by Ian Davies
Scale: 1/8
This model was built using a variety of multi media materials:
- The plastic kit itself
- Technical pens - various colours including silver, gold , white and black
- Spray paints
- Enamel paints
- Paper and card
- Silver and gold foil
- Lead pencil
I started by washing all the kit parts in washing up liquid to remove any residue. The astronaut figure and the backpack were assembled followed by applying model filler to the joins.
The base was sprayed gray and allowed to dry. Then silver on the famous quote part. The base was finished by using a black technical pen to highlight the words. I close silver and black as they closely resemble the colours used on the plaque on the lunar module leg.
More research was carried out to identify all the additions to be made to the kit to make it resemble an Apollo Astronaut, as the Revell kit, although very good only depicts the training version used on Earth.
Yahoo Space modelers was a very good resource and there were several others too.
The main improvements I identified were:
- Additional straps on the boots - paper and card used to replicate these.
- Velcro - represented on the suit by using cut pieces of a brown envelope and brown marker pen.
- The waist belt, from the front of the suit to the backpack - paper and card used.
- Various written marking and emblems on the suit - yahoo modellers have done an excellent sheet of markings. I used these on paper and were cut and attached with white glue. I put them on paper as they real markings seem to have been applied on top of the actual suits. I had decal paper ready in case this did not work out.
- Six hose connection points and not two. I used a circle template to mark our four additional points. In total four of them are blue (Top and Middle) the lower two are red.