Videolamer Search Project Redux: Importing the Site

Task: Cleanup Wordpress installation
Estimated Pomodoros: 1
Actual Pomodoros: 1


When the import process completed, Wordpress reported that some content was not retrieved.  I decided that I would try to obtain and add these files manually.  While I was add it, I figured I could do some additional housekeeping within Wordpress.  For instance, I could delete the video and audio files that were imported.  I could also reset the passwords on all the user accounts (in case I needed to access them).

I only managed to complete the second of these three tasks.  I gave up on password management after realizing that there were 40 different accounts on the site (and after I realized that with the admin account, I could do whatever I needed to).  I gave up on adding the missing content after realizing that all images in VL articles are referenced by upload date.  If I added them myself, they'd all be dated for today.  Sure, I could then go to the affected posts and update the links, but I decided instead that a dozen broken images wasn't going to be a dealbreaker. In retrospect, one could argue that this goes against my promise to be patient, but my decision was based not on the amount of time it would take, but on the fact that it felt kludgy and inaccurate to patch them back in.

This task ended up being a waste of time in the long run. Not enough usefulness for the time spent.
 
Task: Create new MySQL Column
Estimated Pomodoros: 1
Actual Pomodoros: 1

This was another worthless task. The VL site uses a PHP function to display a small excerpt of each article on the home page.  I really need a similar excerpt to display on my site, so I thought I would create a new database column that contains a close approximation.  Not a bad idea in theory, and I actually got it to work, but I forgot that the actual article contents contain HTML tags.  This meant that my excerpts would look very funny when displayed as text.  I know there are ways I could strip out the HTML, but I'm not sure if it is worth it.

This task was especially useless considering that before I began it, I thought that I could simply process the excerpt on the fly via Javascript or something.  Why I decided to do work this task, then, is beyond me.  I think I shouldn't have drank that beer while working.  Or maybe I simply need to take a break and come back later.

Videolamer Search Project Redux: Importing the Site

Task: Import Videolamer.com content into local Wordpress installation
Estimated Pomodoros:1
Actual Pomodoros:1

Pre Task Thoughts

I'm estimating this at one pomodoro.  If memory serves me, the importation process isn't hard, so I'm taking my chances and assuming all will go well.

The reason for this task is simple - I want VL's content in a MySQL database, and I don't have shell access to the VL server.  The only way to get to the DB is for me to duplicate it, and the easiest way to do that is to create a local Wordpress install (which I've done) and import the entire site into it.

Post Task Thoughts

The import was quick and easy, but the importation process took well over one pomodoro to complete.  I'm going to make a judgement and not count that import time against the pomodoro.

Task: Create personal reminder README files
Estimated Pomodoros: < 1
Actual Pomodoros:< 1

This task involves an idea I just came up with today.  I often install a piece of software, experiment with it, and then abandon it for months at a time.  When I come back to it, I don't always know exactly what I did, and what tweaks I might have made.  In order to remind me, I'm going to add files into each folder (named CMWREADME) which will contain notes on what I've done so far.

For example, in the MAMP folder, the CMWREADME explains what changes have been made to the default configuration files, as well as what's in the htdocs folder.  Then, in my working folder for this project, there's another CMWREADME which explains the purpose of some of the folders I created, the state of the Wordpress installation, etc.  I'm hoping that if I keep these files up to date, they will help me get back up to speed after a hiatus of any length.

I worked on this task while the site importation was running, and it rounded out the time for most of the pomodoro.  I still had some leftover, however, and I used it to cleanup and reorganize my development folder.

Videolamer Search Project Redux: Install Wordpress

Task: Install a local copy of Wordpress
Estimated Pomodoros: 1
Actual Pomodoros: 2

Pre-Goal Thoughts
Wordpress claims to have a five minute installation process.  While I don't think it takes that little amount of time, it is pretty damn fast, if memory serves.

Last time I tried this,  I used a MAMP instance for installation.  I still have MAMP, but I might just try using the local version of Apache provided by OS X, along with the MySQL server I compiled from source a few months back.  Or maybe use the MySQL instance in MAMP, and the local Apache?

Post-Goal Thoughts
I decided to use MAMP, as I remembered that Wordpress requires PHP.  I still ended up wasting time during my first Pomodoro.  Let me count the ways....

1. First, I tried using the client program from my source installation of MySQL to connect to MAMP's instance. 
2. Then decided I'd just delete my source install (I didn't like where I had originally installed it, I guess?).  
3. I fiddled with the ports that MAMP uses for Apache and MySQL, before reverting them back to their original states.  
4. Once I began the wordpress install in earnest, I started using PHPMyAdmin to create the database and user it required.  Then I decided to ditch that and find a way to use the command line client.

Once I finally got MAMP's command line MySQL client working, I started making real progress. By the end of the first Pomodoro, I had the DB and user set up.

The second Pomodoro began with me trying to create a virtual host in Apache to point to my wordpress folder. I like keeping all of my programming related material in a specific folder, as it makes it easier to keep track of everything.  A nice virtual host pointing to wordpress would eliminate the need to copy files into MAMP's htdocs folder.  All in all, this task took up too much time, and failed to work.  I didn't go looking into the cause, as I decided it would be easier for the time being to create a symlink in htdocs that pointed to Wordpress.  I'll add a note somewhere to remind myself to clean that out when I'm done (if I'm going to use MAMP, I'd like to keep it as clean as possible, so I don't come back another day and wonder what the hell all these files are, and what I did to the configuration.

My only other small hiccup had to do with database privs.  I typed them in wrong, so Wordpress couldn't install.  With a simple fix, I had it up and running just before the end of the first Pomodoro.

Lessons Learned
This goal took me twice as long as I expected. I may have to adjust my estimation of future goals accordingly.  This may be difficult, since these tasks have less and less concrete steps that I can identify (and far more potential hurdles).

Videolamer Serach Project Redux: Exporting Data

Task: Export data from Videolamer.com
Estimated Pomodoros: less than 1
Actual Pomodoros: less than 1

I already exported the data last time, and I do know where it is, but I said I was starting this project from scratch, and I meant it. Besides, there seems to be one or two new articles posted to the site since then. Might as well grab them.

Thanks for Wordpress, this process is very easy.  Data exportation results in a custom XML script which can be imported into another Wordpress installation with little to no pain.

Videolamer Search Project Redux

A little over a year ago (has it really been over a year?), I tried my hand at a personal coding project. I wanted to index all of the Videolamer archives into an Apache Solr instance, to allow for full text searching on all of the content. I got pretty far, far enough to get a basic webpage up. Unfortunately, the work stopped cold one day.

This happens to me all the time, and I'm getting tired of it. Just once I'd like to finish something I start, so I'm picking this project back up again, from scratch. I'm going to do things differently this time, to see if it makes a difference.

1. I'm going to break up the work using the Pomodoro system. This will entail breaking the work upon into subtasks, as well as making time estimates.
2. I'm going to try and document the process from the very start.
3. I'm not going to be impatient. If there is one problem which I know has undone me in the past, it is sloppy results due to a lack of patience.

Here is my initial breakdown on the major tasks for this project (these will be broken down over into subtasks):

• Export the data from the VL site.
• Install a local Wordpress instance.
• Import VL data into local Wordpress instance.
• Cleanup VL articles.  This is something I learned from the last attempt - the formatting used in each article is not consistent.  This will be detrimental when it comes to indexing the articles in Solr.  I need to make sure they all have proper HTML markup, as well as making sure their intro paragraph has some sort of "intro" id that I can use for returning the opening paragraph in search results.
• Index local SQL database (containing all the articles) into Solr.
• Test article search using the Solr interface.  Tweak if necessary.
• Prepare the website.  I will once again try and just use ajax-solr for this part.  If it doesn't work well enough, I'll consider switching over to a Rails app.

PS - This post took approx. less than 1 Pomodoro to write.

iTunes 11 - Deleting Podcasts

Overall, I might be one of the few people who doesn't hate iTunes 11. It took me a minute to "get" the way the interace was organized, at which point I found it a much cleaner way of juggling all the different media types iTunes can handle.

Today I found my first major gripe.  I stumbled upon a podcast named Ruby5, which is (aptly) about Ruby programming.  I gave it two minutes before I realized that it wasn't what I expected, and I immediately unsubscribed.

It worked, but not really.  After unsubscribing, iTunes continued to show the show among my list of podcasts.  I'm not sure about you, but when I unsubscribe from something - be it email, a magazine, or a podcast - it means I don't want to see it any more.  So why does iTunes keep it around?  In case I want to subscribe again later? If that is the case, I won't forget how to do it. I know Apple likes to tell its users what they should want, but now they're telling me I can't even trust my memory and/or motor skills.

Why won't you go away????!!!!?

I spent 20 minutes trying to figure out how to do an actual delete.  Here's how:

• In the top-center of the above image, you can see that the "Podcasts" view is selected.  We need to switch to the "List" view instead.
• In the List view. your podcasts will be like a file system.  Each Podcast show will be represented as a collapsable folder, and each episode appears below it.  From here, you can click on the show and get a delete option.

Sayonara ...

Not too hard when you know where to look, but in this case, knowing where to look is easier said than done.

Vim on OS X

Being Unix derived, it isn't a shock that OS X has the vim text editor pre installed. Nor is it surprising that this installation of vim is pre-built with a variety of features, including syntax highlighting for a variety of programming languages.

What is absolutely baffling, however, is that syntax highlighting appears to be disabled by default.  I say "appears" because I don't remember if it was once working on my system at any point.  What I do know is that earlier this afternoon, everything appeared monochrome in vim, yet the output of ls /usr/share/vim/vim73/syntax/ looks like this:

Look at all those colors. And that's not even all of them.

The solution is to either edit the system wide vim configuration file, or make a local copy of the file (and then edit it).  The file in question is /usr/share/vim/vimrc. If you want to make a local copy, copy it into your home directory, and rename it to .vimrc. Whichever choice you make, edit the file and add the following line:

syntax on

And that should do it!

Gunpla Chronicles 2: Conclusion

Here it is folks - the RX 78-2, completed.

Here's a closeup of the midsection.  The photo bit blurrier than I would have liked, but I'm a terrible photographer, and the Galaxy Nexus' camera is hardly a winner. Regardless, I think the decals work really well on the Gundam, especially on the shoulders.

From the back.  The red decals on the wrists make a world of difference, especially when lined up properly:

A very blurry shot of the head.  Notice how the eyepiece is fit deep into the back of the head, surrounded and protected by the helmet.

A closeup of the thruster pack on the back.  I left this part mostly alone after the top coat made it look all cloudy.  You can see the remnants of the accident on the thruster nozzles.

The Gundam and his old nemesis.  I'll have to find some non-impossible battle poses to put these two in.

A couple of final notes to wrap this build up:

• You can tell in that final picture that the Zaku looks a bit bigger than the Gundam.  Not just taller,  mind you, but wider as well.  I did some side by side comparisons, and the Zaku is indeed a bit taller, due to the gigantic soles that its feet rest upon.  The difference however is not as dramatic as this photo suggests.  On the other hand, I don't think it is actually wider across.  The Zaku's shoulder armor simply gives it that appearance.
  
  Believe it or not, in finishing the Gundam, I grew to have an even greater appreciation for its counterpart. It seems to me that some of the Gundams in the Real Grade line come with far more accessories and/or flourishes than the Zakus, which didn't seem particularly fair. But I've come to realize that rounded, concave style of the Zaku's armor give it a level of minute detail that simply doesn't exist in the Gundams. It isn't necessarily better, but I believe it puts all of the RG models on more equal footing.



• I did a better job this time around, but I made mistakes and repeated bad habits.  Since I don't forsee building another kit any time soon, I imagine my skills will atrophy again, and I'll be repeating myself should there be a Gunpla Chronicles 3.  That would be unfortunate, but to some extent it can't be helped.  I have a lot of fun building these kits, but I simply don't have the time in the day, or space in the house, to make this a regular hobby.  The only thing I can do is re-read these posts the next time around, to remind myself of what can go wrong.



• I think the Gundam's decals look fine overall, but I am starting to understand why purists out there insist on using permanent waterslide decals.  The standard stickers stand out against dark colored plastic, no matter what you do to avoid it.  After seeing this enough times, you can't help but be tempted to avoid this by using waterslides.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: The Head

In my view, the head is the most important part of this model.  The RX 78-2 as a whole is one of the most iconic robots in anime history, but it is the head which is the Gundam franchise's most recognizable and enduring symbol .  A mistake on any other part of the kit can either be hidden or ignored, but even the smallest blemish to the headpiece will stick out like a sore thumb.  When building this final section, my self appointed rules were simple; no mistakes, no excuses.

Of course, this means that I came this close to making an unrecoverable mistake. I was only saved by an amazing (and confusing) quirk of the kit.

To explain, we need to look at the instruction book:

 These are the opening steps for building the head. In the left section of the text bubble, it tells you to apply three decals to the eye piece - numbers 86,33, and 34.  In the right section, it says to apply decal #32. Now lets look at the relevant section of the decal page:

86, 33 and 34 are three individual decals which combine to make the Gundam's eyes.  #32 is one single sticker that takes the place of the other three.  In other words, the kit comes with two different ways create the Gundam's eyes.  To this day, I cannot understand whether the instructions above are saying to apply all four decals on top of each other, or whether to choose between them.  If it is the former, then I ask - what advantage is there in having two layers of decals applied to the model?  If it is the former, what visual difference is there between the two approaches?

What I do know is that I first tried applying the three individual stickers, and failed.  #34 flew off of my wooden application pick and stuck to my table so firmly that I never got it off.  Even if I did manage to remove it, it would be unusable. I then tried applying #32, and did so perfectly. Bandai, I'm not sure what your angle is with these four decals, but now I don't care.  Thank you for helping save me from myself.

After having so much trouble with the eyepiece,  I decided I did not want to risk messing it up in any way.  So rather than apply topcoat to the completed head, I assembled all the outward facing parts, and sprayed them individually.  This was easier said than done; while the head does not consist of too many pieces, they are all very tiny. Perhaps after my close call with the decals, karma decided I should have some better luck, and I never came close to losing any of them. The paint went on nicely, and the final assembly came together without any drama.  Now it is time to put it all together, in the thrilling conclusion to Gunpla Chronicles 2.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: Arms & Shoulders

Here are the Gundam's arms. They're smaller than I imagined, and are so basic in shape that there isn't much in the way of panel lining to be done.  I did have a lot of trouble getting the gold foil decals onto the joints.  There are supposed to be four per arm, but I only ended up using two, and they're already starting to look awful.  I have a gold Sharpie marker lying around, and I'm tempted to test it on one of the decals to see it it would make them look better.

The arms also led to the first time this build in which I've put a piece on the wrong way.  The the two white pieces positioned at the wrist are not swappable. They have to be placed on a specific side of the arm, or neither piece will stay flush as they curve up toward the elbow. I had to carefully remove both of them before switching them around.  Thankfully I didn't break anything along the way, but one of them is bent outward just a bit.  In the grand scheme of things it is essentially unnoticeable.

I found it curious how the shoulder armor is set.  You have to thread the upper joint of the arm through the shoulder piece before attaching the arm to the torso, as if placing a screw through a washer before screwing into the wall. In contrast, the Zaku's shoulder decorations are bolted straight on, and can easily be removed.

Lastly, I want to discuss the model's hands.  Take a close look at this photo:

There are two things to notice.  First, check out the small, rectangular hole in the palm of the hand.  Next, the small, rectangular piece jutting out from the grip of the gun.  As you might guess, they fit together like a lock and key, which keeps the weapon in the Gundam's hands no matter what pose you put it in.  This was a huge revelation for me.  I had so many troubles keeping the Zaku's rifle from falling out of its hands.  The pose I have it in now is the only one I could get to work, and it has stayed that way since I put it on the desk.  I just checked whether its hands have the same feature, and sure enough, they do.  I simply missed it the first time around.  Embarassed? Sure.  Relieved? Absolutely. I feel like I have so much more freedom to position both models how I see fit.

There's only one piece of the puzzle left, and it just so happens to be the most important.  We're approaching the penultimate entry in Gunpla Chronicles 2.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: The Torso

Preface: When I wrote the first series of Gunpla Chronicles posts, I ended up building the model kit faster than I could write blog entries.  Unfortunately, it happened once again, and the Gundam is complete.  Nevertheless I still plan on detailing the rest of the process.  The only problem is that I don't have photos from the final steps of the build, which means there will be one post without pictures of my own.

The torso gave me all sorts of trouble.  The size of the piece, as well as its location on the model, means that any mistakes will stick out, moreso than any on other part (other than the head).  Suffice to say that it wasn't easy keeping it looking even close to perfect.

The problem is simply that the torso contains more darkly colored pieces than any other part of the Gundam.  Only the most careful cutting and trimming of each piece will ensure that there are no visible sprue marks, and I wasn't nearly careful enough.  When working on the main blue chest plate, I managed to clip way too close to the plastic, to the point where I might have actually cut into it.  I ended up spending a good twenty minutes with several sheets of sandpaper in hopes of smoothing it out.  When I was finished, I wasn't happy with the results, but when I came back later to take pictures I decided it looked better than when I left it.  The sprue marks are still clearly visible, but they are nowhere near as glaring as I thought they were.  Not to mention that the model's arms and shoulder armor should keep this section of the torso hidden most of the time. I suppose there are worse places to have made a mistake.

The torso was also responsible for the most challenging bit of sticker placement up until this point.  The kit comes with shiny gold decals that are meant to be applied to the yellow exhaust grills on the front of the chest.  There is VERY little space in between each plate of the grill, and you are supposed to place a decal on each.  I managed to do it, but not without scraping off some of the gold sheen.  It still delivers the ultimate effect of making the grills shine at the right angle, but I'd seriously like to know how to apply those stickers while leaving them intact.


The Gundam's booster pack came together without fuss.  It was around this time that I started to notice a change in the way I worked.  I was getting both faster and more accurate when clipping off pieces.  I noticed the same change when I got near the end of building the Zaku.  This tells me two things.  First, you can get better at this skill.  Second, you need to do it a lot more than I have to keep it in between builds.

Postscript - It so happens that the RG Gundam kit comes with not two, but four beam saber handles.   It took me until after I finished building it to (sort of) learn why.  If you look at the photo, you'll see that one pair has a small tab jutting out, while the other pair has a small indentation.  The tab allows the first pair to lock into the Gundam's hand, allowing it to stay put during poses.  On the other hand, the indentation allows the second pair to be snapped into the back of the shield for storage (you can also snap the beam rifle into the back of the shield, making it an ingenious little weapon locker).  Having figured this out, I put the tabbed pair into the Gundam's shoulder holsters, and the indendted pair behind the shield.  Still, I question the purpose of two pairs. If the indented pair can't be easily be held, then I wouldn't use them for poses.  And if it stays behind the shield, no one will see them.  I'll have to see if they fit into the model's alternate hand pieces (a closed fist with a small hole through the middle).  Unless they can be held that way, they seem like a pointless exercise.

Gunpla Chronicles 2 - The Waist

The Gundam's Torso is nice and simple.  The individual parts fit together easily, and the skirt armor is very flexible, so it won't easily fall off when the legs are moved for posing (unlike the Zaku, which can't help but lose its skirt armor when you so much as brush it with a finger).

... unfortunately, the waist is so simple, I don't have anything else to say! Thankfully the next post will be much more interesting.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: Topcoating.

At this point, the Gundam is not yet complete, but with so many individual pieces now assembled, I decided it was time to give them some topcoat. When I built the Zaku, I ended up going through an entire can of paint.  In fact, I ran out as I was spraying the last piece, before I could cover it all (thankfully this didn't result in any obvious cosmetic flaws).  I resolved to do better this time by being more accurate and efficient at this process.

My biggest mistake when painting the Zaku was that I held the spray can too far away from the pieces.  After a single spray, the part would look like it had been left out during a light rain.  It took far too many sprays to coat any one section of the model.  This time around, I looked up tips on spraying techiniques, as well as on the best distance for holding the can. Did these techniques help save any paint?  The jury is still out.  I feel like I used less, but I did have to make multiple passes on several pieces. The can feels light, but it felt relatively light when I bought it, so I can't quite gauge how much is in there.  We'll find out sooner or later, since I still have to paint some of the model's biggest pieces.

And how about the results?  Once again, I think I did a better job at this step in the build process than I did with the Zaku, but I still have a lot of room for improvement.  The leg piece and the Core Fighter look gorgeous; in particular, the clear parts of the stickers look entirely invisible on the white and grey armor of the leg.  The feet took well to the paint, but the front sticker on one of them looks nasty. These standard issue decals already stand out against dark colored plastic, but if they suffer any amount of discoloration or warping during application, the topcoat makes them stand out that much more.

Most problematic of all, however, were the accessories.  The Bazooka and Beam Rifle took multiple coats of paint, but still look a bit spotty. With the rifle, this actually resulted in giving it a realistic, gunmetal-type effect.  The bazooka looks fine in all but one area, which I may spray one more time at the end if I have any paint left. Then there is the shield, which took the most amount of work.  The paint just didn't seem to want to stick (This might be the result of the cold weather).  I managed to cover the whole shield eventually, but for some reason one half of it has some weird discoloration.  It isn't foggy, but dark in tone.  You can't see it unless you're right up close, but I'm puzzled as to its cause.

The biggest lesson I learned from this round of painting was to be patient.  My excitement got the better of me, and as a result I tried to do this on a day with less than ideal temperatures.  Futhermore, I originally planned to clean off each piece with a soft cloth before painting, so as to remove fingerprints and sweat.  I forgot to actually use it on all but a few pieces.  I've gotten better at taking it slow and steady with every other step of the process.  Why don't I do the same when painting? If I had to answer, I see it as the one step of the process which has the highest chances of screwing up the look of the model, so I want to get it done and over with before my obsessiveness lets me screw it up.   I need to find a better balance.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: Legs

Finished one of the leg pieces.  This has been my favorite part to work on so far.  The grey and white pieces don't show sprue marks too badly, and the clear plastic sections of the decals become invisible after application.  The leg was another challenge to my panel lining skills.  There are a lot of small panels you can touch up, and they're not all easy to find.  One particular section was difficult to mark at all.  My current panel lining strategy involves filling in all the panels in a particular area of the piece with full, thick marker strokes.  After letting it sit for a few seconds, I then wipe the panel with a cloth or paper towel.  This cleans the outer surface off, but doesn't reach the marker which has settled down into the crease of the panel.  Sometimes this requires multiple applications, but as long as you dry quickly and diligently enough, you can do it all day without discoloring the plastic.

When I began to work on this trouble spot, however, the marker ink kept coming out of the panel crease, leaving the plastic entirely clean. I ended up this section from the leg and working on it in isoloation.  With a bit of extra drying time, and some extra applications of the marker, I finally got it to hold.

Not much else to say about this one.  I imagine the other leg will look just as good.

Gunpla Chronicles 2 - The Lower Body

The feet of the Gundam are quite a bit different than those of the Zaku.  The actual frame is identical, but the surrounding armor is not.  I had a bit of trouble removing some of the sprue marks from the red plastic pieces, but I managed to clear them up quite a bit with some careful use of the hobby knife.

I almost had a near crisis with the second foot. There's a small piece of plastic which must be removed from the foot's frame, and when working on the second foot I dislodged it by applying pressure to the entire piece.  It came out, but when I was done I noticed that there was some discoloration and warping near the back of the piece.  If it were to snap, it could seriously mess up the foot.  I carefully tested it out, and I don't think it is in any danger of it actually breaking.  I'll consider it a lesson in being more careful.

The only other minor problem I had with the feet was the loss of a sticker.  I managed to drive it deep under the sticker sheet, and when I pulled it out it had folded in on itself.  As I tried to fix it up, it flew out of my tweezers.  It was meant to go on the inside of the foot, so its absence shouldn't be as noticeable.  Here are the finished products.  Once again, I'm pretty happy with the panel linings.

Gunpla Chronicles 2: Accessorize

After finishing the Core Fighter, I continued to stay small, working on the Gundam's weapons before getting to the mobile suit itself.  I began with the Beam Rifle, which has a nice two tone look in this kit:

There's not much to say here.  There aren't any nasty marks on the plastic, and I got some nice panel lining on the grey sections of the piece.  I also managed to get the red sticker around the barrel of the rifle to line up nicely.

Next up was the shield.  There's one noticeable flaw on this one - the yellow cross on the front of the shield is uneven at the bottom.  I blame this on overeager sanding.  It isn't hugely glaring, but I'm still disappointed with myself:

On the bright side, I'm happy with how the stickering worked out.  The shield has many stickers which go on its left and right sides, and I think I got them to line up quite well.

The Hyper Bazooka rounds out our assortment of armements.  If the shield was all about sticker alignment, the bazooka was an exercise in proper panel lining.  This thing has a lot of panels, and its small size means that accidental smudging was all too easy.  I had one fit with the eraser that was so bad I had to call in reinforcements (otherwise known as a Qtip).  I can't complain about the finished product though:

Taken as a whole, the unevenness of the cross was my only major gaffe, which means I did a better overall job with these weapons than I did with the Zaku's.  I had a lot trouble applying the stickers on those, and I left one side of the Heat Hawk with what I can only describe as "battle damage".  I'm really happy with my work so far, but all of this has been a warmup for the real thing.  Time to build the Gundam itself.

Gunpla Chronicles 2 - Core Fighter Update

Before I begin the meat of this post, I have an update on the Core Fighter.  I read on numerous gunpla sites that panel lining marker can be removed with a pencil eraser.  I thought it sounded too good to be true, but take a look at what happened when I took an extra fat eraser to the top of the craft:

Good as new! And in a hilarious twist of fate, I lost one of the two stickers that are supposed to go where I just removed the marker.  Thankfully, I didn't like the look of the stickers anyway, so I don't
mind the loss (and I'm still happy that I removed the marker - it looks perfect the way it is now).

I also looked more thoroughly into how to effectively use sandpaper on model kits.  Call me naive, but I didn't realize that you could actually smooth out the look of plastic by using very high grit sandpaper.  While none of the sheets I have are as fine grit as the ones the super Gunpla builders suggested using, they were good enough to fix up the bottom of the Core Fighter.  The lighting in the picture below isn't quite as good as the previous shot of the underside, but I can vouch for the fact that that huge scratch has been buffed out about as nicely as it looks here.

With my two major crises resolved, it was time to apply the remaining stickers. Here's how it looks as it waits to be sprayed with some clear coat paint:

... those stickers look a hell of a lot worse in the picture than they do in real life.

In my last post, I was far from happy with the way the Core Fighter was shaping up, but after being patient and correctly applying these fixes, I think it looks pretty fantastic.  Perhaps it was a good thing that I faced such a challenge right off the bat.  It helped me prove to myself that I can tackle this kit with a better mindset, and that ultimately, I have what it takes to improve.

Gunpla Chronicles 2 - Building the Core Fighter

One of the coolest things about the Real Grade RX 78-2 is the inclusion of a working Core Fighter.  The tiny aircraft can actually be used to help form the torso of the Gundam just like in the show.  Due to its small size, I decided it was a good place to begin.

Before beginning this build, I told myself that I needed to improve on my skills and make fewer mistakes.  To that end, I got a few additional tools to help me out, most notably a set of hobby sandpaper sheets to use in place of the very coarse grit nail file I abused the Zaku with.  Unfortunately, by the end of the first night of work on the Core Fighter, I feel like I haven't gotten any better, and may have even got worse.  Here's a picture of what I wound up with:

You can't quite see it, but the clear plastic of the windshield is a bit scratched up.  Furthermore, those big black panel markings on the top of the fighter are dreadfully ugly, and it turns out that I placed them in a spot where stickers are supposed to go.  I'm not really sure if I can remove them now that they've dried, but I'm crossing my fingers that I can find a reasonable solution.

Here's a picture of the bottom of the fighter as its in docking mode:

There's a nice big scratch running down the left side.  I think this might have been the result of overly aggressive sanding, which means that my new tools are actually doing me more harm than good at this point.

If there is one thing I did learn from my first build, it is the importance of being able to walk away when things look bad, so you can return to it with an actual gameplan, rather than futzing around with desperate, half assed attempts at a solution.  I left this one alone for now, but rest assured that I'm not done with it yet.

Gunpla Chronicles 2

The first series of Gunpla Chronicles entries detailed my attempts to build the Real Grade Char's Custom Zaku II.  While I didn't do a very good job of updating my progress down the stretch, I did get manage to finish the kit.  I found the experience to be challenging, educational, and ultimately rewarding.  While I made more than a few mistakes (and nearly broke one of the leg pieces permanently), I still think the Zaku came out better than I expected for a first try.  To this day I cannot  work in my office without stopping to admire the thing.

I don't know how much farther I plan to take Gunpla as a hobby (I lack the time, money and space to build kits on a regular basis), but ever since last spring I knew I wanted to build at least one more kit to tide me over for the foreseeable future. Now, almost a year later, it's time.

After doing more research on Gunpla, I decided I wanted to stick with the Real Grade line.  The kits are reasonably priced, their small size is perfect for my office, and they are incredibly detailed and well articulated.  I also knew that the choice of which kit to build would not be easy.  After building the Zaku, there aren't many models in the Real Grade line which I care about, not when it is so heavily represented by mobile suits from Gundam Seed.  But of the remaning options, I still had to decide between two of my favorite mechs of all time - the original RX 78-2 Gundam, and the Gundam Mark II.  I like the look of the Mark II better, but the nostalgia factor of the RX 78 was undeniable.  Ultimately, the choice was driven by an overwhelming feeling of obsessive compulsion; Char's Zaku would look out of place standing next to the more advanced Mark II.  Indeed, it had to be paired with its nemesis, the RX 78.  And so it was done.

It may be old school, but it still can't help but look badass

Wish me luck folks.