January 29, 2007 on 1:15 am | In Models
I’ve spent the whole weekend detailing the 3 kits I was working on – the TB ninja girl (see post below), one of my grail kits Otoko no Tatakai (diorama of Eva 01 vs. Zeruel), and a “makaizou” Asuka Langley 
I was cursing the designer of the Eva mechs on their choice of colors and making the thing so damn hard to paint, then today I was totally exhausted after painting the ninja girl’s face and accessories – she has too much auxillary stuff! Grrrr, too old for this crap 
Oh and I’m officially not recommending tattooshock, since they’ve been silent on my screwed up order.
January 22, 2007 on 12:00 am | In Models, WIP
I’ve been working on this Tsukasa Bullet Mizuki ninja girl. Originally I just wanted to make her armor detachable, but then I thought since she’ll have a completed bare back with her armor removed, it’ll be great to give her a full-back tattoo like the traditional Japanese warriors. I’ve been doing some research on tattoo decals, which are used by people to stick temprary tattoos on their skin for a couple of days. After Googling the web a bit I found and ordered some nice ones from tattooshock.com (I’m not sure I wanna recommend them tho, somehow they managed to get the order very wrong…). It’s hard to find something that’s like the real traditional Japanese tattoo, which totally covers the back of the person plus shoulders; nevertheless I think just having something that almost cover her back would be quite exciting. (click on image to enlarge)
This cobra and rose tattoo I picked for her is perhaps not very oriental… ah not caring anymore, cool is all that counts The application is nothing like regular water decal. These things have two backings – one side has glue and the other one is attached to a sheet of paper, which will come off when you soak in water. You’re supposed to stick the glue side on the surface, and wet the other side so that the other backing will come off. But man this is hard for Mizuki’s curvvy back! The backing is qiute thick and so it doesn’t really bend. Also the glue is quite strong so there’s not much chance you can adjust it. So I put her and the decal in a bowl of water and tried my best to fit the decal on. Well it worked mostly, but some parts did tear and I had to do quite a bit of touch ups. When I took the pics, I had gave her a few coats of future to protect the decal, that’s why her back is so glossy I’ll be misting a thin layer of skintone later to blend the tattoo in better with the figure.
On to the rest of Mizuki. After thinking about it a bit, it seems copper is the best match for her armor in the original illustration, and the result looks quite nice, although the original material is probably leather. I’m also wondering whether I should put the petal tattoo in the originally character design on her face. From the buildups I’ve seen, it appears that the petal tattoo has the property of making her face look stretched from some angles; I’m not quite sure why…
January 15, 2007 on 4:04 pm | In Models, Works
A kit I tried motivating myself to finish by Christmas but wasn’t remotely successful. But at least I could get her finished now without procastinating further 
Got enough of a push to finish up after figuring out I did have more than 10 0.02 drill bits for the bubbles’ brass pins, I present to you Lilith in Bubbles~~~~
This kit surely looks like a mess in thumbnails 
By the way I mentioned I was working out a scheme for a mermaid kit in the write up… if anyone has an Ariel to dispose of, let me know
And OMG I built about 6-7 kits last year, but already 3 kits in the first week of 2007? What’s up with that
Edit 01/17: I’ve retaken the pics… boy I wish I don’t have to do that all the time 
The bubbles caught reflections from the light sources, so anything weird will show up. On the left below is the old one; I was using a soft lighting setup with the flash shooting into an umbrella and away from the kit, which gives nice soft lighting, but then you see the shadow of the flash in the middle of the light ring (the light patch at center of the pic, slightly to the right). That can’t be good. So instead I change the flash to shoot into the umbrella at Lilith, which gives a better reflection (diffused circle) on the right pic below… if you look carefully you can see the arms of the umbrella
January 10, 2007 on 12:27 am | In Models, Works
Finally done with this turkey I’ve worked on and off for the past 3 months – the nekokoneko plane VF-OS! I felt relieved that it’s finished, since the Ghost module has so many breakable parts that makes it dangerous to move around.
