Finished my Poe's black X-Wing in 1/50 scale from Revell!

[mcusanelli]

So I finished my black X-Wing from Revell in 1/50 scale, and really enjoyed the build! It's a very nice kit, simple to build, and nicely detailed, except for the inner wing / engine detail and sparse cockpit. Also, you will need to provide a pilot if you want one. The deco on this pre-painted kit really sucks, very sloppy, so repainting it is a good idea. I would recommend the model to anyone, it's a decent price, size, and the finished product is worth the effort. Not Bandai of course, but nice none the less!
I started the build by adding some detail in the cockpit, behind the seat, using a chunk of the landing gear, and the front 'open' landing gear doors, as there was a little bit of raised detail, and is thick enough to cut up and do some 'gizmology' with, to make it busy, you can't see it well once the rear canopy glass is kinda thick. The main windscreen is crystal clear though, and you can see in the cockpit very well. Next up was a casting I made of the pilot I did for the smaller x-wing, fortunatly, he fit and looked to be the right size, so I didn't have to convert another one! I customized his helmet to look like Poe's- that really taxed my patience and eyesight ! The rest of the kit was built out of box, and the only thing I did was to restore the back edge of the nose 'beak', as it fades out- Revell cheaped out and molded the beak with the upper and lower fuselage halves, this was done using 'krazy paste' a mixture of baby powder and super glue, and sanded to shape. I hand brushed Apple barrel acrylic black, and Delta Ceramcoat orange on the insignia areas. It was lighter than the decorated parts, so when i rubbed some of it away, it gave it a nice worn look. The black was heavily weathered with Delta Charcoal - In hindsite, you cold paint the whole thing charcoal, and wash it with black - that would work nicely too. For the paint chips, I used a Prismacolor silver pencil - This was a blast! It works really well, and looks like real metal, much better than silver paint, which I have had no luck with. Finally, I airbrushed a coat of Microscale clear flat to seal everything and even out the colors. I'll probably coat the clear parts with Future to protect them, I've noticed that after a while if I dont, the dust takes it's toll on the clari ty. Hope you like it!

 

[Automaton]

Looks great! That Poe figure you added is fantastic - perfect fit. There are a couple of TFA Revell kits that are actually pretty alright from the looks of it. And I really need some Prismacolor pencils! the more I see of weathering using them, the more impressed I am with them.

Nice work

 

[mcusanelli]

Automaton,
Thank you very much! So far, i've only used the Prismacolor Silver, but i imagine they would all work very well. I can tell you i tried using pastels the other day, and they work great for weathering, and are really easy to use, so much so that I was shocked! They come out looking like you are a master with an airbrush, with far less effort.

 

[i am leaf]

Wow, amazing work. 10/10. I'm going to try a base of gunmetal / characoal and wash with black, as for the prismacolor pencil, excellent idea.

 

[mcusanelli]

Hey thanks Leaf! Your color scheme should look great. You might want to spray some flat over your paint job, it will give the silver pencil a nice 'tooth' to adhere to - Usually I spray Future gloss over everything before I weather, but it didn't work. And with the flat, if you don't like how the 'chipping looks you can wipe it off with a wet paper towel!

 

[i am leaf]

That's excellent advice, thank you kindly

 

[Galactican]

Fantastic build, MC! Mine arrived a few days ago. Got it for 17 € (special offer) and grabbed a Light & Sound TIE for 12, too. Both are about the same scale, so they should look good when displyed together. Agree about the paint ops... Lots of overspray, the inner edges are not covered. However, this is truly a minor issue (just repaint it and everything's fine). One gun snapped inside the packaging but that will be an easy fix. I'll ask Revell to send me the Light & Sound module from the Level 1 kit so that I can add that to the bigger bird.

 

[mcusanelli]

leaf - You're welcome sir!
Galactican - Thank you! I look forward to seeing your build! It really is a nice series, very enjoyable to build.

 

[blakeh1]

That figure looks perfect! I forget, I know you probably mentioned somewhere in the thread on the sound and light version, but was it sculpted from scratch or modified from an existing pilot?

Excellent job on the weathering as well

I was kind of amazed that what I thought was the smaller sound and play seems to have to have the same size cockpit. I guess there isn't really that much difference between 1/50 and 1/58, but the canopy/cockpit seemingly being nearly the same size while everything else is scaled smaller really does deform the look of the sound and light play version.

 

[mcusanelli]

leaf,
The pilot was modified from a 'small' looking 1/48 scale pilot, in this case, I believe he came from an Airfix Sea Harier. I used him because he looked correct for size in the cockpit. I chose him also because his face was exposed without an oxygen mask. I used 'krazy paste' to build up the details, as well as masking tape for the straps, solder wire and styrene for the chest box. But you could use epoxy putty such as Magic-Sculpt or Aves or Milliput to do this as well. Some other figures I would consider that 'look' right in this ship are the monogram P-47D, P-51B/C, or the old Mosquito (the one from the '60's that lets you build one of four versions) Visually they all look smaller than a lot of other pilot figures in 1/48 scale. Oh, sometimes I also use thick acrylic paint and a sharp pointed brush to build up small details, like i did with this Jedi Starfighter pilot.....Hope this helps!