The time constraints that you almost aways have (unless your clients give you open-ended deadlines, which frankly I hate) force you to treat it like any other job, creating the need for speed, efficiency and the maintenance of high quality results.
9th June 2025
There is no doubt that building models for a living to constant deadlines is a very different pursuit, than building them at your own pace as a leisure pursuit. Today – the first day of my working week and the first day of a new project for work – has illustrated that as clearly as any project I have tackled recently. That new project is the Tamiya 1/48 F-35C Lightning II and today, I carried out almost all of its construction…
From the very start of my career in this industry, I have had to work out ways of being as productive as possible, as often as possible. Those systems have had to work within the constraints of timescales that any sensible modeller would consider – quite rightly, I have to say! – restrictive and distinctly, not fun. When speed is of the essence, I have had to settle over the years on ways of constructing and painting models so that I can hit each and every deadline that has been set for me, both self-imposed when I was the chief cook and bottle washer as the head of the magazines I edited, and latterly in the service of the editors Marcus Nicholls and Brett Green, whose magazines I build for each month.
Today was good example of how that can work in action when needs-must.
This month I am tasked with building the Tamiya F-35C. The article will be split into two parts beginning with all assembly, internal areas, cockpit, weapons bay, that kind of thing and then in the next part, I’ll bring the whole shooting match together with painting, decalling and final assembly. It’s all fairly stock stuff and nothing that I’m not familiar with.
The plan had been to start this model last week, but other jobs got in the way, so I am one week behind schedule, despite the deadline not having moved (as you might imagine). That being so, I’ve had to speed the process up, so instead of gently settling into the first part with some relaxing assembly work, today, I’ve spent nine hours building almost everything that constitutes a sub-assembly, at least all of the larger bits and pieces. That means that all of the airframe parts are now ready to paint, the only parts not being constructed being the undercarriage legs and the ejection seat. That’s it.
There are definitely pros and cons to this approach. There pros are that the models can be built very quickly, my mind only focussing on clipping parts from the runners and sticking them together. No paint. No mess. Just clean construction. The cons are that I now have a mountain of small parts that’ll have to be painted – a daunting task given the complexity of the F-35’s finish, both inside and out. The other con is that in this case, I’m not getting the most from what should be a wonderful kit to enjoy. Not rush through. Not treat as yet another project.
Building models as a professional occupation (a job I still can’t believe I have!) is very different from building models for a hobby. The time constraints that you almost aways have (unless your clients give you open-ended deadlines, which frankly I hate) force you to treat it like any other job, creating the need for speed, efficiency and the maintenance of high quality results. Today’s assembly session certainly falls within the first two categories, my work being both fast and efficient. In fact so much so, that I am confident that my week-long delay will be all but wiped out by lunchtime tomorrow. As for the quality part, time will tell if that aspect of this particular project comes to fruition, painting weathering and decalling, being steps that are way more prone to accidents than the simple task of clippin’ and stickin’…
See you tomorrow.
SPENCER POLLARD'S KIT BOX 
Your words hit home. I was the photo editor for an aviation history magazine and each issue had a short “modeling” column that usually related to one of the features. When the author of that piece retired, the duty subtly slipped into my lap as the editor knew of my hobby. I said yes rather emphatically and admit that I did enjoy building and writing a few words about the “adventure.” The original author did give me a word of warning to try and not let it become “a job” and try to remember to have fun. Deadlines are deadlines and from time to time, builds that started out as “fun” soon became “a job” from time to time in spite of my best efforts.
Sadly, the magazine has gone, but I still build, adding some words on an online post, always surprised anyone reads. Today, the deadlines are self imposed but happy that it’s still a hobby.
Thanks
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