New socks

Although the socks are new, its still too big
for Kaelynn. still, she loves wearing them.

DIY airbrush

And so, my idea is forming. I wanted to have an airbrush system in my workshop. But I am not prepared to invest so much at this time. Just getting the airbrush itself is expensive already. And then there is the problem of getting the compressor. Of course I could go back to using expensive pressurised air can (expensive because it just pressurised air and it finishes fast) like I did when I was in UK. But that was more than 10 years ago and not only that, these cans are rare in Malaysia. Then, I could get a spare tire and pump it up at any gas station too but bear in mind, the workshop is so small, I can't even let a hamster sleep there. And if I wanted to get a real deal compressor, I must be willing to shell out a lot because there are other things to get besides the compresssor and other whatnots which I have not researched.

And so, I thought to myself, why not just invest a bit for the airbrush itself and then DIY on the compressor? Great idea, eh? Well, its great on paper, that is. After making the first blunder, I realised that the airbrush itself needs a working pressure between 15-40psi. And the air pump I bought was pumping out a measly 65L/min at 0.04MPa (or 5.8psi) which is way below what is required. Still, it would be a matter of time before I get to try the air pump. And I suspect that I would have to thin the paints a lot.

Although the air pump costs RM160, I got a discount of RM5.00
which I used it for the filter wool, which could be used as an air
filter for my DIY spray booth (later this year)

There you go, the whole casing is made from metal which
gave its weight. There is only one output from the pump
which is the small hole there. You just attach it to a small
black cylinder which then connects to another part which
has multiple exit plugs. I could just use the hole and try it
there and then on the (proposed and coming) airbrush. If
the pressure is still lacking, maybe I could pry open the
case and have a look at the motor to see if it can be either
replaced or modified. I won't do this until I have the cash
to get the airbrush, its piping and some paint.

Found this on the floor. Its a remote for something (car?) and
since it looks quite new on the wet road, I would say someone
jsut dropped it recently. Since there was no one, I waited a bit
before testing its buttons. Unfortunately, none of the parked
cars responded...........

OK, so I was not happy with the replacement probe. After
all, for RM3.00, the plastic was crap and it would only be a
matter to time before it fails when I needed it most. OK, let
me tell you a bit about the probe. There are two versions;
the normal one is a pair of metal blades just like mine. But
there is another which has two pairs of metal blades which
usually peels itself off in weeks, rendering the probe useless.
But now, there is a new verson for this from Pro'sKit which
instead of using the thin metal blades, they replaced them
with a double-sided fibreglass PCB instead. How it works, I
am not sure but in the next few weeks, the result will show.

The Tin Man and the armoured Dwarf

OK, I so I got itchy hands this week. After staring at the Heroclix Iron Man, I wondered how tall it is compared to a Warhammer 40K's Space Marine. And so, after searching from Forums and all that, I discovered Games Castle in Damansara Utama (near Atria). This is one of the places for Wargamers to get their stock of miniatures and also involve themselves in games. But if you need to go there, be warned that the opening hours are biased towards working people.

And so, I was there between 11 to 2 in the morning, observing the players, the game and so on. By 1AM, almost everyone had left save for Richard and his friend who were painting miniatures while his friend was tasked with building the Vindicator from the sprues. As I have never seen the Vindicator up close before, I just sat and watched. Since there was no instruction manual, he relied mostly on the Space Marines Codex (in other words, the catalogue pictures of the Vindicator la). Luckily, I did study the Vindicator's assembly manual from the Net and did get to help out a bit. While we were there, they played "The Librarian and the Judas Chalice" DVD, which was directed by Jonathan Frakes (of Commander Riker fame from Star Trek the Next Generation). Its like Indiana Jones but in a more educational and comedic way.

And so, I got the Biker Scout (again) for RM50 which is a bit
more than what I got from ebay but the dfference is getting
it NOW. And then, for RM30, I got about 11 Space Marines.
I bought these as separate sprues from the boxed game set
"Assault on Black Reach".

There is a reason why these were sold cheaply: They
do not offer much in terms of spare parts and have a
severely limited pose. For example, this Space Marine
comprises of only three parts; The main body, the
weapon and backpack. I could have bought a more
expansive set of Space Marines but I have my own
reasons for this. Maybe I would get more later on.

Compare that to the Bike Scout, which costs RM50 for
just a figure and a bike, the Space Marines works out
to be so cheap. The Biker Scout comes with a lot of
extra hands, and parts such as weapons and a few
heads. So, its worth the asking price.

And now, we compare them side by side. Oh God. Its like Professor Frankenstein with his assistant, Igor. And so, while Iron Man is standing at about 45mm, poor old Igor is stooping at 32.5mm. But if he stands straight, he could still be 10mm short.Then again, these Space Marines are always stooping, which I suspect, could be from the heavy backpacks they carry. And I suspect, they also get shot very easily since those backpacks could be as heavy as
a fridge. If Anthony Star is 6'1" (in Armour, its 6'6") he could very well be close to 1/48 or 1/42 scale. But as for the Space Marine, the scale is a problem. If we measure his head, he could be 1/48. But if we measure his shoulders, the scale is different and so on. Therefore, they are classified as 28mm miniatures where everything is out of proportion. Really. Because if you tried to put him in the same scale as Iron Man, what you'd get would be a fat misformed midget who loves horse riding.

And coming back to the previous post about mass painted
miniatures, the main problem would be the eyes. Here,
Anthony Stark (Iron Man) looked like Marty Feldman,
famous for portraying Igor in Young Frankenstein. When
you're in a rush to complete all those figures, you'd just go
and put two white dots followed by two small dots. And
when someone buys those figures, they would also go,
"dot dot dot dot" [expletives, la]