Gundam RX-78-GP01/FB Diorama Lets make something huge

[Kolin86]

Hey everyone. I don't really go on the modeling side of stuff much, but this year I decided to make a diorama for a really impressive kit I picked up.


The box is freakin gigantic, so is the figure. I needed something that would really do it justice. I was inspired by FitchenFoo and a couple of really awesome drawings.

Namely this, and this:



So I started work. First up was the core fighter
.

And then I moved on to the rest of the suit.


The really nice thing about this scale is allot of the hard work has already been done for me. All of the hatches and armor are on joints and can open up, which will be how the end piece will be displayed. Also note the grid is in inches, freaking huge.




once all the inner frame was done the rest of the suit came together quickly. Eventually it was time to assemble the FB version and the gantry.



Now this would look impressive in itself, but I really wanted to go with something more. I ended up ordering 4 Wave kits for the hanger display and 2 1/72 scale kits for equipment and mechanics
.


Now thats starting to look better. But now that assemble was "done", its time to start stripping everything back to paint it all up.

I've started with the base and the equipment.

This is the base with preshading and after painting over to blend it out.

after giving the base a blackwash I needed to paint up the equipment.



They are turning out nicely, still need to add some extra details to them, but its still in progress.

So far I've primed my gantry and painted up the back end of the core fighter.



as well as assembling the additional figures that will go into the dio.

Now I've run into my first snag. I'm using a really really crappy 20 airbrush from amazon and a tiny box compressor. I'm gonna have to upgrade that asap before I really move on. But I should be able to do that this friday and by tuesday I should be up and running again. Sorry for the image dump but hopefully someone here likes it.

 

[shenphong]

always happy to see another gunpla build on here, looks fantastic.

 

[Aurora]

cant wait to see the paint job. All painted prefect grades look gorgeous

 

[Kolin86]

Lets hope so. Right now I'm using a pretty crappy master airbrush and the stupid box compressor it comes with. I get a half inch line at the narrowest and spotchy at that. Painting the white armor will be the last thing I do however as I'm gonna be scribbing some extra panel lines on it eventually. But lets see how the core fighter goes first before I start working myself up to anything major. Expect some more updates tomorrow either on figures or the core.

 

[Mike J.]

The equipment looks great!

 

[Kolin86]

Thank you Mike, the color is a tamiya dark yellow with a dark grey preshade. I don't think any of the preshading came through with the kit just cause of the airbrush woes I'm having. I'm buying a new compressor tomorrow from harbor freight.

 

[Kolin86]

So now the corefigher is just about done. Still need some touch ups and decals but I'm getting in the waterslides in today. Once I get them applied I'll go over it a final time and do some extra stuff to it. I also started painting up the left arm today and will probably be working on it until about wed or so just due to the amount of things I want to do to it. Will it ever be seen? No, sadly but because of that I have a great ground to practice on.

 

[Kolin86]

So Finally got in the decals yesterday and got the plane looking a bit more pretty. Still need lots of work to do, namely weathering the landing gear and access hatches around it and painting up the canopy. But, I'm moving forward with other parts of the project, namely the arm. It's painted and the armor is weathered, still need to do some more work on the frame and hand but I'm pretty happy with it overall.

 

[Kolin86]

Another update time. Progress has been chugging along steadily. Mostly done with the leg units now. Still need to wash and weather everything along with applying decals but they are coming along nicely. Before I consider the leg internals done I will be painting out the hydraulic piston covers red and yellow to help break up the overall look, even though none of it will really be seen. I'd rather get the practice in on areas no one will see than where they will.

Tonight I'm stripping down most of the kit to paint the internals on the waist and torso internals. Heres hoping that they go well.

 

[HaVoC373]

awesome! I've been getting into Gunpla as well lately, Though i'm current working on another project after i finish that i plan to start prepwork on a big gundam project of my own.

So far your painting of the kit is looking amazing can't wait to see the final piece!

 

[Kolin86]

Another progress update. Hopefully I'll have the chance to get some more done this weekend. Feet internals are painted along with cod and waist areas. Might torture myself this weekend and try and paint the individual pipes a brighter color to make them stand out and give some variety. It's on my to do list anyway.

In addition to this I started building out some more of the supplimental stuff for the base, including claws and item racks. These still need to be painted, but will add a nice touch to everything once it's done.

 

[chris_s]

Pretty much know nothing about Gundam but I know that looks flippin' awesome!

 

[Kolin86]

Thanks man, there's still so much work to do I barely know where to start. I need to get more primer, so so much more primer...

 

[Kolin86]

HAHAHA! Finally I had a weekend to myself to do some major painting!

Immediatly started up an assembly line of colors and what not. Made some good progress.


Got the feet done

Painted the second chest armor

painted nearly all of the remaining white
got the shield done

got the head done

started up on the weapons

This will be wrapping up in the next couple of months now that I've broken ground on it again. Very happy.

 

[Wes R]

I think this is one of the largest Gundam kits i've seen. Looking good so far.

 

[Kolin86]

Another busy week but I was able to get some done, even started up some decals!

Boosters for the Space type were amazingly detailed, couldn't let that go to waste, Still needs some clean up but I think you get the idea.


I got waterslide decals in, and man, they are super thin, if you look at them to hard they break which is slightly annoying.



This weekend I want to get most of the decals done, which will be a nice break on my airbrush and compressor.

 

[Kolin86]

Been trying to post multiple time but no luck. Lets try again.

Got lots more work done.



Figures are painted, finally. Uniforms are EFSF styled uniforms from the series.





Please forgive any mistakes on these guys as they are FREAKING TINY! Also pull out most of the kit and started weathering the lower half last night. Will decal tonight and I think for the most part the kit will be damn near complete.

 

[ubcs86]

Good god those figures are tiny! I used to love building gundam kits, mainly the 1/144. A buddy of mine brought me back an GM Sniper with the power pack from 08th MS Team and Chars Zaku II from Japan, can't remember the scale but they are pretty big as well. I used to have a LEGO gundam diorama, this project makes we want to resurrect that.
Any plans to add LEDs to the display?

 

[Kolin86]

Good god those figures are tiny! I used to love building gundam kits, mainly the 1/144. A buddy of mine brought me back an GM Sniper with the power pack from 08th MS Team and Chars Zaku II from Japan, can't remember the scale but they are pretty big as well. I used to have a LEGO gundam diorama, this project makes we want to resurrect that.
Any plans to add LEDs to the display?

If they were bigger they may have been 1/100 MG kits. Which are pretty much the standard as far as I'm concerned.

And yes, I'm adding in a couple of LED par cans the the diorama for some up lighting at some point. Mainly these: https://www.hlj.com/product/YLSPPC-K87/Sup

 

[ubcs86]

Pretty sure the are the 1/100 MG kits.

If you can find a model, I can print you out a bunch of those mini spotlights. $9 seems steep for a pair of them! You can get a jumbo pack of LED bulbs for cheap, then just put the LED bulbs in and wire up the whole set.