By Loran
Today I’m going to do something a bit different and go for a build log. Recently my reviews have featured a lot of poorly-assembled and poorly-painted kits from my youth. That’s mostly because I haven’t been all that into Gunpla lately. Thankfully, the release of Unicorn episode 2 has gotten me to finally sink my teeth into my backlog, and now I’m taking on my Unicorn kits-ReZel Command and Unicorn Destroy Mode. For the time being, I’m focusing mainly on the ReZel, but I there’s some special background work I’ve been doing on Unicorn to make it awesome.
As you can see, I don’t have too much done on the ReZel so far, but you can see what I’m doing with a custom color scheme. Initially I planned on going with the stock colors, but I thought that because it’s an officer’s unit, I could give it an “ace pilot” color scheme. My first plan was to paint it in green and black, going for a Green Lantern Corps look, but I decided against it when the plain green I was using didn’t want to behave. I removed all of that and looked for a color I rarely use on kits, and there it was-Intermediate Blue-at least I think it is, it might be the stuff I used on my Rick Dom II kit. Whatever it is, I made a great choice here and it looks great against the base black of the kit, giving it a very “stealth ops” look.
For the head, I used my typical technique when dealing with translucent visors, but I was able to change it a bit here. Because there’s actually solid plastic behind the visor, I was able to paint that silver instead of the back of the visor itself. This makes it look more realistic and makes the visor pop out more.
I haven’t done much work outside of the torso but I have started on the waist. Note that it uses “stick joints” instead of ball joints, much like many other kits today. The front skirt doesn’t come pre-split, but a simple cut with a knife or pliers makes it easy enough to get it to work. Also, the crotch on this thing will always look silly. (What was Katoki thinking?)
For Unicorn, I’m much further behind, as I haven’t even started assembling it yet! And yes, I have kind of done the unthinkable and primed all of the translucent pink pieces. But I have a reason for that! After seeing a custom of the Full Armor Unicorn with the green skeleton, I wanted to try something similar; mostly because I feel translucent pink is a tad overdone in Gundam.
I had my friend photoshop me a series of alternate color schemes, and I asked a bunch of my friends which ones they thought looked best. Unsurprisingly, almost everyone voted for the blue one (also unsurprisingly, nobody voted for yellow…), which was perfect because I was leaning towards that myself.
There is one issue in dealing with translucent parts, however-unless they’re completely clear, or if you’re using a darker color, they can be harder to work with. So, I opted to prime the entire runner beforehand and run some tests on the color I plan on using.
I decided to mix my own color for this project. Since it was translucent originally, I felt that using a flat or even gloss color would just look boring. I took my jar of light blue paint that I accidentally spilled a few months ago and added a ton of silver to make it nice and shiny. The effect it leaves on the surface looks awesome, and while the shade doesn’t completely match the original image, it gets the job done. Oh, and for the record, these jars are some of the best for paint mixing-while they don’t hold as much as the Model Masters jars do, they don’t get stuck nearly as easily.
These two projects are still in their infant stages, but I can tell right now that they’re going to be fun. I have some neat plans in store for both kits, especially the Unicorn. If you want to try some similar stuff or are just interested in the kits themselves, we’ve got you covered-we have both versions of the ReZel (standard and commander) and both modes for Gundam Unicorn (Unicorn and Destroy modes).
Oh, and if you’re still wondering about that GM Cannon from a few months ago, he’s still in build limbo…
