With SCGMC 2022 behind me, I have a whole new year of model projects to look forward to. SCGMC2023 is coming up and this time really for sure the Zaku Kai is gonna be done. I have other projects in mind for the show as well… Plus Anime Boston is coming up and I need […]

A while back I saw a video on Youtube that really inspired me: it was a slideshow (set to The Village People’s “Macho Man”) of a build-up of the original 1:144 Zaku kit from 1980. The end result was a pretty funky-looking Zaku, and an interesting direction taken with a kit that can be hard […]

In the last few days before Otakon I made an effort to finish up the HGUC Zaku so I could display it in the Otakon model contest. I was basically successful; the model was in a state that I could reasonably call “finished” and the Zaku won “Best in Show” in the Gunpla Builders World […]

I guess this is a bit more substantial of an update than the last one, since now I’ve actually painted some parts. This is the first real look at this Zaku (approximately) as it will look when finished.

Lately I’ve been working on getting the HGUC Zaku parts ready for painting. At this point pretty much all the parts seem ready apart from the hands – there were a lot of bubbles in the castings and so I’m thinking of starting over, casting a new set of hands and using pressure-casting gear this […]

Lots of changes as I’m trying to wrap up the structural portion of this project and move on to painting… The electronics are done, new “power cables” are installed. Hand casting is done (though there’s still some cleanup to do) and I’m sealing up the last few assemblies that were kept un-glued for the sake […]

It always bugs me when kits I’m working on have poor details, and Zaku kits always seem to have a couple major issues along those lines: the kit-supplied hands are usually crap, and the monoeye is usually embarassingly simplistic even on the best kits. The monoeye thing is a real problem, because the eye is […]

Since last time I’ve been spending a fair bit of time trying to improve the modified legs and get them to better match up with one another. Additionally, I’ve recast the shoulder armor and permanently mounted it to the Zaku, and I’ve done a bit of work improving the look of the elbow joints.

Last time I talked a bit about what’s wrong with the HGUC Zaku, what inspired me to try to fix it, and showed a little bit of the process and the results of the modifications applied to the left leg. Since then, I’ve applied the same modifications to the right side. There’s still some rough […]

When the HGUC Zaku was first released, I was thrilled at the prospect of a new kit which would return the Zaku to its roots… abandoning the rigid definition and boxy shapes of the MG Zaku and adopting a look more in line with the original Zaku. However, over time, I became frustrated with the […]