Space Battleship Yamato 2199, Cosmo Reverse Ver. [WIP - Assembly of the painted Hull Exterior/Interior and Wave Motion Engine; sans weathering]

With scale model kit builds requiring individual parts to be painted first before assembly can begin, even intermediated payoffs can feel like a long time coming. After what seemed like a prolonged period of mundane prep work, airbrushing, top coating and panel lining of the numerous pieces, it was finally time to attempt Phase One of assembly for the 1/1000 scale Space Battleship Yamato 2199 Cosmo Reverse Version. This initial process involved assembly of painted parts comprising the bulk of the Hull Exterior, the Hull Interior, the Wave Motion Engine, and the Exhaust Nozzle.

Space Battleship Yamato 2199 Cosmo Reverse Ver. work-in-progress: Assembly of the fully painted Hull Exterior / Interior and Wave Motion Engine (sans weathering)

Hull Interior (gray green section) is suppose to house the Fighter Hangar Bay (not shown)

Wave Motion Engine (metallic orange part) will likely be covered up by an exterior hull plate armor

At this stage of the build, the ship's paint job is suffering from work prior to Phase One Assembly. For example, the hull looks too shiny due to a gloss top coat that was applied to facilitate panel lining. Moreover the basecoat colors look monotone and dull because I airbrushed the hull pieces without adding any shadows or highlights. In theory, my plan to apply oil dot weathering effects on the Hull Exterior should solve both issues in one go. How? Well, the matt clear coat I'll be applying before and after the process should take care of the glossiness while the weathering effects should introduce some hue variation on the exterior. It's not a plan that's set in stone though as I'll need to test out the technique on a spare piece of hull to see if I can achieve the results I'm after.

So far, only a basecoat, top coat and panel lines have been applied to the Exterior Hull

Hull Interior might be left empty if the Fighter Hangar Bay is displayed independently from the ship

One small gimmick inherent in the kit allows the bottom Hangar Bay door to swing open downwards (see below). Meanwhile, above that particular door is an empty space with grayish green interior walls that is supposed to house a carousel like contraption containing a fleet of Cosmo Falcon Fighters (not shown here). The Hangar Bay lies adjacent to the Wave Motion Engine which in turn connects to the Exhaust Nozzle at the stern of the Yamato. I've painted both the interior and engine to give myself the future option of being able to display the ship together with her exposed innards, if I want to.

Hangar Bay door is a movable part, shown here in the closed position ...

... and in the open position from which, theoretically speaking, fighters can exit from the ship

Wave Motion Engine (metallic orange part) connects to the Exhaust Nozzle (burnt metal part)

As much as I'm happy with how the burnt metal effects on the Exhaust Nozzle turned out, I admit the jury is still out on whether such effects actually gel well with the non-metallic looking Hull Exterior. For the moment at least, I don't think it does. So what I'm hoping for is that the oil dot weathering process is able to lessen the seemingly stark contrast that currently exists between the burnt metal effects and the monotone basecoat hull colors, by introducing hue variation to the latter. 

View of the Exhaust Nozzle from behind the Space Battleship Yamato

Weathering effects should lessen a seeming disconnect between the nozzle and hull

Once upon a time I would've been happy to leave the Hull Exterior as it is right now without doing any further work on it. And I might even have gotten ahead and done so if there wasn't such a stark contrast between the nozzle (metallic with burnt effects) and hull (monotone basecoat). In addition to the oil dot weathering process, I'm also hoping that future application of water decal markings on the hull would makes things that little bit more visually varied thus further reducing the said contrast.

Exterior Hull is still missing a few hull plates/armor and winged attachments ...

... as well as the First Bridge and Upper Deck, which will be painted before being attached  ...

... but essentially most of the pieces are already in place, sans weathering and decals

Something you may have noticed in the photos so far is a Display Stand that the Yamato sits upon. In this case, assembly of the stand was actually Step One in the instructions and for good reason. It's needed to hold up the ship during assembly. And because the stand will likely receive some rough handling during this process, I've left it in its original unpainted state. Only once assembly has been completed will I go ahead to paint the stand and apply its shiny signage stickers. Incidentally the stand will also be used to display in scale fighters as well as the structure holding up these fighters.

Display stand (lower left corner) that's holding up the ship will be painted at a later date

Barrel of the Wave Motion Gun is located slightly below the ship's bow, and it will be closed up with an orange cover piece in the Cosmo Reverse Version of the Space Battleship Yamato

Once Phase One of Assembly was complete, another bugbear of mine resurfaced in a more visual manner. I believe I had gone on record before voicing my dissatisfaction with how small this kit is, and this was made more obvious when placed next to a paperclip and five sen coin (see below). Now if it was meant for tabletop gaming then the size isn't all that bad. As a display piece I wish Bandai would've made more Yamato ships in a bigger scale. I do have one kit in 1/500 scale but most of the ships in this scifi universe comes in 1/1000 scale. I guess I'm being hypocritical considering I don't have much space in the house to display that many 1/500 scale ships. That's human nature for you. 

View from above the work-in-progress Space Battleship Yamato shows off the exposed inner section which will eventually be covered up by the ship's Upper Deck and First Bridge

View from above the work-in-progress Space Battleship Yamato displays the red hull section

Scale comparison of the Space Battleship Yamato 2199 against a paperclip and a five sen coin

Coming up next for this build will be either the Upper Deck section or the Fighter Hangar Bay section i.e. the carousel like contraption I mentioned before. And there's also that test piece I need to do with the oil dot weathering process. So the way forward is clear. I just have to start taking those first steps, which every scale modeler knows is difficult once inertia sets in. Speaking of which, I've managed to kick-start yet another mothballed project, namely the Bandai Star Wars Scout Trooper/Speeder Bike kit. As such, do expect work-in-progress photos and posts of this project to start slotting in between the Volkswagen Beetle, Sturmgeschütz, and Space Battleship Yamato. The more the merrier I say. And I might even add a new figurine project to that courtesy of being inspired by my previous book review. More on that later. For now, have a good weekend ... and wear your mask!