IJNfan

thanks for the kind comments everyone

These flyhawk kits look great. This one in particular shapes up really well.

So I have come here with a last update because the build is finished for me. Due to shortages in time I did often take pictures but forgot to upload them to the forum. however, we are done which means it is time for the post build reflection and some final pictures. reflection. Tamiya kits have been recommended to me as being great fits, immaculate engineering and also very friendly builds. I generally did find this all to be true but after building fujimi and trumpeter kits I had become used to have some wiggle room. This kit didn't which means I had to adapt. The quality of the plastic was great, it was clean, not much waste from the molding itself on the plastic was present, if any and the parts were decently detailed. However Tamiya's style of detailing has struck me as a little cartoonish/simplified at times. I think in general i prefer Hasegawa, Fujimi or trumpeters style. It is executed with less finesse but the overal atmosphere/style of the model appeals a little more to me. Not to say the Mikuma isn't a great kit, it is just not fully how I would like to see it, Aoshima's Atago is an example of something I would prefer instead with hindsight. The painting of this kit has been part new method, part old stuff. The base colors were Tamiya paint. For all their inaccuracies in color, their handling is unsurpassed for me and with some good old mixing I find i can get colors that appeal to me which in the is what i build for. The new part is the use of both washes and rust effects. This went wrong since I did not see that my new stuff was also enamel which smudged my whole weathering. This is something that I need to consider for my next build. Especially if I want to use the ColorCoats enamels I would need to use two clearcoats which in itself may give rise to other problems. All in all the end product isn't perfect. But sometimes I find it easier to except that flaws and make sure not to repeat them next time. I have applied post shading for the first time as which has given such a nice touch that with some more refinement this will definitely remain in work process. ven me enough lessons for my next build especially on the painting process but also the building process. Instead of using a build all and then paint all workflow I will adopt the modular way of working. Which may also help keep stuff a little bit more paced. With IJN builds the last step is painting the Chrysanthemum on the bow, (special picture included). As for the final results here are the usual pictures, I have tried using a better camera + tripod and a healthy dose of light to capture the ship. Note that on one of the turrets I had a very sad reaction between some rust powder on enamel wash that I had applied an hour before, It just stained out overnight and I have polished off a little bit of the stuff but was afraid I would damage the PE on the turret so I let it be as is. Now when reviewing the pictures I see more paintwork stuff, but I will let it be too. In general when working in modules I can focus on smaller sized pieces which hopefully will allow me to work with more refined detail and less errors. Since I have not updated for so long I will also put in the relevant pictures for the steps in between. The floatplanes when drying The Ship before the weathering and post shading When the weathering with new materials reacted with the washes underneath it After a thorough cleaning With one turret so smudged I needed to sand it and still it wouldn't completely come off, also because I was afraid to sand away the pain and postshading. End results And per tradition, the last imagine is also the last part I painted and added, the Golden Chrysanthemum. Stay safe, and till next time.

Ty Mike and Popeye. It has been a bit, it is still busy and I have not yet had the time to make pictures of everything but here is another small update. As always ME PE frets have a ton of unused stuff so I have been trying to figure out what has to go where. That process is slowly progressing. At the same time I have decided she will be depicted with the guns trained as if she were on the sea trials, this also means the paintwork is not gonna be too spoiled with weathering and some stairs along the sides will not be mounted. I will also place the lifeboats on te suppots on the deck and not mount them to the davits. I have made the wo catapults, worked on the planes, worked on the lifeboats, adding bits and pieces of pe, and reworking the one from my last post to remove redundant plastic, I added pe to the hull, added the davits to the hull, pre-bend a few stairs and made a plan for the paintwork. More pictures will follow tomorrow or friday. I am also on the lookout for a next model, I have 2 pontos models, bismarck and nagato, but ain't sure if I am already up to the job of doing that. originally I wanted to build Hiryu, but I can't find a wooden decksticker#sadness. i might as well decide to redo the paintjob on my Hamakaze IJNfan

It has been a long long while since I posted any update, university, thesis and all that came in the way. Apologies for the long time I didn't update. Now I am back in a position to do some small stuff with it. So here is a tiny update. In hindsight I should have painted the deck parts separate, thats a lesson noted for next time. Also I found some parts damaged or not the way i'd want to work rn so I took of some parts, hence the glue rests. I made the Secondary guns, not much pe there but anything counts. I made a first lifeboat I finished the turrets Hopefully the next update doesnt take me 4 months but 1 week or something. Thanks and stay safe IJNfan

here is another short update, I work slower than before partly to have more fun but mostly cause I have too much to do in too little time. Still I try do at least one page of the instruction manual each week. What have I done this week, Been busy with small stuff, - added a few doors and ladders to the base of the bridge - created the flying bridge structure between the bridge and funnel islands. Note that I corrected the slanted supports of the right one after reviewing the pictures. - started on 2 platforms with searchlights, due to tensions on the railing I decided to leave those 2 alone for at least a day before going on to prevent railings getting loose again. Hence the unfinished state - added 2 pieces of PE to the mast - started work on the turrets. Brass barrels not yet fully calibrated to be neatly lined up stay healthy, greetings IJNfan p.s. The pictures:

Hello everybody, It occured to me today that when I posted the Hiei there was a request for me to put my next build, then said to be IJN Mikuma, into a build log again. Honestly, I had forgotten about it and build logs take time and I was busy so I wasn't able to do it but since the build is going slow paced, I've looked into the topic and was reminded of the request so hereby I'll try and log the rest of my build. I have been building on the ship for a month or 2 - 3 now I think, and it is going rather well. A lot of the superstructure stands, together with some etchwork, railings, aa guns and masts. The pictures are shared below, what is to come is this - Repairs on one of the main masts where the support girders of the PE set got lost and denting out some railings that I saw on pictures were dented - finishing superstructures - making the gun turrets - putting small brass strips over the deck - paintjob - rigging got a few doubts too about the paintwork, whether I'll mount the superstructure on deck and then start the paintwork, or whether I'll paint the subassemblies first and then the deck/hull before mounting everything together. Maybe anyone got some tips on this. For the model I use the following - IJN Mikuma Light cruiser 1/350 Tamiya - Infini 13mm and 25mm twin aa guns - veteran IJN deck equipment - Eduard Mikuma PE sets - Uschi rigging - Tamiya XF paints and AK wheathering. - Aber main gun barrels (155mm triples) I'll include more pictures when I finish next steps to provide some extra detail. kind regards and stay safe

These Japanese Ships in general have graceful lines but the Kongo's being battlecruisers and having a short Pagoda are indeed very nice to look at, even in 1/700 it is "charming" in a certain way. Anyway, I have done some rigging (by no means a full rigging which is far too tedious for me in 1/700) and added the flag, finished the floatplanes, and added some decals there as well. Although this ship is by no means a masterpiece it has thought me a lot of useful tricks and methods to weather. I can also state that this will be the last ship in 1/700. 1/700 PE is something I am not build for, it can be done but with so much frustration that the point in pursuing this hobby would seem pointless. Anyway here are the pictures, my next build (without a log I think) will be the IJN Mikuma 1/350 from tamiya enhanced with the usual goodies. Here are three pictures, with that I am glad to pronounce this build finished (at last).

Thanks everybody, I have chosen for this weathering out of the conviction that IJN ships weren’t that well maintained during operations. Also some pictures of the ships dated from 45 show the state of the paint was generally awful. I won’t always do it like this but I do like it heavily weathered. But I do also agree that it is a bit on the heavy side, even though the pictures do give a magnifying effect to the wheathering. Anyway this ship was a test object. as for the rigging, I employ Uschi rigging, it is a difficult thing to glue it, you will have to learn use it but then it works fantastic. Later today or tomorrow I shall post a picture of the Hiei with some minor rigging, but for now this HMS Hood picture will show how it looks (youll need to zoom in) For 1/700 I use 0.01mm and for 1:350 0.03mm.

Hello fellow modelers, I have been working on this ship for quite a while and honestly I had been planning to have it long finished by now, but frustration, error and accident all threw wrenches into my schedule so I am as of yet not finished. And since it will require work to finish it up and seeing that I have very few free hours these months I thought it best to post and ask for a bit of advice. I have employed post-shading for the first time and enhanced it with some weathering Enamels from AK interactive, now honestly I feel it has potential but also it hasn't worked out, maybe some of you can give some pointers on how to improve the results? edit: the ship is not finished, decals varnish and rigging must be added and weathering and paintwork need touchups. I will address this in upcoming updates. EDIT2: Some people pointed out to me that I hadn't included any closeups, So I hereby upload some of these too. Here are the pictures

Its all perception, I think all these ropes on the prince willem are tiny. The Hood is 74+ cm. Sietze is nice, even on a Witte it can sound nice but its different. Anyway I have a Johannus vivaldi 350 and refularly rent a pipe organ for practice. Like bovenkerk kampen, lutherse kerk den haag and oude kerk delft. And I receive lessons from G. Budding in Gouda’s sint jan’s kerk. But I am straying a little off topic I am afraid🙃

Thanks Jan and everybody for the warm welcome! And yeah I already drew on some of the build logs for an earlier build! As for Bach, I like everything that is not modern and not ancient (from before 1650 roughly) 😇. Currently I am learning and playing Bach Chorals and Sonata's from Mendelssohn and Guilmant but also this particular dutch organ culture around church Hymns which I also play often. Combine that with typical dutch organs and you get a gorgeous result! And since I record everything I play I can always listen it back and enjoy it just like the models we build and enjoy when finished and displayed I Certainly will, my currentbuild is closing in on the finish so I'll post the final result and when the next build (1/350 Mikuma with a nic PE batch) commences I'll start a build log.

Hello everybody like the title said here’s another novice in modelling. Me and modeling do not have a very long history yet. I am resuming the hobby after a 4-5 years hiatus. My last kit was bought in 2015/2016 and never finished, I lost it as well somehow. Don’t ask my how one loses a revell 1/350 plarinum New Jersey because well, it happens. nevertheless the work I did on that kit was botched. I wasn’t ready and got annoyed. Before that I build several oob Airfix ships and a Revell Tirpitz. My fascination with model ships goes back even further though until around 12 years ago when I was 8 and used to admire a wooden model of a ship-of-the-line (I think it might have been a victory or something of that order) amazed, it was fully rigged and had all cannons etc etc. I however never ventured into wooden ships. Instead I bought some lindberg Iowa class ships that I put together. After that came a lot of airfix models and the tirpitz and then it stalled. however back in January this year I had time to spare, so I went to the hobbyshop in the neighboring city and got myself a set of Revell paints and a 1/700 model. My interests for ships are fairly narrow, no wood, no civilians and no scratchbuilding. I lack the patience and skill for wood and scratching and the interest for civilian ships. One of the fun parts of modellijg warships is that nearly every ship has a backstory long story short, Covid put my organ playing lessons on a temporary hiatus while the study was fully digitalized. So I invested in an airbrush and a bunch of models. I have learned that I like 1/350 most of all scales, while 1/700 is enjoyable it doesn’t have the “wow-factor” of the larger 1/350 models. I solely use tamiya paints as they airbrush easily and drt very quickely! Currently I have two goals that I am working towards, 1. I want to build the Nagato 1/350 with the Pontos set 2. Maybe At some point I might want to build the Soleil Royal from Heller but that would be a steep curve without doing some other heller sail ships, whether I have the patience would be a large question-mark anyway. How do people cope with these massive building times stretching ng out over multiple years? Mine never stretch longer than 2-3 months until now. Anyway, these past months I have been refining my skills and my last ship was the HMS Hood in 1/350 with flyhawk, eduard, infini and north star pe. More builds are definitely ahead cause I am in this hobby to stay and I like to share my work, bw it good or not, with likeminded people who enjoy the same hobby cause there is nobody in my circle of friends and family who I share the hobby with, which is sad, but alas I speak several words English and this forum is amazing, (the amount of expertise, help, techniques, tricks and skills that can be found here is astounding). And thus here I am. And since I love the IJN ships for their appearance ever since I saw a picture of the Kongo class somewhere, I shall henceforth be named IJNfan🤪 greetings from Holland Gerco ps. Here is my latest creation