About The Designs »

I acquired this new MG Rick Dias in a trade. I liked the design, but I wasn’t sure how I wanted to color it. I really didn’t know much about the Rick Dias before I saw Zeta Gundam. Even after that I needed more information to build this kit as it’s been a year or more since I saw the series. I went to MAHQ for more details and found the following:

Originally intended to be called the “Gundam γ” (“γ” being the Greek symbol “gamma”), the MSA-099 sported a more Zeonic look, so it was named “Rick Dias” instead (“Rick” is derived from “remake”, and was a term first used on the MS-09R Rick Dom to distinguish it as a space-use remake of the MS-09 Dom; “Dias” was the name of the discoverer of the Cape of Good Hope on Earth).
–MAHQ

Having read that I decided to base my decal designs on the “Gamma Gundam” idea. I also decided to keep a similar look to my Type 100 Afterburner as I thought it’d work well here. I also decided to make Jeep styled mods so enhance the look. Shiny metal parts.

About the Build »

The kit itself is pretty nice and goes together well. It’s rather big and bulky as well, but is still quite posable I found. Below is what I did to modify the kit:

• Scribed additional panel lines on forehead, chest, skirts, feet, hands, and elsewhere.
• Added 1.5mm MechaSkunk balls on rear skirt.
• Added small MechaSkunk screws to skirts and legs for detail.
• Added various 1mm MechaSkunk beads to detail the armor and simulate small vernier.
• Spun all thruster bells on my drill (used like a lathe) and sharpened the edges with a razor to create thinner looking walls.
• Painted bells with Alclad Polished Aluminum and then with Tamiya Clear Blue.
• Added details to all verniers in the way of additional bells, beads, and tubes.
• Detailed bazooka barrel using aluminum tubing.
• Replaced beam-gun barrels with aluminum tubes.
• All aluminum tubing polished to a shine using drill and steel wool.
• Custom Color Scheme
• Custom Decals designed by me.
• More!!!

About The Look »

Originally, I was going to do this kit in red instead of the blue-violet, but after playing around with my color scheme, the blue-violet just seemed to fit this kit very well. Plus I’d seen it done in red a few times and while it was nice, it was too “bright” for a kit of this size. I used these particular colors as well to give it a prototype/elite feeling.

I also took some influence from an EX-S I saw in a hobby magazine a while back. Those influences can be seen in the whites on the shoulders and the rings around the guns.

The various whites and grays are meant to give the piece more depth and visual interest than you’d get by painting it all one gray or all white.

I designed the decals in Flash and Illustrator. I sketched the “Miss Iota” decal first then scanned her in and traced/redrew her in Flash to make her nice and clean. You can see on a close-up of the decal in the gallery how the Alps printer did the purple. On that close-up it looks weird, but at a normal viewing distance (without the EXTREME CLOSEUP!) it looks great. Thanks to Peter at Models4You for the great print job.

About The Kit »

Okay… this is a HUGE kit. When I showed my wife the finished piece, I actually got a “holy crap” out of her as opposed to the usual “that’s nice”. LOL!

However with “huge” comes lots of sanding. I hate sanding. Honestly, I worked on this kit for 2 months and 6 weeks of that was cutting and sanding. Really! Granted that was maybe 1/2 hour a night on most nights, but you get the drift.

While doing this kit, I took a break to work on the SD GunTank just because I was getting burned out. At several points I had thought about giving up on it and putting it aside, but stuck with it. And After I got the whole thing together, I’m glad that I did. Now, all that time and energy feels worth it.

The EX-S comes in a PG sized box with hundreds of parts. Many of them are tiny to accommodate the transformation process. I will
not be transforming this kit as I fear scratching my paint and decals up.

The kit is nice though as far as seams. There’s only a hand full in the usual spots. Head, weapons, backpack, fuel tanks, wing binders, and the base.

Would I recommend this kit? While I was working on it I would have said “NO!” but now that it’s done and sitting on my shelf, I’ll have to say maybe. If you’re willing to put in the time, and I mean a lot of time, on this kit, then it’ll be worth it in the end.

05.10.04 » Concept
Work

For
my next project, I’ll be tackling the Master Grade EX-S Gundam.
It’s a rather large and “partsy” kit. I don’t think I’ll
be doing anything modification-wise to this piece. I may add some
LEDs, but other than that, it’ll be OOB. (out of box) Best case,
I light up every “green” spot on the kit. Worst case,
I do the head and booster lights. I counted 27 green parts which
would need lit if I went the “best case” route. Plus the
4 boosters. If I go that route I may look into skipping a battery
and going with an AC adapter. LOL!

Color placement-wise, I got inspiration for the white
on the shoulders and stripes on the booster pack guns from an EX-S
I saw in Model Graphics a while back. The rest of the color choices
are because I think they look cool. The color that I don’t feel
is coming off very well over the web is the blue/purple color. I’ll
be mixing that to be a very pale blue-violet with airbrush fades
of a lighter version of the same color. Kind of like I did for my
ReGZ. The reason for the blue-violet is to compliment the orange
and yellow accents on the rest of the kit.

Decal-wise, I was looking through a book on WW2 nose
art that a co-worker of mine had and decided to base my “Miss
Iota” decal idea off of some that I’d seen. It’s amazing the
varying quality of the nose arts. Some were crap while others were
simply amazing. The rest of the decalse are various text markings
and such. I drew my girl “simple” due to the limitations
of the ALPs printer. There is a screening to the purple and orange,
but it’s slight thanks to Peter and Models4U! Thanks man!

There’s no made-up back-story for this kit. I’m basically
doing it because this is the way I want it done.

06.23.04 » Painting… FINALLY!

I finally finished sanding and got to painting this
thing. It has so many parts that it took me longer than usual to
get started. Plus I took a week off to do the GunTank. Anyway, I
have 3 colors sprayed so far. Here’s some pics:

07.03.04 » Ink

The painting is almost done. All I have left is to
paint the lenses and that won’t be until I’m done with the decals.
That’s because I don’t want a flat coat of future over my lenses.

Currently, I’m inking all the parts. It’s taking forever,
just like EVERYTHING with this kit. I have decided that to save
time, I’m going to build what I can as I ink before decaling. The
reason for this departure from my norm is that it took 3 1.5 hour
airbrushing sessions to apply 1 coat of future to all the parts.
By building sub-assemblies, I’ll have less skewers to paint later.
Here’s some pics.

07.04.04 » Ink is complete!

I’m done with the inking. Next I’ll give the inked
parts another coat of Future to seal the ink from the waterslide
decals and also to give more gloss for applying the decals. Here’s
a few more pics:

07.06.04 » Decals

I started adding the decals today. Here’s a pic of
some of my progress. The other sides of the pods and shoulders are
decaled as well as other misc. parts.

Story »

“…The Men of Earth came to Mars.
They came because they were afraid or unafraid, because they were happy or unhappy, because they felt like Pilgrims or did not feel like Pilgrims. There was a reason for each man. They were leaving bad wives or bad towns; they were coming to find something or leave something or get something, to dig up something or bury something or leave something alone. They were coming with small dreams or large dreams or none at all…. it was not unusual that the first men were few. The numbers grew steadily in proportion to the census of Earth Men already on Mars. There was comfort in numbers. But the first Lonely Ones had to stand by themselves…”

–Ray Bradbury: The Martian Chronicles

ter·ra·form tr.v. ter·ra·formed, ter·ra·form·ing, ter·ra·forms

To transform (a landscape) on another planet into one having the characteristics of landscapes on Earth.

During the Sentinel Era of the Universal Century, let’s say 0086 or something (Whatever, I’m not that big of a fan boy.) Aneheim Electronics Advanced Research and Projects Group (AEARPG) led an independent study on the feasibility of placing a permanent colony on the martian surface. This colony would be the launching point for a terraformation project. To make Mars into another Earth could solve the problem of overpopulated space colonies in the Earth Sphere.

A special task force dubbed the Fourth Planet Terraformation Initiative was created to oversee the project. Phase one of the Independent Permanent Mars Colony and Terraformation Study (IPMCTS) would be to seal off large portions of the Valles Marineris Canyon system making the Canyon itself into a colony.

Having no support from the Earth Federation, AEARPG took it’s own security measures in the form of three mobile suit squadrons amid fears of terrorism from Zeon remnants and other military capable groups. These MS squadrons would patrol and scout the martian landscape and defend the project if necessary.

For the first year of the project, all was quiet. Work proceeded on schedule and the 29th Zeta Plus MS Squadron spent most of their time mapping the landscape and escorting shuttle and transport craft.

About the Kit »

This is the Master Grade Zeta Plus A1 Type. I gave it a custom color scheme designed as Martian camoflauge. I designed the decals in Adobe Illustrator and had them printed by “Scale Models 4U”. Since this mecha would be oporating on Mars, I gave it a dusty post shade to simulate Martian dust.

Overall, I really like the MG Zeta Plus kits. There are some issues that arrise when in Wave Rider mode, such as the back armor not meeting up with the chest armor, but other than that, it’s a great kit. It has several locking mechanisms which keep it from being floppy and they actually work pretty well. Well, as long as you don’t treat it like
a toy that is.

01.12.04 » Independent
Permanant Mars Colony and Terraformation Study

“…The Men of Earth came to Mars. They
came because they were afraid or unafraid, because they were happy
or unhappy, because they felt like Pilgrims or did not feel like
Pilgrims. There was a reason for each man. They were leaving bad
wives or bad towns; they were coming to find something or leave
something or get something, to dig up something or bury something
or leave something alone. They were coming with small dreams or
large dreams or none at all…. it was not unusual that the first
men were few. The numbers grew steadily in proportion to the census
of Earth Men already on Mars. There was comfort in numbers. But
the first Lonely Ones had to stand by themselves…”

–Ray Bradbury: The Martian Chronicles

ter·ra·form

tr.v. ter·ra·formed, ter·ra·form·ing,
ter·ra·forms

To transform (a landscape) on another planet into one having the
characteristics of landscapes on Earth.

During the Sentinel Era of the Universal Century,
let’s say 0086 or something (Whatever, I’m not that big of a fan
boy.) Aneheim Electronics Advanced Research and Projects Group (AEARPG)
led an independent study on the feasibility of placing a permanent
colony on the martian surface. This colony would be the launching
point for a terraformation project. To make Mars into another Earth
could solve the problem of overpopulated space colonies in the Earth
Sphere.

A special task force dubbed the Fourth Planet Terraformation
Initiative was created to oversee the project. Phase one of the
Independent Permanent Mars Colony and Terraformation Study (IPMCTS)
would be to seal off large portions of the Valles Marineris Canyon
system making the Canyon itself into a colony.

Having no support from the Earth Federation, AEARPG
took it’s own security measures in the form of three mobile suit
squadrons amid fears of terrorism from Zeon remnants and other military
capable groups. These MS squadrons would patrol and scout the martian
landscape and defend the project if necessary.

For the first year of the project, all was quiet.
Work proceeded on schedule and the 29th Zeta Plus MS Squadron spent
most of their time mapping the landscape and escorting shuttle and
transport craft.

01.12.04 » Concept Work

I’ve been very interested in Mars and especially the
exploration of since reading several sci-fi novels. The first is
a classic: The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury. The other three
Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson which
chronicle the colonization and eventual terraforming of Mars based
on the science of today. It was really an enjoyable series.

Because of this I decided to do a kit based on a martian
theme. The Master Grade Zeta Plus A1 Type seemed to suit this quite
well. It’s transformable nature made it a great choice for exploration/defense.

I’ll be giving the kit a martian style camo. Now you’re
thinking “why isn’t it all orange?”. Well, while Mars
does have an iron rich soil giving it an orange/red appearance,
the martian surface actually has a variety of warm colors. You can
see this in many of the satellite probe images from Mars.

I don’t think I’ll be doing any modifications to the
kit itself. Probably just a custom color scheme and custom decals
seen below »

01.21.04 » Head Modifications

Here are a few shots of my modifications to the head
to make it more like the A2 type Zeta Plus. I’m making this front
piece interchangeable with the standard so that I can display either.

01.28.04 » Head Modifications Complete
+ Painting

Here’s the final shots of the head modification. You
can see the build/prime/sand/prime/sand/ etc…

I have gotten pretty far with the painting. I have
the internals, light gray, gold, red-orange, beige and darker beige
painted. You can see where I have painted the red and gold first,
then masked them off for the grays and beiges.

01.30.04 » Camo Painting

Okay, I’m gonna go step-by-step on painting this camo
pattern. THis will help you do it yourself, but more importantly,
it will help me remember how to do it for a later
kit I’m planning.

Here is a top-view of the camo pattern that I quickly
threw together as a guide for where I need to mask. »

First, I masked and painted all of the parts with
the martian rust color I custom mixed.

Next I masked off everywhere that I needed to keep
the rust color. Afterwards I painted the areas where the brownish
purple rust color goes. Note that the image of the wing is the closest
to the “real-life” colors. The other pics were taken with
a flash and are over-saturated.

Tomorrow morning I will need to mask and paint the
gray-brown. Tomorrow evening I will mask and paint the reddish brown
which is the final color. The reason I’m waiting to long between
coats is to allow some time for the paint to cure. Also, I am not
removing the tape until all of the colors have been painted. Otherwise
I will have trouble remasking the previous areas.

01.31.04 » Camo Painting is Done

I finished the camo painting today. Here are the final
pics.

02.07.04 » Panel Lines

I am trying a new technique for my panel lines. Check
it out here on my tips page.

03.08.04 » Base

I started and almost finished the base for the mars
Z+ this weekend. The only things I have left to do is to give it
a flat coat and drill for the rods that will hold the waverider
up.

The base is another circular wooden plaque exactly
like those I used for the Griffon and PGM Cloud 09. I coated the
plaque with glue and baking soda and sanded it down to a rough surface
when it was dry. Then I primed it with flat black spray paint and
drybrushed many layers of reds and oranges. They don’t show up too
well in these pics due to the gloss, but will show up better when
I flat coat it.

The ejecta (rocks) are little bits of petrified wood
which I pummeled with a hammer. They’re attached to the base by
a coat of future. After the future dried, I dusted the whole thing
with a very transparent coat of the same orange I used on the Z+.

I’ll apply the flat coat when I flat coat all of the
other pieces after I’m done with the decals.

03.20.04 » Internals

The internals are all done on the FPTI Zeta. I painted
them a dark gray, then drybrushed them with silver Rub ‘n Buff,
then post-shaded them with a martian dust color. The “dust”
was made using the orange color from my camo mixed with a good bit
of Future to make it semi-transparent. The weathering looks nice
when combined with the brown ink panel lines.

03.22.04 » Final Update!

Everything’s all set and ready for the final build.
I’ll post photos up after I build the kit and attach it to the base.
Here’s a few shots of the dusted externals.

About the Build »

The GreenPlate Special is complete. This has to be my most bold, creative and best piece to date. It’s currently my favorite. At least until the next kit. Ha!

The ‘GPS’ is a basic build with seams sanded and puttied. Originally I had painted it in “stock” colors, but felt it could had looked better. I used three different greens on different panels and raised areas to give it more eye-appeal. White was used as a highlight color and yellow-orange was used for the lenses and insides of verniers.

The decals were custom designed by myself. I had been wanting to use a particular font for a while now (font diner sparkly) but hadn’t had a good enough reason/project to use it on. When I decided to go for a retro 50′s look on the decals, that font screamed out to me.

For an added effect, all of the decals were done in white. This makes them stand out against the darker greens.

I added little weird touches to the decals. Check out the “Tasty” decal on the ass-plate armor. The fuel tanks also have various  sayings on them. I have a weird sense of humor.

7.18.2003 » greenPlate
Special

Next up in my que is my MG Zeta Plus C1 Repaint. This
one will be known as the Green Plate Special. There is a font that
I have been wanting to use forever for some project. Nothing seemed
appropriate to use it for until now. The font is called “fontdiner.com
sparkly”. It’s a 50s retro kinda look. Very fun font.

Anyway, I made these decals a few months ago when
I made my Type 100 Afterburner decals. The seafoam blue-green color
scheme fits in with the retro look I was going for. This kit will
also involve the same tight masking that was used on the Type 100,
but without the flames.

7.18.2003 » strip search

This evening I stripped the kit of it’s old paint
job. The original kit was painted “box colors” and no
seam lines or puttying was done. Since I used Tamiya for all the
paints, I was able to strip the kit using 91% isopropyl rubbing
alcohol. It ate the Tamiya quicker than 409 and didn’t leave the
gummy residue that 409 always leaves me. Here’s a “before”
pic of the kit and a drying parts “after” picture.

7.19.2003 » color update

Made a few minor color changes based on some feedback
and the fact that I colorized this before the shiki, so some knowledgable,
evolutionary, wisdom, changes were made. See above for the new colors
compared to the old.

8.16.2003 » been a while…

Hmmm… not much of a progress page if I’m going to
show the concept, then the near finished kit and nothing inbetween.
I’m applying the decals now and should be done in a week or so.
Obviously, these parts will look much better once I put the flat
clear-coat on.

8.21.2003 » new and improved

I got a decent digital camera! Here’s an almost done,
clear, teaser pic.

About the Build »

The Afterburner is complete. I decided to do something
very different with my Master Grade Hyakushiki. Instead of doing
a “war machine” I decided to turn this kit into a pimpin
“street machine”. The premise being that collectors of
Mobile Suits give them custom paint schemes to show them off at
“Air Shows” of sorts.

This particular scheme required a ton of masking.
It also has a total of 11 colors. Yellow, Red, Orange, Blue, Dark
Grey, Medium Grey, Light Gray 1, Light Gray 2, Green, Black, and
White. Phew!

No modifications were done to this kit. I just puttied
and sanded the seams and started painting.

The decals were designed by me for this kit. They
were printed by Peter Savin at Models4You. He did a fantastic job
and you can see amazing little details in the text.

Check out the custom paint scheme image on the progress
page to see how close I got it. The only real difference is
that I painted both slots on the front skirts yellow, instead of
one blue and one yellow.

6.8.2003 » afterburner

So I decided on starting my MG Hyaku-shiki next. Last
night I stripped all of the chrome and now I’m deciding on a color
scheme. The decals are already done. This kit will be called “afterburner”.
Anyway, here are some initial color schemes and my Type 100 decals.
I’m almost definitaly going with the blue/gold-flame look. I wanted
to do a flashy, sporty, “muscle/ricer” car look with this
kit.

6.26.2003 » slow burn

This is taking a while. Lots of baby stuff to be done.
Here are a few progress images of my pre-coloring. These will be
for the flames. I’ll mask them off later when I apply another color.

6.28.2003 » gray on gray action

Here’s a shot of the backpack so far. It is 2 tones
of gray. I also finished all of the parts which require a massive
dose of these 2 gray colors.

7.12.2003 » big flamer

After a brief hiatus due to the birth of my daughter,
I’m back to the modeling. Here are some in progs for my flames.

7.12.2003 » i got the blues

More Progress today!

About the Build »

This was the second kit that I recieved for Christmas. Thanks Rachel! This kit took me almost a month to complete. I decided to stray from the “normal” color scheme for this kit. I’m glad that I did because I love the final results! Unfortunatly, this kit will never be transformed. Transforming it will scrape up my paint job and it’s just not worth it.

For those of you out there who are considering this kit, I highly recommend it. It’s a very challenging kit and has a ton of parts. The photos released by Bandai do not do this kit justice. They’re taken at an odd perspective and make the kit look out of proportion. The head could be a bit smaller, but it really doesn’t bother me.

Size wise, this kit is actually bigger than my MG FAZZ by about an inch.. It’s heavy too! The extra core fighter system is cool too. The dry transfers had a clear backing to them to make the really small text transfer easier. No more missing letters!

I love the legs. I have it standing on my shelf for now until I build a stand, but lemme tell you, this kit stands VERY well. Bandai did something different with the legs on this kit. There are no ball joints. Right above the knees, the leg swivels left-right. The hip joints are solid. Overall, the new additions to the legs make this kit very sturdy and give it the ability to stand in a wide-leg stance.

Anyway, this is a great kit. Check out the images and see for yourself.