Jedi Starfighter: Revell easykit

Introduction

Let me tell you about an impulse purchase that I made this week.  I found a trader on eBay that was disposing of large numbers of the same old kit.  I can speculate that these may have come from a distributor that has gone bust or a shop that is selling off excess stock.  However, that's just a guess; I don't really know how these models came on to the market.

Anyway, I bought a couple of the Jedi Starfighter kits at £3.75 each (including postage!).  Now the problem I have is what to do with them!

Options

Actually, I have seen this kit before and therefore I know that it makes a very nice, small sci-fi flyer which is pretty much perfectly scaled for 28mm gaming figures.  I know this because my younger son went through an intense Star Wars phase some years ago and built pretty much all of the relevant "easykit pocket" kits from Revell.  They're not to a constant scale (nothing like!), but all of the models in the range are about the same finished size, somewhere around 10-15cm long.

So, I've borrowed my son's rather dilapidated Jedi Starfighter and posed various figures alongside it to try to inspire a colour scheme and back story.

Spectrum "Angel Interceptor"

My first idea is that I could paint the 2 new starfighters white and give them Spectrum (Captain Scarlet) markings.  They would then make good alternatives for the iconic Angel Interceptor craft and I could use them in games of 7TV or the like.

I'd prefer a "real" Angel Interceptor, but I'm pretty sure that nobody makes a model that is even close to 28mm (though there is a paper model available somewhere on the Internet, I think).  Mind you, even if such a model could be found, it would probably be quite large for a games table!

If any purists gag at the idea of calling this an Angel Interceptor then I could call it something else.  After all, Spectrum had quite a range of aircraft in their fleet; this could easily be some previously-unseen jet.  Perhaps it's an "Angel Scout" or something like that?

Viridian Flitter

Alternatively, I could give the models a green/gray splinter camouflage to blend in with my sci-fi Viridian army (or paint them cream/black for my Syntha faction instead).  If I did that then they would be some type of reconnaissance or light ground-attack craft.  Sadly, I cannot see that they'd ever be used in a game since I don't really use any of my VOID armies and cannot see this changing in the future.  Still, they'd be nice to collect.

Star Trek mini-Shuttle

My final idea is that the starfighters could be painted up pale grey (for Federation) or dark grey, green or blue (for Klingons) and used as single-crew shuttles or fighters.  This doesn't completely fit in with the Star Trek universe; such tiny craft don't appear very much in the canonical version(s).  However, there are enough occurrences in spin-off works to justify pretty much anything.  In any case, it's my universe and I can do what I like, so there!

Conclusion

Have you ever bought something without having a need for it, either immediately or in the future?  Just because you liked it and thought that it might come in handy some time?  I'm pretty sure that most people do this at least occasionally!

I don't really know what to do with these kits.  I could even paint them up as non-airworthy sci-fi objectives, perhaps  being maintained and with inspection panels open.  Alternatively there must be many other ways that I could integrate them with one of my existing collections of figures.  I suppose that I could even start collecting 28mm Star Wars figures to go with the starfighters - but that'll not happen; it's a crazy idea!  Ah, what shall I do?

The Spectrum Angels

Introduction

Not so long ago (here), I unveiled my undercoated "daredevil sisters".  These are 28mm models from Crooked Dice and it should be obvious to anyone who cares that these are closely based on the Angels from the old Captain Scarlet TV series.  In that show, they were mostly the pilots for the Spectrum organisation's fleet of air vehicles, especially for the Interceptor fighter aircraft.  Spectrum's field agents (such as the eponymous Captain Scarlet) were the people who were more directly involved in confrontations with the bad guys  Occasionally the Angels had to play this role as well...

Individual Angels

In the TV show, there were 5 Angels.  However I ended up with 6 models (due to forgetting that I had bought a pack of 3 models and later buying another, duplicate pack).  Since I didn't want to leave any model unpainted, I had to come up with a 6th Angel in my world.  Aficionados of Captain Scarlet will be able to tell immediately which is the non-canon Angel, of course - but I've tried to keep my 6th Angel in character with the rest.  Mind you, I did consider briefly using that model as an evil counterpart, in much the same way as Captain Black is an enemy of the Spectrum agents!

Painting white uniforms is hard.  In my view, it's all about the colour of the shading; this can change the character of the model completely!  My research into the Angels suggested that in many of the pictures their uniforms had a slight cream tint to them.  That might just have been a trick of the light, but I took that idea and went with it.  I've used a couple of shades of tan when painting the undercuts and seams, but the upper parts are still pure white.  Please let me know what you think...

Without further ado, here are my 6 Spectrum Angels:

All Together Now...

Finally, a group shot.  This shows quite clearly that I painted the bases in 3 different styles (2 models in each style).  I think that the concrete bases (the last 2 models on the right) are a bit dark, but otherwise the bases are quite straightforward.

Conclusion

I knew that I wanted these models as soon as I saw them on the Crooked Dice website.  Due to my purchasing mistake, I ended up with 6 of them rather than 3 - ah, well.  But now that I've finished painting them, I've no idea what I'll use them for!  The obvious answer would be to use them in a game of 7TV, but I fear that poor Captain Black would be considerably outnumbered by my Spectrum personnel if I include all my agents and all my Angels!

White Out!

Introduction

I'm going to be doing 2 things in this post that are somewhat unusual, for me.

• Firstly, I don't normally show pictures of models that aren't finished.  It would be all too easy to fill the Internet with images of my started-but-on-hold model mountain.  However if I did that regularly then I would lose all credibility as someone who can actually complete anything.
• Next, I normally undercoat models in grey.  I've tried black before and it's really difficult to lay down pale colours on top of this.  White undercoat, in my experience, doesn't coat too well.  Unless a model is to be predominantly black or white, I compromise and use grey.

Strangely, this week I've found myself undercoating a number of models in white, though..,

The Apparitions

I'm trying to collect some figures that I can use in games of Fear and Faith.  Last week, I posted details of Mystery Incorporated (better known as "the Scooby Doo gang") and I can probably come up with some suitably suspicious civilians to use as allies, bystanders and low-level enemies.  However, I wanted some monsters as well.

These spectre models come from Black Tree Design, though they only seem to be available in a regiment-sized pack.  I've had a large bag of them sitting in the lead pile for many years and now seemed like a good time to paint a few.  They'll be used as haunts in Fear and Faith - but in the best traditions of Scooby Doo they may turn out not to be real ghosts.  Instead, they could be just images projected onto clouds of smoke by the demented janitor.  Or maybe not!

I plan to paint these spectres to be as pale and ethereal as possible.  This might be a challenge, since they're quite solid models and I don't have any transparent paint.  Still, I'll give it a go...

The Angels

It came as quite a surprise to me recently to discover that I had not one but two packs of the Daredevil Sisters from Crooked Dice.  I don't normally forget a purchase so completely that I buy another copy of the same thing!

Now, as anyone with an interest in Marionation knows, the Daredevil sisters are based very closely on the Angels from the Captain Scarlet TV series (gosh, is it really almost 50 years?).  The Angels were the 5 female pilots of Spectrum's fleet of fighter and passenger aircraft; they were young, international and glamorous!  As with the other members of the organisation, they all had code names, in this case Destiny, Harmony, Rhapsody, Melody and Symphony.

Since the Angels wore white uniforms, I've decided to undercoat these models in white (well, obviously!).  I bought a separate pack of helmeted heads to customise them a bit, so at least I won't have 2 sets of 3 identical figures.

Actually, I went a bit further than this and also changed around the equipment the Angels were holding or wearing as well as their heads.  This gives me 6 models that are all unique, though it's easy enough to spot the duplicate bodies.

Of course, there were only 5 Angels in the Captain Scarlet show.  I've decided that in my universe there is another Angel who isn't quite as well known.  Perhaps she's been on leave, or on special assignment somewhere.  I'm thinking of naming her Serenity; I had to abandon the musical theme when the only name in that area which I could find was Cacophony!

So, there you are - some of the recent works from my "White" period!