by George A Georgopoulos
1/60 Guillaume le Conquerant (Heller)
This is one of those in-between projects. Years ago, I had purchased the model for my daughter to make, and assisted her in the build. It proved an unfortunate choice for a novice though. You can see in the pictures that the fit of the main pieces leaves quite a bit to be desired.. In any case, after it stayed around for a couple of years, I finished it off and made the sea base for it, partly so that it does not lie unfinished, partly to play around with making water bases.
Not for a novice modeler
The reason this kit would be difficult of a novice is that it forces upon the modeler a couple of intricate gluing exercises; the main reason being the presence of a 6-piece hull. The hull comes in two lower pieces (left and right) and then on top of these are two additional pieces (left and right again) carrying the top two planks. These last two long and slender pieces are not easy to glue on the lower pieces of the hull. In addition, all four pieces have to be glued to the bow and stern extensions of the keel (those pieces culminating in the dragon heads). Other than that, it is a rather simple kit to build. Not concerned about its accuracy, I cannot pass judgment on it.
The build
This is an out of the box build with minor variations. I skipped the vacuum-formed sail for a piece of clothquite out of scale on close inspection.
The wood grain was achieved by washing a darker brown from children’s watercolors on a lighter base of brown. Quite a forgiving method for this scale, as you may wash it away and redo it even after it has dried off.
The water base
The model is depicted beached on a sandy coastline. I placed the oars inside the boat as, frankly, I saw no other way of making them look natural in the absence of a crew.
The base is a pizza box, with the top cover bowed-in in a slanted position to represent the inclination of the beach.
The sand is well... sand, which is totally out of scale, but it was free. It was pasted on the base after applying diluted white glue on it.
The snow on the beach is talcum powder, sprinkled on, after applying diluted white glue on the beach with a bush.
The white glue worked quite well. You can turn the model upside down, and nothing falls off!
I attempted three times to sprinkle the talcum powder on to the boat itself with abysmal results, so I gave up. You may still discern the leftovers in some of the close-up pictures. I just could not achieve a uniformity of coverage that would look convincing.
The water is toilet-paper mush with water and white glue, painted with blue and green acrylics. The breaking waves are made with Apoxie sculpt.
