Opel Astra DTM

[Plastickitbasher]

Here goes my first blog so to speak lol!!

I've had this one in my stash for some time now and I think I need a change from figures, armour and aircraft. Now that I've got my DBS thought I'd build this first!! Looks like there's a lot to do as the box is stuffed with a number of spruse's and all sorts of bits so it should be fun!!

Time for some photo's.

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As for the painting I'm going to use Tamiya rattlers for primer and body colour, interior colur by hand or with my airbrush.

I'll try to update as often as I can, just to let you all know I'm a slow builder lol

Regards

David

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[john]

I'm sure you will enjoy this, I've done a few Tamiya car's and bikes and they are so well made as with all Tamiya kits I've done.

 

[m1ks]

Good luck, we're all rooting for you

Be prepared to be patient when Decaling, i've just done a MotoGP bike, (wil stick up details soon once i'm closer to completing) and chuff me, it's the most decals and the fiddliest decaling i've ever done. (Glad I got the Micro Set and Sol now)

 

[Richy C]

I love this race car David , I`ve been on the look out for one of these for ages but are few and far between and when they do come up on eBay they go for a small fortune , looking forward to this build , please keep us updated

Richy

 

[bikerbart]

Really, really nice kit this David. How do i know? Cause my mate took his to the Torbay Model Show today and its a stunning kit made up...looks awsome on display. You will have a lot of fun with this one. All the best, Martin

 

[backonthecase]

Superb I have the Team Phoenix one and want to add this one to the stash too! I'll be watching this one!!

 

[Plastickitbasher]

Hello Gents

I have made a start so here's the first update on this build.

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Main body work has now been built and is ready for the primer coat.

The rear light clusters have been fixed together with Krystal Klear and then over coated

with Vellajo's liquid mask. Body parts were fixed with Tamiya's extra thin cement.

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The chassis has been built the way with Tamiya's extra thin cement, I haven't put the front wheel assemblies on yet as I want them to be movable when the model is complete.

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The dash has also been assembled, I am thinking of giving this the Carbon Fibre treatment just to give it a bit more wow to it.

Ok now for a photography bit.

As there seems to be a bit of a camera buzz going on in the forum I'm going to try and tell you all what and how I do my photography (Now by no means am I anywhere near being a pro, however if it helps a few members then all to the good)

What I used and what I did.

Canon 30D, lenses Sigma 50mm macro sigma 105mm macro and Canon 17-85mm

Now for most of the shots so far I've used the setting for appeture prority (Read Your Camera Manual (RYCM) on how to set this up) this means the appeture has been set wide open so there's lots of light going in and the background is thrown OOF (Out Of Focus) thus hopefully concentrating the viewers eye on the model parts, I've also used the cameras pop up flash to help in the low light conditions.

The close up shots of the front, rear wheel areas and dash I've used the Sigma 50mm marco lens as this lets me get that much closer to the subject, however I've still used the same appeture priority and pop up flash.

Photoshop.

This can be a total nightmare to anyone using it for the first time, so I try to keep this as simple and easy as I can for all the photos in this blog all I've done is to use the three following adjustments Auto level, Auto Contrast and Auto Colour, then saved for the web.

Later on I will change cameras and use my Fuji S7000 camera as this is not a DSLR so hopefully you'll see that you don't need all the fancey stuff (lol)

That's all for now I'll try to get some more done over the weekend and post an update in the week.

Regards

David

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[Plastickitbasher]

Small update

A small update on this current build

Not sure if this will work but I've taken a leaf out of the aircraft builders book and pre shaded the shut lines on the body after first spraying on the white primmer.

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The lower chassis has now been primed and also has a coat of semi gloss black in it which is in the shed currently drying.

Dashboard.

The dashboard has been built all bar the steering wheel and has been detailed up with carbon fibre decals. A lot of time and effort plus a lot of Mr softner to get the decals to sit down nicely but it does look the part now.

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Regards

David

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[Plastickitbasher]

Mini mini update

Sorry for the slow build but I'm having to work in Stockport so I'm only at home for the weekends.

The rear wing has almost been built still waiting for the wing ends to be fixed on. However I have found that where the wing and support join some light filling work is required to finish it off, also on the underside there is two ejection marks that need to be sanded out.

The lower chassis has now been completely painted in semi-gloss black, next on the list for is to have the rear brake disc painted along with the wheel struts a nice little job for the weekend!!!

Sorry no photo's just did have enough time this time round.

 

[backonthecase]

Nice job on this little beast so far David! I love the CF decalling, I was tempted to get some of these and the Studio 27 PE kit for my one, just for the hell of it! But it looks to have enough detail on the kit parts so I think you've convinced me not to!

Nice work, keep it up

Stuart

 

[Fenlander]

Looking good, and nice when you add your own stamp to it. I have looked hard at this CF decal stuff and it appears to come in different sizes, by which I assume it means the pattern. How do you know which one you need?

 

[m1ks]

I've not seen it myself but does it not come in Scale sizes?

Real carbon fibre does vary slightly in size due to the thickness of the weave but i'd have thought ty'd be packaged according to scale size.

 

[Plastickitbasher]

For CF decals I'm using small, it adds a little something to the build but how much will be seen when the kit is finished that may not be very much, I did the same for a RayBrig NSX and you'd never know looking through the windscreen lol

 

[PeanuckleJive]

This is a great kit, I had one a few years back which I abandoned after a masking disaster, gutted!

enjoy it, I love the effort tamiya put into the moving doors