Jake, Author at build.

Review: Alliance Modelworks FAMO mit Flak 88 conversion

A few years back, I ordered the Alliance Modelworks FAMO mit Flak 88 conversion kit. It's been sitting on my workbench since then, calling my name so sweetly. Well, I finally listened and busted it out. This conversion kit takes the Tamiya FAMO (#35329) and the Dragon's 8.8cm Flak37 (#6287) and reworks with resin and photoetch. At $150 USD, it's a pricey kit for a big vehicle. I have mixed feelings about this kit. At first glance, the instructions are clear, the resin parts have crisp details, and the photoetch was nicely done. And the subject was an interesting one, so I was excited looking at the parts and instructions to get started. Like so many conversion kits, however, it's the details that matter. While the instructions are some of the best for conversion kits I've seen, they are still lacking in a number of ways, in a number of places. [...]

By Jake|2023-09-14T17:02:24-05:00September 3rd, 2016|Build Logs, Reviews|1 Comment

German surrender footage [VIDEO]

I’ve always been fascinated by the “rest of the story”. The battlefield tales are interesting, but learning how local residents survived or rebuilt after the battle is infinitely more interesting. I came across this footage of Germans surrendering at the end of the war. Fascinating look at how things can turn from brutal to something much different. There’s also a TON of diorama ideas here! [Watch the video] UPDATE: The moment I posted this link, I went back to the video. It had been playing and I noticed that the FAMO mit Flak vehicle was driving along in the video. Hilarious, considering finding pictures of this low production, end of the war vehicle has been incredible hard. And now here’s a color video! Nice!

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00September 2nd, 2016|Fun Finds|0 Comments

Amazing model railroad [VIDEO]

If you're not following Atlas Obscura, you should. It has some amazingly interesting content! This article caught my eye, and the video below is a great watch. An Up-Close and Personal Look at the World's Largest Model Railroad

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 30th, 2016|Fun Finds|0 Comments

Friday Fun Finds – August 25, 2016

Cool old school video about how Matchbox cars were designed and produced Impressive, recently released WWII allied photos Awesome, self-referential diorama Using sawdust for foliage Moson Model Show 2014 - diorama collection Impressive colourized WWII photos Overview of the lifecolor Guns & Weapons set (I'm a big fan) “Carrier” — Landing on a Pitching Deck Cool video series on painting a figure, especially around non-metallic gold Captured German armor dump photos The challenge of pricing pre-owned model kits

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 27th, 2016|Random thoughts|0 Comments

Rant: Lady modelers are just modelers

When my Boresight magazine arrives, I'm always excited to tear open the envelope and read. I usually get through at least half the magazine standing in the spot where I open my mail. When the Nov/Dec 2015 issue arrived, I was... Frustrated. Right there on the cover the top story was "Lady modeling comes to Bulgaria". "Lady modeling", you say? Is that some sort of special sub-genre that focuses on female figure painting? Is that a style of airbrush technique that a group of women have perfected? Is that a group name acronym...Lazy Articulated Dioramas of Yesteryear? Nope. Basically, it was an article that took a talented modeler, prioritized her gender, then said "LOOK! There's a female in this hobby after all!!". For those keeping score at home, this is flat out sexism and it make us all look like the mostly homogenous group we happen to be. And it's frustrating [...]

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 27th, 2016|Random thoughts|0 Comments

My portable build studio

In the last few months, I’ve been spending more and more time at my finance’s house. I don’t have a dedicated workspace there, so I’ve created a portable build kit that I’m pretty damn proud of. I thought I’d share! I started with what I believed was the bare minimum footprint of tools and materials to be able to build a kit out of the box... not paint, weather, convert, etc. I’ve added items that were missing or that I found myself really needing for regular usage. It’s surprised me how much I can also remove (or re-org, as you’ll see) as well. But I’m getting ahead of myself. I’ve discovered that whether in this portable build studio, or in my portable paint studio, the works starts in finding the right single transportation device for your necessary materials. Portability goes out the window if you’ve collected up a series of small [...]

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 20th, 2016|Modeling thoughts|0 Comments

Gorilla Glue Gel is Great

Holy mother of pearl, have I found something amazing. Gorilla Glue Gel. Have you tried it? No? Stop reading this and go order/buy/steal some of this stuff. It’s OK, I’ll wait. My go to CA (super) glue has always been the Zap-a-Gap line. Whether the green thin, yellow thick, or even the purple foam, I’ve used them all. But as I’ve been working on the building the Alliance Modelworks FAMO mit Flak 88 conversion, the Zap products just weren’t working on the resin they’d used. (NOTE: Check back here shortly, I’m going to post some thoughts on that conversion kit) A while back, I’d grabbed several various brands of super glues at Lowe’s and they’d been sitting on the shelf. Out of frustration with the Zap, I grabbed the Gorilla Glue gel and BAM! Magic. Here’s why: It worked. Whether resin to plastic, resin to resin, or resin to PE brass, [...]

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 19th, 2016|Modeling thoughts|0 Comments

Bob Bethea Interview

Austin's own, and my friend Bob Bethea is interviewed. Hopefully we see more of this - he's a wealth of knowledge!!

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00August 24th, 2015|Random thoughts|1 Comment

Friday Finds: June 19, 2015

Some of you readers may already have heard, but I've quit my job and have grand plans to take the summer off. Hopefully that means you'll be see a lot more building and blogging on this site. If you like what I post, leave a comment and/or drop me an email and let me know. I'm more inclined to post if I know people are reading! Dorothy Mckibbins interview - Manhattan project Tutorial on making a (rough) brick wall Beautiful diorama... this is the quantity of ruble you should see when a building collapses!

By Jake|2016-10-29T19:09:31-05:00June 19th, 2015|Fun Finds|0 Comments

Friday Finds: June 12, 2015

Incredible train bridge diorama Son finds lost D-Day footage in father's attic Good tutorial on using Vallejo's Still Water product (and a nice idea on building a cool diorama too) Some non-modeling nerdy fun Green leader - cool Star Wars comic

By Jake|2015-06-10T17:10:16-05:00June 12th, 2015|Fun Finds|0 Comments

sink

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