Re: Bandai 1/72 Millennium Falcon
In other words , ‘ How accurate is accurate - and what’s the criteria for it ‘ ? .
I've been comparing museum photos, like
these, to
screen grabs from ANH. There are also period publicity and commercial photos, like the
MPC box, that give a good indication where the damage is original. If ever in doubt, ask the question here and you're likely to get the answer from one of the great Falcon experts here (I'm not one of them).
In general, remember that the 5-footer was a working prop used in making the OT until the spring of 1983. It was heavily modified after ANH for TESB, but most of the changes seem limited to the lower hull. From 1983 to the 1990s it was mostly stored in the Lucasfilm archives before going on museum tours from the 1990s on. Whatever damage occurred post-ANH likely happened at ILM while it was being modified, used, and stored between projects.
So how accurate is accurate? Well, that's part of the fun and obsession of modeling. If I can see a detail in museum photos, and I can pick it out on a screen grab or in a publicity photo, then I'll absolutely add it. If the evidence is inconclusive, I'll ask here for second opinions (like I asked about the cockpit "blob" decal earlier in this thread). Thanks to modelers like JoeCS and nkg I've only recently learned plenty of new things about the 5-footer's original cockpit. I'm always learning new things. Eventually, however, unless you have a time machine or the 5-footer model sitting in front of you, it's impossible to be 100% accurate. Every modeler faces the "it's good enough" moment and you have to walk away. Paraphrasing the famous quote about films, models are never finished, they're abandoned. For the Bandai, my personal benchmark is the
MPC box lid. I want my finished (or abandoned) model to look as close to the photo on that box as possible. That's the model I wanted when I was 11-years-old. To me, that's as accurate as I need to get with this model.
