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DeAgostini Millennium Falcon 1/1 scale, updated 11/8


cbk57

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32 minutes ago, cbk57 said:

Finally keep in mind there is no "official Mellinium Falcon" it is a composite of what we think it was and the various states it existed in movies from Prop, to Set to CGI.  


I guess that could be said about a lot of sci-fi hardware and vehicles.

 

Kev

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8 hours ago, Uncarina said:

Very well put, and an extremely impressive build! You are making me want to pull out my 1/72 Bandai kit!

 

Cheers,  Tom

I built it and it is a better and more detailed kit than this one.  It is very Tamiya like.  It is actually a snap together or press fit kit and 95% of it would stick together with no glue whatsoever.  I glued most of it but only a few pieces really need glue to hold them on.  The fit is near perfect, the detail is beyond belief and it is a finer crisper level of detail than this kit which is bigger.  

 

At the same time for the size and nature of the Deagostini kit it actually has fit together really well.

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Back to assembly of the disks.  These actually went together really well.  To reduce uniformity, I painted each panel individually.  There is nothing uniform about this big ship so I painted the base off white on each separate panel sort of in batches.  I would paint about 5 panels at a time.  First is a shot of the frame going together.  Each panel is later screw to the frame.

 

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I masked each individual colored panel once I had the basic assembly together.

 

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The gun port windows are aligned wrong in the kit.  I scribed both out and aligned them to the correct orientation.  Why the maker did not leave them as separate parts is a mystery to me since they were about the only parts affixed in place and predone.  Most of the color panels were not done by the manufacturer, a few were present but most were not.

 

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  • cbk57 changed the title to DeAgostini Millennium Falcon 1/1 scale, updated 9/19

Each build step comes with a magazine and a small plastic bag of parts.  It is okay, it can be built in this matter but it is not so great.  It is meant to spread out the cost of an expensive kit as you can buy it over a subscription.  It is also designed to create a kind of "excitement" so instead of a logical step by step you jump around in weird ways.  For example a issue might come with a small sprue of parts.  In one case there was a tiny circular part left on the sprue.  I don't even remember what magazine it was from.  Well that piece did not go on until the very last stage.  It was one of the last pieces that went on the model.  So you had to keep that tiny piece where you could find it until the model was completely done.  Here are a sample of the magazines.  As instructions go they are okay, however there are some inadequate bits.  They tend to give you a small bag of screws in each issue.  They could just give you one big bag of all the screws.  Then you are not dealing with dozens of tiny bags of six screws.  Also sometimes they just say use a screw to attach the part and it is not clear what kind.  There are at least 5 different kinds of screw in the kit.  

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Here is a shot of the recess ports for one of the Mandibles.  I weathered them with various shades of pigment, some rust tones, some soot, maybe some earth.

 

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1 hour ago, Uncarina said:

This is a feast for the eyes! I’ve been intrigued with the subscription concept, but this is the most detailed assessment I’ve come across.

 

Cheers,  Tom

I think it is better to buy a kit with a set of high quality well thought out directions like we expect from top kit manufacturers.  As a subscription kit it poses some unique challenges, nothing that can't be overcome.  But you have to have an expectation that you may have to dig back through the booklets until you find the booklet that covers the step you skipped.  I mostly built in order but some things just don't make sense.  For example I went through and built all of the side wall components and the side airlock hatches together.  The overall fit is actually quite good.  I did not find a lot of problem with parts not fitting or anything of that nature.  

 

I was working on weathering this morning as actually the model is built now.  I was comparing to the movie prop and rewatched the movie last night and the model is very multiple personality disorder.  Some aspects are more like the prop, some more like the movie.  For example I noticed this morning as I tried to apply streaking effects that some of the panel lines on the prop don't exist on this kit.  Also the satellite dish attachment on the prop is drastically different from what is in the kit and the movie.  

 

I am going for a more movie look as there are a buch of effects on the prop that don't show up in the movie.  For example on the sidewalls they used lot's of rust effects on the prop.  None of that shows up in the movie.  All the races are very dark like they are dirty and grungy but no orange tones at all.  

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  • cbk57 changed the title to DeAgostini Millennium Falcon 1/1 scale, updated 9/25

Here are some more updates.  I built up the various bay inserts.  I then added various pigments to give them some of the filth and weathering that seems apparent in the movie.  I also put together the cockpit cone, however it is just snapped in as I intend to add a couple figures still.  This is a insert painted up no weathering.

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  • cbk57 changed the title to DeAgostini Millennium Falcon 1/1 scale, updated 9/28

More update on the Big Falcon.  I continued with subassemblies and started working on some weathering, panel lining that sort of thing.  The first photo is showing the rear deck area as I finished all the small part assembly.

 

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This next series shows some not so well done Night Shift style chipping.  The idea was I was going to practice on these as the owner was going to wall mount it.  However, I think you will see that when I pull together washes pigments and oil staines they actually came out really nice.

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Again we are going to revisit these a bit later and I think you will see a huge improvement.

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  • cbk57 changed the title to DeAgostini Millennium Falcon 1/1 scale, updated 11/8

Here are some photos as it comes into final forms.  I have made some creative decisions as if you have to make a tough choice here.  If you are trying to replicate the studio scale prop, it has a lot of features that never show up in the movie.  For example along the sides there are extensive use of weathering materials that resemble rust effects.  Also the Satellite dish area looks totally different from what is replicated in the model.  Also the prop is fairly clean.  There is little panel lining, there are subtle streaking effects and some basic washes.  Now when you go back and watch Empire Strikes Back the look is totally different.  The falcon in the movie is just filthy.  The sides are just loaded with soot and very dark dirt effects.  Also in the movie scenes the set designers loved leaking hydraulic fluid.  You look at anything where there are hydraulics like the entry ramp and there is leaking fluid everywhere.  The thing is filthy in the movie.  

 

I in the end went more for the movie look.  I rewatched the movie and the rust effects don't seem to ever show up or make any sense.  When you see the movie prop it looks fire enough back that I think the movie close ups should influence the look more.  So here you go:

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