Chrome

Today I decided to have a go at the sails, starting with the main sail. It was made through wetting three layers of rice paper with pva and then shaping that over an ice cream stick. After that it got painted.

Thank you guys! I'm enjoying this build a lot more than I thought I would and you have been a great help in making it so.

Since movement have been out of the question today I've tested my patience with trying to find blonde hairs on a bright wooden surface for a couple hours.

Today I went to the dollar store and bought something I never thought I'd buy for myself. A pack of faux hair. Decided that it would be better to use plastic and even coloured hair rather than my own for rigging and shrouds. So, the rest of the day went towards making the rig for making shrouds and now it should be fairly straightforward to make all of them. A test shroud to see how it works: I need to be a bit more careful, managed to glue two horizontal hairs together on the test piece, but now I know it looks more or less to scale. Enough for a good looking effect at least!

Thank you! I did opt for extra vibrant paints for this one, suspected that if i used paint that was less so it might wash out at this scale.

And after a bit of a hiatus where most of my spare time was gobbled up by this monster called "reality" I finally got some time to sit down and fiddle some more today. Fist I decided to add some more details to the decks, can't go without railings between the decks after all, the crew could hurt themselves. Then I got to painting, didn't take any progress pics though, the process proved to be fairly fast at this scale. I'm feeling quite proud of the icon at the stern, even though it doesn't look like much when the pictures are this blown up. Here are a couple other angles:

Oh, I will definitely paint it, and I think having at least the largest sails straight would make for a more interesting model. And also a chance to see if I'll be able to paint the emblems on the main sails.

I'm planning on doing sails but I'm not sure how yet, don't think I could find a cloth fine enough to pass as proper at that scale.

Thanks! Yeah, I think she's just about ready for a bit of paint now, there is just a wee bit of detailing I want to cram in there before trying.

Masts have been milled, bad words have been spoken, often and loudly, but in the end I believe I came out on top. They're a bit uneven now that I look at the photos, but they do say that the camera adds a few pounds and why shouldn't that apply to scale models, hmm? What do you guys think? Cheers! Tony

Love this little fella! Makes me want to go full on and try proper planking on my next model. Might need to have a lower scale then though.

This morning was spent making the decorative shields that go on the aft of the ship. They were made out of a 0.2mm aluminium sheet that used to be a soda can. I also started milling the masts out of bamboo toothpicks. Thanks for that tip, Igor! Never thought bamboo would be that resilient even at that scale, it's a dream to work with! Cheers! Oh, and thank you for the birthday wishes Patrick!

I have decided not to go with any carriage this time, but I was curious whether I was able to actually make one so small... Well, I think I did alright. But I seriously need to get myself a magnifying glass of some kind... And a camera that can give better details on pics like this one.

The thread I was using for the large cannons was already a 0.3mm one so I decided to go with the smallest workable thread I could find, 0.2mm copper thread from stripping a lamp cable. I decided to forfeit the carriage when going that far down in size though.

Beautiful stuff Igor! I definitely need to get myself some syringe needles, would make a lot of stuff easier. Sadly I had a problem with the cannons I made, they were roughly double the size of what I needed so it's back to the drawing board.

Today I made a cannon, pretty pleased with it but I do wonder if I might be able to give them wheels. Pin for size reference.

They are indeed made of metal, though it's a soft brass so I think I could drill them without them falling off if I'm careful enough.

Oh, I'm certainly enjoying it! And with this being the first build I've ever done in this scale or from scratch for that matter it's a whole new learning experience for me. It's safe to say that I'll be drawing a lot of inspiration and ideas from wherever I can find it. I'm not sure what type of thread to use for rigging, I've been contemplating straight up using hairs or strands from copper wire, but if you have any suggestions I'm all open for them! I do want to try to build the cannons, I have some 0.3 wire that I think might be just enough to simulate the body, and I think I could use the brass to make the carriage. Not sure if there's any point in making wheels though. And you're absolutely right about the scale! I seem to have slipped an extra zero in there, getting right on correcting that. Thank you guys! Tony

Just finished looking through some of your logs as well now. I'm in awe of both of you! There has been a slight build up of performance anxiety now, I'm not worthy.

Please do! Input is what I'm here for, and I've been peeping on your logs a bit, input from you would be highly valued!

This is absolutely amazing! I'm definitely going to pick up some inspiration from you, Igor!

So, I've been having a couple really small craft store bottles lying around the hobby area for quite some time not knowing what to do with them. The body of the bottles are roughly 25mm high and I bought the bottles on a whim because I found them adorable. A couple days ago I got an idea; why not make a ship in a bottle from one of them? I haven't gotten far on the build but I did manage to do a bunch before I realised I wanted to log it so there aren't many pictures on the prep work nor on the initial stages, but the hull is simply ice cream sticks held together by two tooth pick plugs. I made the rudder and the balcony by sanding a piece of wood and then dousing it in super glue to make it able to withstand the force of filing and cutting the pieces to shape. I tried fitting the tip od a needle as a front mast but I'm still not convinced it feels ok scale-wise. Today I gave her railings and some hull details made from brass etch sprues(or whatever it is actually called when it has nothing to do with injection moulding) that I had lying about. I might have to dye the wood if I'm going to keep working with brass, it definitely doesn't combine well on camera. Also, I've started contemplating not making it a bottled ship but instead just go crazy on details. I'm feeling a little torn there.

Thanks guys, needed some reassurance. I'll get right to experimenting!

I've gotten a hold of a ridiculous amount of cloth on a recent trip, it's thin and has a lovely grain that I think might look interesting when used as sail cloth. All good and great so far but the cloth is incredibly pearlescent and shiny on one side and unless I'm making some pixie fantasy airship in the future this will most definitely feel a bit out of place. Is this something that is easily remedied with a bit of paint or matt lacquer or will that upset the look of the cloth?