The Zaku II, The Completion!!!

Yes, at last I have completed my SD Zaku II model, and with which I am utterly satisfied with the outcome of, well, pretty much the whole thing. At first I was a bit doubtful about how the colours would work together, and also, with this one having a lot more complications with the backpack and a few other parts.

Part 1
Part 2

Part 3 (This post XD)

(Above) After initially looking at the sample, I tried my best to get the same colour as shown, but then the blue turned out to look a little too bright for the build itself.

(Above) Cried while looking and doing this as the part just looks horrible after all that thinner and having to crave out the very, very thin lines in which I would have to panel line later.

Well after much sanding and repainting and asking about what the best colour combination would be, I had finally got the right colour to make the back pack look at the very least acceptable to me. But some people might find it absolutely horrible.

(Above) It looks something like that, not too bad, but hopefully I will not make such mistakes again.

It has been a while since I have built SD models before, so long in fact that I forget how much of a joy building one can be. Although they are not full sized models, just having a smaller bite sized I would like to call them, models do give you about the same amount of satisfaction the normal HG or even MG models can. This is however an older model, and the parts do lack the articulation and detail of the newer SD models. Some of the newer ones have leg parts with 2 articulation points, and given the size of the SD model, that is pretty cool. This model is some what one of the much newer SD kits which have a fully movable arm and hand articulation, which although is quite a challenge to paint, since you have to paint the parts which are on the inside and then glue them together and then paint that part as well. Reading through some of the Gunpla Hobby Magazines, I realised that they make those parts removable, like joints which can be removed from the arm and shoulder to be painted and then fitted back in to look seamless. Well, on to the finished model!

(Above) As you can see in the pictures above you, I have put quite a large amount of decals for an SD model in my opinion. It is my first time using water slide decals and I find them quite a joy to put on the model. They are however extremely delicate and can tear very easily. But thankfully none of the decals I had put on tore and gave me any trouble. The gold detailing was something I considered completely skipping since I'm not at all planning to open up the top piece and allow people to see them, but looking back at the samples they were some I just had to add to the model.The tubes on the face of the model and around the waist was also quite a challenge to complete. The tube were originally light green if you have read the previous post, and apparently the easiest method of having the grey sections done were to fully paint the entire thing Medium Grey and then apply the grey inside. After that all that's left is a little cleaning up. The reason why that method was most easy, was mainly because how very easy it was to remove the grey paint which overflowed out by simply lightly sanding them out and then touching them up with model Medium Grey. A Top coat was applied to the model, and to my surprise, the top coat also smooths out the brush strokes which I have tried so hard to make as hard to see as possible. 

The colour mixtures used :

The eye : Tamiya Enamel Paint Red (1 part)

               Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat White (4 parts)

The light brown on the majority of the parts : Tamiya Enamel Paint Medium Grey

The brown on the body areas : Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat Brown (3 parts)

                                               Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat Green (1 part)

                                               Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat Black (1 part)

                                               Tamiya Enamel Paint Medium Grey (2 parts)

                                               Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat White (5 parts)

The black on the feet and the chest armour : Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat Black (3 parts)

                                                                   Tamiya Enamel Paint Medium Grey (1 part)

                                                                   Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat White (1 part)

The back pack : Tamiya Enamel Paint Medium Grey (2 parts)

                          Tamiya Enamel Paint Desert Yellow (3 part)

                          Tamiya Enamel Paint Flat White (1 part)

The joints and inner parts : Tamiya Enamel Paint Dark Grey

(Above) The top coat used, I highly recommend this, but when applying it on the model, apply a very thin layer by spraying from about 30 centimeters away from the model.

And as usual, no stickers were used in the making of this model! Hahaha, and to you reader, have a nice day~

Farid