The shield is the next component on the build list.
The construction is quite simple. This is all you need:
Tragically, the decals got a little dark, so not only are they now extremely obviously decals, but they clash against the pure white of the shield. I originally thought and hoped that the color may fade away over time, but the next day it looked even worse.
So I peeled off the stickers, leaving me with a plain shield:
At first I was cool with this. After all, the Tallgeese has no markings on its shield in the original TV show. This should be plenty fine. But then it started to bug me, so much so that I had a wild idea - why not comb through all my old, leftover decal sheets to see if I had anything I could cobble together to replace the original ones? My first attempt looked something like this:
But I quickly decided that nothing about this looked right. Here was my second idea:
This looked … pretty good! Yes, that is an Earth Federation logo in the center and yes, it is a bit too small, but overall this will work for me. The logo gives it a bit of flair, and the red markings add some color without being too busy.
Beam Sabers
Since the shield contains the beam sabers, I figured I ought to put them together as well. The handles are square, which is not common, but I like it. Reminds me of the Gundam Mk II:
The handles attach to the back of the shield, nice any easy:
Clear Beam Blades
Now for something I have never seen in a model kit: Clear beam saber blades:
Note that these are in addition to the standard red blades most kits come with. Clearly (pun intended) these are meant for us to paint in whatever alternate color we wish.
The only problem with this is how? That is to say, how do you color these without losing their translucent look? A bit of research online reveals that there is clear paint, though I could not find any at local stores. It seems to be something you have to go to a specialist online store to obtain, and it is not necessarily cheap. That goes against my typical philosophy of using the simplest, cheapest solution possible when experimenting with a new technique, so I had to look for an alternative. I found one on Reddit, where someone suggest using the paint from one of these:
In case you are not familiar, this is a plastic “suncatcher” for kids. They come with special paint that allows light to pass through, ala a stained glass window:
If the paint allows light to pass through, it should work on these beam sabers. Considering a suncatcher costs a buck or two at any craft store, it was worth a shot versus buying specialty paint.
I wanted my beam sabers to be blue in yellow, to match the Tallgeese’s “minor” colors. Here is how the blue looked after a few coats:
That’s … actually really good!
Now for yellow:
That’s … not so good. The yellow paint was a different texture than the others, thicker and syrupy. I wonder if perhaps the lid opened up and it was exposed to air. All I know is that it simply was not easy to spread, and so the blade got very little color. Time to switch to another one of the two colors the suncatcher came with:
This is a bit too similar to the color of the standard blades, but it is at least a little different.
After a day of drying, the blades looked even better:
I am amazed at the fact that this worked as well as it did.
Rounding out this part of the build is the shield’s control arm. This is one of the coolest features on the Tallgeese. Both the shield and the gun are attached via control arms to the mobile suit itself. In other words, they are strapped to the body so that the pilot does not have to drop them when not in use. Since the body is not yet built, we cannot yet see this feature in action, but here is what it looks like:
Not very long if you ask me. I am curious to see exactly how and where it allows you to position the shield. Here is how it looks attached:
I can confirm that it does twist and bend in a lot of ways, but until it is on the mobile suit itself I can still only guess at its usefulness.
With all of this complete, we wrap up this post. Tune in next time to see the assembly of another random body part!
Other Thoughts
- Considering how many fancy features Bandai went out of its way to add to this kit, I figure they really ought to have added a dry transfer or waterslide decal for the shield’s markings. They are unarguably the most visible and visually interesting markings on the model, but their size ensures that they very much stand out as decals, even if you do no get them dirty, like I did. A waterslide or dry transfer would have looked much better.