Welcome to the Fantasy Factory

This kit is full of several mini-projects, like the Arboretum in the previous posts. Here’s another one.

Basic stuff here. I shot the whole thing with flat black primer from a rattle can, then airbrushed the Tamiya Desert Yellow. I then taped off the walls, and handbrushed the medium gray flooring. More tape, followed by the red recliners and benches. More tape, followed by the brown tables. Some decals, some ballast, some bushes, and a layer of dullcoat lacquer. I kinda like it!

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In last post, I left you with wondering how I got gravel onto a model of a garden spot on an imaginary spaceship. It’s quite easy, really…you use model railroad supplies! I got the idea from a couple of other builders, and modified it to suit my needs and tastes. I got a bag of Woodland Scenics Fine Ballast, Fine Turf – Green Grass, and Scenic Glue. And no, I don’t get a dime from the company.

You’re supposed to put the glue down, then put this stuff in some kind of shaker bottle, and…well, shake it out over the scenery to get a natural look. The pre-made shaker bottles are 8 bucks apiece…time to improvise! I took a small workbench container, drilled some small holes in the lid with my trusty Dremel, and…

Home-made shaker bottles!

The pics below show the method to my madness. I used the exact same steps for both ballast and turf, so we’ll skip the complete play-by-play. The first pic shows all the ballast down, and some of the turf. The second shows show I “painted” the glue over the area to be covered. I used a cheap hobby paint brush for this, making sure to get a uniform coating.

Next, I took my shaker bottle, and generously coated the glue area with the turf. After allowing it to dry (2-3 hours, depending on the humidity), I tapped the sides of the part to shake away the excess. If a little got outsie of the lines, I scraped it off gently with an unfolded paperclip. Once complete, I sprayed the whole thing with some Scenic Cement, to seal all the ballast and turf. The final pic shows the fully covered Arboretum.

Do you see those little holes scattered around the turf? Remember those lame trees (the sticks with cotton balls)? That’s where they go in. I figured that I could do better, and Woodland Scenics was able to help out again. I trimmed some of the branches off their Deciduous Armatures, and glued them into the holes using the Scenic Glue. I then dropped a blob of Scenic Glue in the fork of the branch, and dropped a Medium Green Bush onto it. I teased and trimmed the stuff to look like tree foliage, painted the doorways a medium gray, and sprayed the entire setup with a dullcoat lacquer.

And with the ceiling piece in place, ready for the rest of the lower hull.

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I’ve got some of the smaller pieces of the Big-E in work, and wanted to update my progress. The first section that I tackled is the Arboretum. It’s like a little park tucked away in the secondary hull of Enterprise. There are very few pictures of it, model or screen, so imagination is pretty much the name of the game.

This pic shows the unadorned part. The part came with some triangular points sticking up from the base; I guess they were supposed to be evergreen trees. A little work with the Dremel, and they were gone. There were also some add-in parts meant to be deciduous trees, but looked like sticks with cotton balls on top…tossed ‘em.

I then added some detail to the interior walls, courtesy of Paragrafix’s excellent brass photo-etch enhancement set. A lot of the pieces here will show up as the model progresses. I love the look that the wall pieces add.

Next up, I hit the whole thing with some flat black primer. Because the model will be lit from various places, I’ll need to black out the backside of most everything, to allow the light only where I want it.

After that dried and cured, I hit the whole piece with my airbrush, using Tamiya’s Desert Yellow acrylic. I chose the color simply because I thought it added a nice warm tone to the ship’s interior. I then detailed the pond areas, and began laying down my gravel path.

Gravel? What the heck am I talking about? You’ll have to wait until the next post!

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Well, the holidays treated the family and I well. Lots of good times with family and friends, waaay to much good food, and not too much family drama. I think everyone with a family knows what I’m talking about with that last comment. I’ve always assumed that the drama is always there, under the surface, and that the stress of the holidays simply brings it out.

I was saddened to hear that my favorite author, Robert B. Parker, passed away on January 18th. He was apparently found at his writing desk, the victim of a sudden heart-attack. I began reading his works since my early teenage years, and thoroughly enjoyed everything he’s published, especially his Spenser novels. The writing is spare and witty, and the characters pretty well formed; there’s little room, or need, for origin stories or background. Growing up, I was a pretty rebellious and directionless kid, and his novels struck a chord in me; Spenser (or Parker, undeniably the Boston detective’s alter ego) had many qualities that I tried to emulate. Sort of like trying on clothes, in that you see what fits or looks good, and discard what doesn’t. They weren’t  bad role models, all things considered. I’m gonna miss the joy he brought with each new release. Further details about the man and his craft can be found here, and pretty much all over the ‘Net.

A coworker of mine was demonstrating his Amazon Kindle e-reader the other day, and I have to say that I’m hooked! Of course, the recent Consumer Electronic Show showcased some 20 plus e-readers, not to mention the forthcoming iPad from Apple. I almost pulled the trigger on a Kindle, but then read about battles between Amazon the major publishing houses. That, coupled with Amazon only supporting a proprietary format/DRM scheme on the device, has given me pause. Maybe a Nook, with its industry de facto format and DRM?

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I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. I cooked a turducken for family, and a Cajun-style deep-fried turkey for a friend. The turducken turned out wonderful, after 10 hours of slow roasting in the oven. The stuffing (a cornbread, and an onion and sage) were a perfect complement to the layers of roasted birds. Hats off to Don at Great Lakes Butcher Supply for putting it all together. 

Unfortunately, the deep-fried bird was a little…well, extra crispy. One of my dogs slipped her collar right after I dunked the bird into the oil, and it got a little extra heat (temperature-wise) while I chased the dog down. I was really embarrassed to deliver the bird to my friend, but assured him that the meat itself was just fine. He later told me that the meat was just fine, but that his family was looking forward to the crunchy, peanut-flavor infused skin. Maybe I’ll get a chance to redeem myself at Christmas…

In between school and the holiday, I managed to finish some pieces of the Big-E. I’m still wrestling with the best way to handle the bigger assemblies, so I thought it would be best to work on some of the smaller stuff.

I’m actually pretty proud of how this all turned out. Handling the tiny details that these pieces brought to the table has really bolstered my confidence about this whole idea. Hopefully, that translates to faster progress!

RMW

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When I bought the Big-E home, I’ll admit it took a couple of hours of me looking at the box before I tore off the shrink wrap. Was I intimidated? Maybe a little…it’s 17 inches square, and 5 inches deep.

I finally gave in, and ripped the plastic off. The box was stuffed full of parts.

I gave the instructions a once-over while looking at the part bags. I decided to take a look at the model’s base, to see how I could get it to support the actual model and it’s electronics.

I consulted the Oracle of Google, and decided I could accomplish this with a brass rod through the center of the base. Out came the Dremel, and several drilled holes later, I got my results.

Not bad. Off to the painting booth for priming…

RMW

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Does anybody remember this scene from “Bull Durham”? The one where Kevin Costner lists the things that he believes in? I pulled something very similar just the other day…

It’s October 31st, around 3 or 4pm. The TV is busy showing an advertisement for holiday-themed pancakes at IHOP, followed by an ad for a creepy motion-capture Disney version of “A Christmas Carol”. WTF?

I gave up hope, long ago, that the Christmas advertising blitz could be held off until Thanksgiving. But Halloween afternoon? My kids were just starting to get their costumes on, and you want to peddle eggnog pancakes?

Needless to say, I launched into a rant of the things that I believe in. A lot of it fell under the category of “When I was a kid”, and my daughters responded with the predictable “Dad, you are SO old school!” comments. Whatever…I’m used to it. Anyways, in no particular order: 

• School shouldn’t start until after Labor Day (and I mean nationally)
• Regular-season football shouldn’t start until the weekend after Labor Day (greedy NFL)
• Christmas decorations should stay “in the back” until after Halloween (Thanksgiving centerpieces need respect, too)
• Ditto for Christmas-themed TV ads (umm…can’t remember any Thanksgiving-specific ads)
• Keep the Valentine’s Day cards off the shelves until after New Year’s Day (do I really need to buy these while I’m returning gifts?)

Anything that I’m missing?

RMW

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Well, it’s only been a month since my last post…that’s better than two months, isn’t it?  Since I’ve been talking about the Big-E in a couple of posts, I figured I give a breakdown of what I’m actually doing here.

The model itself

This is actually a slightly modified rerelease of the original Polar Lights kit; the whole Polar Lights/Round2 mess is a tale best left to the interwebs. I actually have two of the original kits, as I royally screwed up a major assembly on the first one. Luckily, a kind soul on the HobbyTalk message boards sold me his spare kit, still in the shrink wrap, for 40 bucks. As eBay prices for these little buggers have gone as high as 250 bucks, I counted myself VERY lucky.

Brass photo-etch details

This kit is designed to add extra detail to the stock kit. You can get much finer detail with a brass photo-etch part than you can with injection-molded styrene. You need a very sharp Xacto knife and a very delicate touch to get some of these pieces off the frame, or sprue.

Replacement parts and enhancements

While one of the, if not the, best Enterprise kit, there are some pieces that are woefully inaccurate. Scroll down until you see the PL Refit Detail Parts. I’ll be working those into the build. Scroll up a little, and you ‘ll see the Travel Pods, Work Bees & Cargo Containers. These pieces are used to detail out the shuttle/cargo bay on the main model…and most modelers consider it to be a model in itself!

The lights

I got the DIY kit, in order to save a little cash. I had no idea the undertaking this was going to be! It looks as if I’m going to be drilling holes all through the model, in addition to LOTS of soldering resistors to LEDs. I might look in to some wire-wrapping tools to make this a little easier.

I’ve also got a ton of paints, brushes, tools, and model railroading supplies (?). Oh yeah, an airbrush and a home-made painting booth to capture and exhaust the paint fumes. But more on that later!

RMW

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My last post was July 19th? Oi, I have to do better than that. It’s been a busy summer, what with my classes and regular summer-type activities. No excuse, however!

The family and I took a trip to Arkansas over the summer, to see some extended family. It was our first road-tripsince moving back to Michigan, and we all did pretty well. I loath road-trip vacations as a general rule, but this one wasn’t so bad…sort of. The trip there and back was weather and traffic free, and we got to see a ton of sights. We stopped at the junction of the Ohio and Mississippi, where Lewis and Clark began their push into the West. You could feel the history.

We spent a day or so on the Spring River, picnicing and swimming. My oldest daughter got caught in the rapids, so I got to find out how good of a swimmer I still was (pretty good, actually). She ended up a mile downstream, in some shallows, and pretty darn scared. I got her calmed down, and we slowly made our way back to the beach. Somewhere along the way I lost my wedding band, which when she found out, sent her into tears. We explained to her that it was just an object, easily replaceable, and the important thing was that she was OK. Other than that episode, it was good times and good eats with family.

I wrestled with a stubborn server for the better part of August. We’ve had problems with this particular piece of hardware since it was deployed; three others exactly like it run fine. We asked the vendor to replace it at least twice, and as a result of the latest issue, it just might happen. Long story short, I was installing some routine hardware updates the the server decided that it didn’t like. I got tech support on the phone, and after several hours of troubleshooting, I was advised that I needed to physcially move some internal components around.

Now, I live about an hour away from this particular server, it was about 7am, and I’d already been up since 6am the day before. Nevertheless, I drove on in, and performed the swap as requested. This resolved the initial issue, but caused a cascade effect that brought down the application running on that server. I called the app’s tech support line, and spent the next 12 hours online with them. We FINALLY resolved the cascade problem, only to have it reoccur two days later. Several more support sessions brought us back to the hardware as being the culprit, in particular a intermittent network connection. The pieces involved have been replaced, and the server has been solid for almost a month. We’re still lobbying for a a total swap-out; the previous issues, as well as this latest round of fun, have left us with little confidence in it.

The kids went back this last Tuesday, and I’m looking at the final week of my current class. For those playing the home game, that leaves 4 classes left! I’ll try and find the pictures from Arkansas, as well as update my progress on the Big E, very soon!

RMW

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When I announced to my lovely wife that I wanted to start a blog, I was greeted with a moment of silence, followed by the statement above. I told her it would be a way to reconnect and keep in touch with family and friends. I mentioned that writing about myself and my interests and experiences would be an excellent way to overcome the “writers block” that I always seems to get while doing my college work. Finally, and almost lamely, I mentioned that a lot of my co-workers had one. Needless to say, that reasoning scored extremely low on the WAF scale.

Now, those of you that know my wife know she is a sweet and gentle soul. You also know that I’m a pretty big kid at heart. And if you didn’t know these things, now you do. Needless to say, these two attitudes conflict with each other at times. More than once has she had to put up with a crazy scheme of mine. In her mind, I’m sure that this was one of those. Anyway, I cast around for something to to inspire me, and then it hit me. “I’ll blog about my Big-E Refit”, I told her.

Now, I’m a sci-fi geek in general, but I’ve always had a soft spot for Star Trek. My grandpa and I used to watch the reruns every Saturday night on Channel 50 in Detroit, and if you came into the living room making noise during the show, you were in BIG trouble. I’m just able to remember them, but I recall those times as good ones. Anyway, a couple of years ago, a company called Polar Lights released a model of the Enterprise as it looked in the first couple of movies. BTW, this was supposedly the same ship from the TV series, updated and refurbished, hence the term refit. The model clocked in at almost 3 feet long, and was extremely detailed. I was sorely tempted, but it would have taken months to properly build and paint the thing. In the end I chickened out, Polar Lights went under, and the remaining kits became highly sought-after and expensive items on eBay.

I was looking for a hobby to fill in the blanks during the long, cold Michigan winters, and started to look at building a model of a F-16, the airframe I worked on in the USAF. While slumming at the local hobby store, I ran across a Polar Lights Enterprise Refit, still in the shrink rap…and at the original selling price. I paused, blinked, and ran for the register with the thing in my hands. I was gonna do this, and I was going to go completely type A in building it. Reality is still setting in over my decision; it’s not just a big task, it’s gonna be HUGE! But through the magic of the Internet, we’ll build it together.

RMW

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