing, and they're rather big. The refit Enterprise comes it at a hair over 22". This is also predominately the scale of the TOS Movie Era, with the Refit Enterprise, Reliant and Klingon K'T'Inga's coming in this scale, as well as several vacuum formed kits by a company called SciFi Spaceship Miniatures (now out of business due to a C&D from Paramount), as well as pretty darned close to what the 22" Cutaway TOS Enterprise is (officially, I think it's 1/500).
And now we're on to Jason's favorite scale. 1/2500 is pretty small, tho larger than the old MicroMachines that they used to put out back in The Day. There have only been a handful of kits produced in this scale, w/the original's being the ERTL 3-Enterprise set which included the TOS, E-A and E-D. They later came out with a "Fill In The Gaps" release which included the E-B, E-C and E-E. While these are nice kits, they too have their problems. There are also a small number of resin cast kits in 1/2500 scale, as well. Thomas Models has released some and should be re-releasing them again shortly. TM Lindsey has a small - and growing! - number of kits, as well. And, of course, you can always go Jason's route, give up a personal life and kitbash and/or scratchbuild a bewildering number of lil' ships! If you've not already, check out Jason's site for pics of more of the ships he's built.
There are other scales, as well, but most of those are sort of "off-scale" ships, being predominately "One Of's", so to speak. While you can feel free to ask model related questions here, obviously, I highly recommend [url=http://www.starshipmodeler.net/cgi-bin/phpBB2/index.php]Starship Modelers Discussion Forums[/ul] as a great source to go and read what others might have asked before, as well as visit the main site for lots of "How To" articles.
Hope that doesn' scare ya off. Posted by Phoenix (Member # 966) on :
Thanks again, that message board looks good.
By the way, what is the difference between resin and plastic models? I did a couple of models when I was about 10 (I didn't paint them ) and they were plastic. What difference does resin make?
Posted by Griffworks (Member # 1014) on :
Resin kits are almost all solid, unlike their injection molded plastic cousins. Resin will often have crisper detail (tho not always) and be relatively cheap to mass produce in considerably smaller numbers than injection molded kits. The reason that most plastic kits retail so low is that thousands are produced, dropping the price, but if you go with just a few hundred, the prices go up dramatically - according to the research I've seen others do into trying to produce a limited injection molded run of a subject.
Downsides to resin:
*) Poor castings can result in airbubbles and pinholes littering the surface of the model.
*) Poor molding of the master can result in seam lines in very bad places. Right in the middle of a nice, flat area of a models surface isn't the smartest place for your mold to "break" so you can have detail on both top and bottom surfaces. Open faced molds are often pretty hard to deal with, too, as they make it to where you must perfectly mate up both surfaces for the model to look right. This isn't an easy thing to do....
*) Poor making of the master can also result in complicated molds, resulting in complicated construction of the model.
*) Voids (airbubbles) just under the surface can cause problems and must be filled.
*) Struts and pylons can be made too thin to hold the weight of others parts, and later sag because of this.
And there are other problems which can occur from poor mastering and bad castings. However, they're pretty kewel, in the long run. They often result in a variety of subjects that you'd not have otherwise.
Again, don't be afraid to ask questions. I'm sure that between at least Jason, "The Woozle" and myself, we can answer most any question you've got and put to us here.
Posted by Phoenix (Member # 966) on :
Thanks.
I'd better get my exams over before I start modelling though...
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