The New Order

Another Kit, this time it’s the First Order Stormtrooper.

 

The Trooper contemplated his new kit.

 

As I said in my previous post, I love that these snap together and remain posable. takes about 1-2 hours to build one. and you can finish up with the stickers, waterslides or some paint.

 

Previous generations look on in anticipation

 

In this kit, the baton needed quite a bit of paint as its body is black, wheras on screen its mostly white.

 

And my paint application to the required bits, a bit rough due to the gloss plastic, in future I'd abrade the surface first..

 

The gang’s all here (except the phase two clone, for which there isn't a good, affordable option at the moment in this scale.)

Way too old for toys

So what am I doing with the action figures and model kits? Where are the 40k models? why isn't there an army being built?

Well the short answer is I haven't had time for anything much on the personally creative front since September. But I also have the same problem a lot of you out there do, an obsession with geeky things and a need to do something creative with my time.

These kits and figures are allowing me to collect.. (an illness a lot of us share)  to obsess (yep there's another) and to be a little creative in that I can take pictures like the ones in this thread, and I can build the kits, and I am looking to get into some customs. I’m going to start with a repaint or two and maybe even do a little sculpting or recasting and modifying of parts here and there.

So what does this mean for the blog? I guess if there's interest and I have the time and energy going forward I’ll keep you up to speed with what I’m doing. If I can I might make a tutorial or two for some of the photography and post-processing I’m doing along with any builds or customisation.

Let me know in the comments if this is something that anyone would be interested in.

Bandai 1/12 Scale Stormtrooper

 

Having decided I wanted a Stormtrooper and in my mind, one that wasn't too expensive, wasn't to small or large and was a decent looking model, I looked at what was on offer, everything from the Mafex, SH Figuarts, Black series, Revoltech and finally the model kit.

I quickly realised that for me, the model kit was the best looking option, as far as visible joints, scale and proportion it just looked better than the others. So I asked the lovely people of Japan to send me one.

This is what you get in the box, some white styrene parts, lovely and shiny, some black hard plastic elements, and some softer plastic elements. and the eye lenses are smoked clear plastic. you also get some decals and whatnot.

The kits are interesting in that they don't require any glue, the whole thing just snap fits.

and once complete, the thing retains its articulation, what you are building here is an action figure in kit form.

Instructions are easy to follow, and while some of the kits will need a lot of paint to look awesome, the stormtrooper is largely already the correct colours. a few dabs of blue and grey are all that's needed.

He stands up well

And I love the way the head sits low, and the shoulders are narrow. this is what Stormtroopers should look like.

Here he is with his black series clone cousin.

Yes at this stage the plan was “just to add a first order kit” so I had the three iconic armours I loved.

Alive. Just Busy

Hello everyone.

I’ll level with you, this isn't me “back” – this is an update, and there may be more, but there is no sense of a return to any kind of schedule I’m afraid. I simply spoke with one of our community on the phone the other day and it reminded me that I should probably let people know that I’m actually alive.

The simple truth is that my new job (September new) has me very busy, and I burned through all my stored content. I’ll also level with you all in saying that I am not really turned on creatively by 40k at the moment.

Now don't think I’m going to be selling armies or pacing things away. but I just don't have the time to build a unit at the moment much less an army.

What I am excited by, and what I can just about fit into the time I have available is a little bit of star wars stuff. the last few times I've had the opportunity to game it’s been X wing that has my attention, it required less set up and pre planning yet still offers a fun game with cool models. painting and modelling is optional, for someone with limited time that's a bonus. I made the asteroids in the pic there too.

I’ve also discovered just how good “Star wars Figures” are now. when I was a kid I had a ton, and with the new movies coming out the idea of a storm trooper for the desk was too good to pass up. Well as you can imagine for a person with my collecting, building and toy obsessions it didn't stop at a single storm trooper for the desk. Between the star wars hasbro black series, mafex, figuarts and bandai model kits, there's a wealth of good looking /12 scale posable models and what it has allowed me to do is flex my creativity a little in taking some pictures, which I’ve enjoyed, and in building the odd one off model kit – I may post more on those. I’m also looking at customisation and paint for some of the figures.

I did manage to play fallout 4 too. and I got a little way into XCOM 2 but then work got in the way again and ive not touched it for two weeks.

So yeah, Alive. Busy. Still doing some stuff, but, ya know, different stuff. At some point I’ll return to painting and making, but I don't know when. until then I’ll try and let you all know what I am doing a bit more regularly.