Hasegawa 1/72 Macross VF-1A Max TV Custom - 1

I've also started working on the 1/72 scale Macross VF-1A by Hasegawa. I'm a huge sci-fi and anime fan, and Macross is one of my favorite animes. I'll be building this to represent Maximilian Jenius' custom colored white and blue VF-1A. Again, sticking with my "back to basics" theme, this will box stock (mostly, as you will see below).

First step was to assemble as many sub-assemblies as possible before it goes to primer. So I assembled the main fuselage, the engine intakes, and rear stabilators.

An important step is to work on the exhaust nozzles. The way the kit is engineered, I need to paint the nozzles before they can be assembled into the engine nacelles. I decided to add styrene to represent ridges at  the edges of the nozzle. The kit parts have a panel line to represent this, but it's fairly faint. The modified part is on the left, the original kit part on the right

It took me two hours to add the ridges to the nozzles, so I decided to take a break from them and move onto another area of the kit.

 Like a majority of aircraft kits, this kit requires that the cockpit tub and interior be painted before the fuselage halves are glued together. I primed the cockpit and fuselage interior, then covered it with Testor's Model Master Gunship Gray FS36118 enamel. A light wash with Model Master Black acrylic to bring out the details, then drybrush Testor's silver on the corners to show some wear.

The fuselage was glued together. I mocked it up with main fuselage to get a feel for how it will look. 

I filled the seam with a putty made from super glue and talc.

And the sanded result. I love using the super glue/talc putty because it dries quick, dries super hard, and won't shrink over time. When I primer it, I'll go over any voids I missed with Mr. Surfacer 500.

That's it for this week. My plan for the upcoming week is to get the exhaust nozzles painted and the main engine nacelles assembled. As awlays, any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!