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Model Art |
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Model Art Model Magazine No. 694 - December 2005 |
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Reviewed By Jack Kennedy, #12511 |
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MSRP: ¥1000 JPY Ok, so they say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so this book is worth a million. This is the Dec, 2005 issue of Model Art from Japan. It has a ton of great photos; however, the text is almost 100% Japanese. My Japanese isn’t what it should be considering I have been building kits from Japan for a zillion years. On to the book itself, this issue has a theme of Honda F-1 cars. This really hit a nerve with me because I have seen almost all of the Honda powered Formula One cars race since the beginning in 1964. Reviewed in the book are the first F-1 cars from 1964 and 1965 up to the Honda powered BAR (British American Racing) car of 2005 and many in between. Honda got out of racing in the 70’s and 80’s, but came back in the 90’s. The photos of the kits in the book are very sharp and clear and would be a big help to anyone that wanted to build one of these beauties. The down side is the lack of translation to English. I couldn’t even find out who manufactured these fine models. I know that they were in 1/20 scale but other than that, nothing. I have models of most of the cars pictured in 1/43 scale so the photos will come in handy when I decide to build them. Also included in this book are detailed photos of a D.H. Vampire T.55. The photos are of a real aircraft and also for modifications to the kit. In the ship area of the book is an article on U.S. heavy cruisers showing detailed drawings and camouflage. Also reviewed is the 1/350 Russian Cruiser Varyag, from 1904, with some of the best color photos ever. These may be used as a guide for those wishing to build this beautiful ship. In the new kit review section is a review of the Dragon 1/35 late variant of the German Tiger 1 with the zimmeritt already applied. The review gives instructions on how to get the tracks to sag properly on the road wheels. Fortunately, the photos do justice to this advice so no translation is really needed. While on the subject of armor, the new Italeri 1/35 Italian Autoblinda armored car is reviewed. The color photos show an intricate camouflage that can be reproduced, if one is careful with the airbrush. Some detail shots are also included in this review. We now move to the aircraft reviews. The first is the 1/32 Tamiya F-16C “Thunderbirds”. I’m sure that anyone wishing to build an F-16 in this scale will welcome this variant. If I built in 1/32, I know that this is one I would want to build. I have taken a million photos of the “Thunderbird” aircraft. Again the color photos of the kit and of some of the building tips are excellent. The next aircraft reviewed is the 1/48 Mono Chrome kit of the Fw-200C-4 Condor. Now this is a really big bird. I don’t think that the company bringing this kit into the US will be Mono Chrome. I couldn’t guess what label it would have. The Condor is shown in a built up from with no detail instructions. It is in a very nice diorama setting with trucks, jeeps and figures all around it. The only fault I could find is that the aircraft is too clean. I would have opted for weathering it. In the book is a section of new products, paints, accessories and decals. Especially nice was the decal section that showed what is on the decal sheet and that takes a lot of guesswork out of the equation. There was even an article on using Metalizer paints. I couldn’t understand a thing but it looked terrific. Overall I found the models shown in the book to be of the highest quality. Other than being too clean, I could find any faults at all. They were photographed beautifully on very nice, expensive, glossy paper. The book abounds with a ton of advertising with photos of every kit. Again, if my Japanese were better, I would be able to order from the book and probably get the kits cheaper. Is this a good book? Yes! I understand that it may be purchased for about $16 US from Hobby Link Japan. I would like to thank Model Art for supplying this book and John Noack for allowing me to review it. |
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