Category: modeling

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A trip to Mandai in Takasaki, May 2026

This is the building with Gunma Leisure Land game center and Mandai Shoten in Takasaki. We went down to Takasaki last Saturday. Mandai doesn’t open until 10, so I spent some time at the game center where I played some shmups like Senjin Aleste, which I wrote about in an earlier post. Then later I checked out Mandai.

Plenty of Macross model kits, old and new.

The Nautilus double set from Nadia. I have the regular submarine Nautilus, but not the nu-Nautilus starship.

The flag of Zeon was hanging overhead. Nice touch.

Several of these kits are pictured in the last post I made about going to Mandai.

I didn’t notice these Eggplane Girl resin kits the last time I was here.

The high prices of Saturn games (and all retro games in general) is sad. I really need to sell a bunch of games now hat Ulan is getting braces. It’ll be a tough decision to make which ones I want to keep. I really can’t play any retro games anymore since my new TV has no S-Video inputs. I’d have to see if I have the regular composite inputs, but it looks like ass on a high-def TV. Rats.

There’s a new Neo Geo console coming out that features HDMI output. Neat stuff, but I won’t be buying one. I also found a boxed Sakura Taisen Dreamcast. I bought mine when I first lived in Japan, in December 2000, IIRC. Unfortunately, the plastic has yellowed and the pretty pink color has been ruined. Rats.

Oh yes, and when I was at the game center in the basement level, I got to play Cotton: Rock with You for the first time. You can play as Izuna, the unemployed ninja! I played those two games like crazy on the DS. Her shots are shuriken, and you can slash your sword for up-close damage and to swat enemy bullets away.

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My modeling workbench setup at the in-laws’ place

My home away from home, we’ve had our own room at the in-laws’ place in Nagano Prefecture ever since Mayu’s grandfather passed away. Years ago, I commandeered an unused table and set it up as a modeling workbench in front of the TV. The blue zaisu (floor chair) is partially busted. I’ve had it ever since our apartment when we lived in Himeji. I have some tools and supplies I keep there. I’d posted earlier about Japanese modeling setups, so here is my secondary modeling workbench.

This neat holder for glue bottles and paint brushes was 3D printed. SMKR gave it to me as a gift several years ago, and it is perfect for this little modeling setup.

Tamiya’s enamel, acrylic, and lacquer thinners, toothpicks, ceramic paint trays, plus a bottle of Mr. Base White 1000.

I keep a bunch of modeling crap in the drawer. Sandpaper, tweezers, scissors, paint trays, etc. My nippers here are from a Taiwanese company and I got them when I worked for Aoshima 10 years ago.

I keep a Tamiya work apron here too.

I bought a cheap region-free DVD player on YAJ and it’s there for the TV whenever I want to use it. The TV doesn’t have the best hi-def resolution, but I’m not gonna complain. It actually has S-Video inputs in case I ever want to hook up a retro console to it. The last time we stayed here, I had my hacked SFC Mini console hooked up to the TV. Usually I have either my laptop or Raspberry Pi set up on this table.

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Update on my old Bandai/Imai Macross Glaug kit

It was a quiet weekend at home, and on Sunday while I was following the events of yet another attempted presidential assassination by the “tolerant left,” I finally got around to resuming work on my old 1:100 Glaug kit I started working on last summer at the in-laws’ place while on vacation. I sort of lost track of this build for several months. I’m pretty good at starting new kits and losing track of them.

I’m inserting Wave’s ball joints to add better articulation for the shoulders and the hips. While this kit does have plastic-on-plastic swivel joints, Adding ball joints should improve mobility and allow the legs to be splayed for more natural poses. I’ve sanded down the dome-shaped protrusions and intend to replace them with Wave H-Eyes lenses. I’ve also taken a mold of the mono-eye. I plan to cut out that plastic, attach the mold, and backfill it from the inside with clear UV resin. I did this with the old Bandai/Imai Q-Rau kit.

I thought that I’d buy some more of these Wave ball joint sets, but when I looked online I saw that several of them are sold out! I can still get the BJ-05 set, and I ordered a couple from Yodobashi Camera. But I couldn’t find the BJ-04 and some other sets anywhere!

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Nearly finished with my Bubblegum Crisis Priss sofubi figure!

I’m excited about this! I bought this Priss sofubi kit soon after I moved to Japan. I posted unboxing photos of this kit on my Tumblr account 11 years ago. I didn’t pay much for it at the time, but since then the price for sofubi kits have increased considerably. I began working on this kit a year ago and I like how it is turning out.

 I’ve painted her entirely with sofubi paints. mostly V-Color but also I’ve used the new, water-based Mr. Hobby Sofubi Color for the metallic black parts. The metallic blue color of her hardsuit is a mixture of silver, clear blue, and a bit of regular blue V-Color paints. It looks so beautiful.

I finished painting her eyes last week, using acrylic paints. (She has red eyes in the anime, so this isn’t a case of my color-blindness causing me to make a mistake). I added a bit of white to the red paint to one side of her irises to give them two tones, then painted the black pupils, and finally the light spots.

Unlike other sofubi kits I’ve made, this one is made to be semi-poseable. Her arms pop into sockets and her legs can swivel at the thighs. Her heads can pop in and out, and I’ve employed magnets to make this easier. Her regular face is sculpted with her neck together, but her helmet has the head and neck as separate pieces. I have magnets in there to make her head movable.

I’ve since done a panel line wash using Turner Acryl Gouache black paint with Mr. Hobby Weathering Paint Gouache Solvent. All that’s left is the final assembly at this point.

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Update on my 30 Minutes Sisters customized Luluce build

Over a year ago, I posted about how I bought Luluce with Option Body Parts A03 (color C) and some optional hair styles. I had some leftover skin color from a Shantae garage kit I built a few years ago to give her a darker, sexier skintone (in my opinion), so I used this and did some shading with burnt umber Faber Castell and artist’s chalk for her breasts and butt. I was lucky to find a set of the official 30MS eye waterslide decals, which I don’t see often. Her hair color is Mr. Color Lascivus Aura CL103 Black Hair with Tamiya Panel Line Accent Color Black for shading. I sealed these with a flat coat. The rest of the parts are the original plastic. Her “assault rifle” is made by a company called Yamada, which I bought at a Seria 100 yen shop.

I want to work on her underboobs a bit more, because the shading I did is a bit too dark. I’ll pop that piece off and see what I can do.

I bought this bikini-like body parts set when I was nerd shopping with my friend Lou in March. I haven’t been able to find the bare legs and arms sets at any hobby stores, so I will probably buy a set on Yahoo Auctions Japan.

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Mini 3D-printed Minmay from Macross complete

My friend Gary sent me this small, 3D-printed Minmay figure a few years ago. I’ve slowly worked on it since then. The UN Spacy logo is from a set of Macross decals I bought on eBay years back, some of which I’d used on my 1:100 Imai Armored Valk I finished earlier this year. The pattern on her dress is from leftover decals from a Haku Rinpha resin kit from Hasegawa Eggplane Girls series.

She is VERY small, so zooming in with my camera like this is exposing the flaws I cannot see with my naked eyes. Her eyes turned out better than I thought they would. The sides where her torso joins her waist does not fit together like I’d hoped it would, but it fits very well in the back.

As for the Buck Rogers Starfighter visible in these pictures, my friend Blake had sent me this. He asked if I wanted one and I asked if he could print one in roughly a 1:144 scale version to make it essentially like a Bandai Mecha Collection-sized kit. I scanned the decals from the Monogram kit and shrunk them down to size to fit this small kit.