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Saturday, June 8, 2013

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
Been meaning to build this for the longest time already and now I was finally able to. The Gundam Astray Red Frame of Lowe Gule from Gundam Seed Astray side story has been one of my most favorite Gundam designs. This kit was initially released in 2004 and is a 1/100 non-grade kit.

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
Bandai already released a 1/100 Master Grade kit of the Gundam Astray Red Frame, but this kit never grows old despite its age. Like the kits in its product line, this is well known for its articulation.
1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
Like what I've often preached in this site, I wish that Bandai would release more 1/100 scale non grade kits like this one. I mean master grades and high grades are nice, but the high grade is too small and the master grade is just too expensive. One other thing that the 1/100 non-grades have going for me is that they don't have an inner frame (like the master grades), which I don't really care for anyway.
1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
When I set out to build this, I wasn't planning to spend too much time on this. Meaning that I wanted to do as minimum painting as possible. Took me about 5 days to finish this while allotting only about an hour a day for this.
1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
The first thing I did was to assemble the kit. Afterwards I separated the key components (head, torso, arms and legs) from each other. After that I sprayed on a matte coat of Bosny Dull Laquer.


1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
When that dried I started to do some panel lining on the kit using my trusty 0.5mm mechanical pencil. You need a matte coat on your model kit before applying panel lines by means of a pencil because the rough surface afforded by the matte coat makes the lead stick on more easily to the surface.

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame

After I applied the panel lines by means of the pencil, I then proceeded to apply some post shading on the panel lines and edges by means of my wife's old eye shadow kit (that's makeup *snicker*) that she had given me. I would have preferred to matte coat the panel lines first prior to applying the black eye shadow, but since I was going for a speed build I decided to put them on together. Came out the way I wanted to. The eye shadow was applied by means of a soft round brush. Whenever I ran into problems with the eye shadow going where I didn't want it to go, I just used a rubber eraser to remove the offending mark and start all over again. I just realized that this was the first time for me to apply weathering on a mecha model kit.

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
For the Red Frame's Katana I applied some Reeves Acrylic tube paint to color the gold parts of the scabbard. For the hilt of the Katana I applied some Gundam Marker Phantom Grey. For the whites of the fingers I applied some Gundam Marker White. After painting was done I sealed the panel lines and post shading in by means of another coat of Bosny Dull Lacquer.
1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame
I kinda like this method of building a Gundam kit, because it means that I can save a ton of paint and worrying as to how to mix the paint. Kinda nice of Bandai to mold most of the parts of a Gundam kit to its assigned colors, because that is really what makes this method possible. I also like how this method saves me a ton of time yet still affords me a presentable looking finished product that looks painted. Well technically it still is painted despite only a matte coat being applied.


1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame

Really had fun with this build because of the ease of putting the kit together. Personally I think that this is a great kit, both for its price and the level of detail that Bandai put in (then again, they are already known for that).

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame

1/100 Gundam Astray Red Frame