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title
Another one from the rebooted (and better) Battlestar Galactica from the early 21st century. The title ship, as a matter of fact, in 1/4105 scale, styrene, by Moebius Models. This was a fairly straight-forward build that went a little longer than expected, mostly because I tried a few new things, some that worked, some that didn't.
Construction is straight-forward and fairly simple. I ran into some fit issues with the hangar pods, mostly because of the photo-etched inserts that I installed. Not sure if I installed them correctly or not, but the pods didn't line up as I'd have liked, necessitating a lot of sanding between raised ribs. In future builds I'd simply not put in the pod interiors, as you can't see them anyway unless you're lighting the thing. Other than that, building was straight forward with a little filling and sanding needed here and there.

Paints Used

  • Badger Black Surface Primer
  • Vallejo Model Color "Dark Sea Green" overall coat
  • Vallejo Model Air "Barley Gray" for raised armor
  • Individual panels picked out with Vallejo Sky Grey and Tamiya Sky Grey (yes, they're different shades)
  • Vallejo Model Air "Fire Red" for stripes
  • Various MIG and AK washes and pastels
  • Highlights airbrushed and drybrushed using the base "Barley Gray" lightened with "Silver Gray"
 For extras and aftermarket, besides the aforementioned hangar interiors, I also used photo-etch "windows" from the same set for openings on the starboard hangar pod. I also purchased some gun turret bases from Aptivaboy on Shapeways (the same kind soul that helped me with the Valkyrie build). The bow antenna came from telescoping brass tubing. The shuttles in the hangar were picked up at JerseyFest a couple of years ago.
For painting I initially shot it an overall gray, and was going to use a set of decals that includes all of the armor panels and plating detail. Test applications looked dead to my eye however, so I scrapped that plan and painted individual panels differing shades of gray, both by hand brushing and masking. It was a surprisingly enjoyable process and the results are exactly what I was going for.
Not much else to report. I enjoyed the build, and learned a thing or two. I plan on building another Bucket someday for myself, so I can apply the lessons learned.

Completed January 2017. Model now resides in a private collection.

All in progress photos taken with my Samsung S6 Edge phone, final beauty shots done with my Canon 400D (Rebel Xti) and 50mm fixed lens, using external daylight-corrected CFL light sources. Post-processing done in Photoshop using a gray-card reference shot.

 

2016-06-29 21.12.34 2016-07-17 13.27.37 2016-07-23 17.09.39 2016-07-24 17.28.33
2016-07-25 20.53.28 2016-09-11 21.21.07 2016-10-23 16.23.58 2016-10-30 18.16.09
2016-11-01 21.02.53 2016-11-12 14.53.23 2016-12-04 18.30.32 2016-12-11 18.10.03
2016-12-11 21.11.21 2016-12-18 14.38.28 2016-12-18 18.58.30 2017-01-25 18.27.38
2017-01-25 18.30.27 2017-01-25 18.30.37 2017-01-25 18.30.44 2017-01-25 18.30.53
2017-01-25 18.31.00 2017-01-25 18.31.18 2017-01-25 18.31.51 2017-01-25 18.32.11
2017-01-25 18.32.20 2017-01-25 18.32.28 2017-01-25 18.32.41 2017-01-25 18.33.12
2017-01-25 18.33.17 2017-01-25 18.33.23    
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