Kitamaebune by catopower - Woody Joe - 1/72 scale

[Roger Pellett]

Claire,

 

Very nice work, and an interesting subject.  

 

What wood  are your models made from?  It certainly results in a crisp, clean appearance.

 

Roger

Edited November 11, 2021 by Roger Pellett

[Ekis]

9 hours ago, catopower said:

Ekis, the Higaki Kaisen kit is a more serious ship model kit. Woody Joe really designs their kits to be buildable by first time modelers. But, their Higaki Kaisen kit is more of a ship model kit for ship modelers, designed with the assistance of the former president of the ship model club the Rope Tokyo. Definitely more challenging a kit than the Kitamaebune kit, and supposedly even the Atakebune kit. I wrote a 3-part article in Seaways' Ships in Scale on it, so I'm interested to know what you think about the kit.

 

Yes, I think this Atakebune kit from WoodyJOE needs some improvements.

But these are modifications that are mostly aesthetic to suit our own western culture.
I think that Japanese people don't have the same approach as in the west for the reproduction of their boats in models.
The Higaki Kaisen kit shows it well, this new kit of the atakebune is even more accentuated with extreme simplifications to be built more easily.

In Japan, the model itself does not have to be the miniaturized version of all the details of the real version. The model must find its own aesthetics by keeping the concept of the boat for the essential, even if it means removing everything that could harm the original design. The model is the symbol of the historical boat, not the absolute reduction of the scale 1.
In the West, and I am speaking in particular for Europe, we try above all to give an image as close as possible to the real thing, even if we have to lose the general lines in a swarming of details and aging.

I do not judge what is better or not, but simply a difference. 😀

So for this Atakebune, I will have to find a balance between the Japanese aesthetic and my own criteria of reproduction and reduction of reality.
We'll see as we go along, but to start with, I think I'll try to reproduce the hull with pieces of strakes at the scale of possible boards from the trees, and not huge plywood plates out of scale for example.

[catopower]

Hello Ekis,

 

You bring up an interesting topic about aesthetics and accuracy between east and west. I'll have to think about it a bit.

 

But, one really big issue is that there is almost no historical information on the construction of these ships. Something as obvious as the construction of those hull "sheets" is not just simplified because it makes the kit easier. It's also done because nobody really knows how they made the large flat sides. Certainly, they weren't one solid sheet as you say. But, there's also a tendency for us to think that it was made up of strakes. Clearly, they would have to use smaller boards, but they would actually be quite wide, and may not run the way we might think they do. 

 

Details like this is one of the main reasons Woody Joe rejected the idea of producing an Atakebune kit in the first place.

 

The Higaki Kaisen is another matter, as these ships were around into the 20th century, and there was the recently built reproduction to pattern the kit after. But, even that has simplifications compared to the actual hull planks, which have been documented. Still, it shows 

 

I kind of run into this issue a lot on my models of Japanese watercraft. In my mind, it's better to simplify than to add details showing the world how much I don't know... 🙂

 

Perhaps that's part of the cultural aesthetic?

 

In any case, I'm interested to learn what you come up with. I actually had considered a hull planking modification for a while, based on drawings, paintings, and models of other Atakebune.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by catopower

[catopower]

16 hours ago, Roger Pellett said:

What wood  are your models made from?  It certainly results in a crisp, clean appearance.

 

Hi Roger, thanks for the comments.

 

Most of my models are made from a wood that the Japanese call Hinoki, it's Japanese cypress. It's a lightweight wood, kind of like basswood, but doesn't fuzz up when sanded. Over time, the color will turn to a nice tan color, but starts off very light, which is why I dye the wood. It is actually quite brittle when dry, but it doesn't take much to dampen the wood enough to make it bend. Closest wood in the States is Port Orford cedar, which I have used with some models.

 

For the 1/10 scale models, I use a wood called Sugi, which is Japanese cedar. It's the same wood that most boatbuilders use on their actual boats. It's not a great wood to work with, but I use it to maintain the Japanese model aesthetic (props to Ekis!).

[BobG]

11 minutes ago, catopower said:

which is why I dye the wood.

 

What kind of dyes do you use, Clare, and how do you do it?

[catopower]

Hi Bob,

 

I used Transtint brand dye I buy from Rockler. I just add a few drops to a small mixing jar, add denatured alcohol. Then, I just use a piece of cloth to wipe it onto the wood. You'll want to experiment with mixtures of color and your wiping technique to get consistent color. Since it's a dye, I apply it to all the parts before assembly, as it won't affect the glue joints. Sometimes, I take a thinned mixture and brush it on afterwards, but only if I was really careful with the glue not getting onto the finished surface of the wood.

 

I usually try to mix up a batch that will last me through a project, to make sure to avoid color variation.

[Ekis]

You are right, we have very little information about the atakebune, and I just don't want to lose the aesthetics of Woodyjoe's model which is fundamental for Japanese boats!

 

It's a real problem and I need to read up a bit on the maximum width of the possible strakes for the hull before starting it. Maybe looking at the Korean turtle boats which are more represented in the archives for their construction.

Once again, I don't want to lose the Japanese aesthetics by transforming it with inappropriate details...😁

[catopower]

Hi Ekis. I just looked up Japanese red cedar, which is very common in Japan and probably what was used to construct Atakebune. It's the type of wood that seems to have been used predominantly in wooden boat building in Japan.

 

It turns out that the trees can have trunks up to 4 meters wide, and I know that certain Edo period riverboats had hulls that were supposedly made from single planks that were close to 2 meters wide. I didn't know if I really believed this, but now I think it makes sense.

 

You will, of course, need to make your own decisions on things, but I think 2 meter wide boards would not be at all far fetched. 

 

As for Korean turtle boats, I wouldn't think there would be much connection there. Different shape, different construction style, different traditions.

 

Also, one last point to consider is that the Japanese typically use calking between planks on their smaller boats, only at the chines, if they used it at all. This makes seams between adjacent planks pretty hard to see. At 1/100 scale, it would be invisible.

 

In fact, when I think about it, I only use separate planks on models at 1/10 scale. Even at that scale, you can only tell that the planks are separate parts because the grain and figuring of the wood is slightly different between the two. Without that, you'd never know.

 

 

This is a really good and important topic, and I think I'm going to continue it on my Atakebune build log here.

Edited November 12, 2021 by catopower