Good evening fellow people,
with 2023 now being finished (also since quite some time, did not yet get around to writing this article, sorry) we now begin to direct our views to the new year: 2024. And what a year there is to come: Let us dive right in:
(Warning: this article will be mostly text, most likely not for the faint of heart)
Also a first teaser for you guys to enjoy: the MAZ-537G with some “minor modifications”:
About the subjects:
Let us begin with the topic that will be the most interesting: not the personal background, but what new interests I want to chase in the year and what there is to expect in the following year. For this time and circumstances will just be ignored, this will come in the next part.
(side notes: current status of all projects is available 24/7 here and the shortest of summaries can be found in the post about 2023)
These chapters will only focus on changes I want to make in 2024. Since I am already pretty satisfied with my current way of working not a lot of changes will be needed there.
diverging from the norm
What exactly do I mean with this? I personally would consider german and soviet armor to be current standard subjects. (6 out of 7 fall into this category in 2023). This is not the end of the world, I just want to branch out into different subjects.
A topic that I want to explore in a brand new way are trucks and other military vehicles that are not tanks. This will also certainly mark the beginning of 2024 as the first truck is already in the making – the MAZ-537g. This topic will most likely be my personal main focus of the year.
Another possibility I want to explore are armored cars forming a type of hybrid between the trucks and my typical subject. On this topic I of course also have the pick-up of doom in mind, the one and only: the toyota pick-up. Maybe not necessarily this year, but certainly in the near future. And of course also complete the started projects. Kind of ironic how it is the last point menioned in the last, hope this is no bad omen.
New and extended skills
At first I wanted to start painting figures as a different form of subject, but seeing as I again and again lose the interest and/or motivation I do not think that this will be the right direct to follow. Thus I will also cut this from the plans for 2024 for now. Still I want to extend my knowledge and skills beyond my usual repertoire. The new subjects will be of great help, however these are not automatic. Topics that I want to explore this year is one I started in 2023: custom metal parts. These includes remaking fenders, parts from sheet metal and also wiring and tubes in a greater extend than ever seen here before.
An additional change that I planned is to increase the complexity of my models. I want to do this with custom metal parts, but also more changes with PE, scratch building and resin. This is the preperation to soon raise most of my models to my current midnight-master-models and beyond. (Like to the stars and beyond in a metaphorical sense)
Of course I also want to counteract one of my biggest weeknesses: MUD – once an aspect that caused a lot of joy but I have kind of fallen out with. A skill I want to regain and extend upon. Especialy weathering with real dirt, pigments, textures and contrasts. I see such a great but unused potential there that it annoys me time and time again.
Other related goals beyond “just the models”
One of the most important goals of 2024 is to bring the models to place outside the digital world. Maybe visit a few exhibitions, get in contact with more modellers in the area. By now I feel ready to take on some more serious challenges as my models have gotten better over the last year and will continue to do so. Thus I do not want to let them just rest here but get them out to the world. Or a few fellow scale-modellers to be more exact. No matter how, I want to start be. The first exhibition to visit as an exhibitor is already planned, but more on that in it’s own article.
Another topic that should be mentioned are the circumstances I will face in the near future and when to expect models. First off: I wish to post one article every month, most about models, but with some exceptions, as seen here. This will be the article for january. The new articles should be publicised on the friday of the 3rd week every month.
Website – also some last additions
The website is by now mostly in its final state, atleast for my vision so far. I do still have a few more goals to conquer in 2024. First of all I want to finally get a form of newsletter to work. So far you can enter manually to recieve e-mails, this solutions is however far from optimal. Additionally I want to make an easy way for you, the reader, to give me input for future models. Here I think about something like an idea-box where you can write me suggestions, wishes, models you want to see and much much more.
However I also want to do some changes to the articles: As I already mentioned I want to keep a monthly upload schedule, but I also want to make them more detailed and informative. This means splitting them up into more parts and especially more steps. Just more than just a post after construction and one after painting. This goes directly hand in hand with me wanting to put more work in for each model.
As an extention of this idea I also want to conquer in the future the article detailing my exact method in detail giving you a step by step guide on how to also make models like you see here.