The HobbyLink Japan hobbylink.tv‘s Playing with Plamo 2013 contest winners have finally been announced and I managed to get fourth place in the advanced category.

Thank you to HLJ and the Hobbylink.tv crew for the competition and for altering the rules somewhat this year allowing it to be a more enjoyable experience. I also want to thank the guys at GundamUK / The Mecha Lounge forums since the PG RX-78-2 I used for this contest came from the Mecha Lounge contest in 2012.

I started this build in October and finished it at the very end of December just before the deadline. This came right after the very long and frustrating MG Sinanju build which made me a little worried about this but even though this is a Perfect Grade its age made it somewhat simple in comparison.

When I originally started this I wanted to do a PG RX-78-2 like the ones Suny Buny has done, going so far as buying the decals in advance. But as I was finishing up the Sinanju I kept checking out the WIP’s of the other contestants and felt that my original idea just wasn’t enough. So while trying various color schemes I ended up deciding on the color scheme of my favorite Gundam the Nu. But then I had the idea that maybe I should add some panel lines, pla bits, and modify a few areas here and there in order to give the kit a RG RX-78-2 / Nu ver.ka look. I wanted to up the detail but not go overboard since I didn’t have the time, money, or resources to do a bunch of heavy modifications.

After building it and drawing on the layout of some of the details I started modding the chest to have it resemble the Nu’s chest.

From there I scratch built the shoulder camera like the Nu’s using the techniques I learned in Thehelmosengine video.

A few more mods like hand guards, extra sections for the beam rifle, and altering the skirts and face all helped it look a bit more Nu’ish.

Besides the bad seamlines on the beam rifle that I had to get creative with to hide the biggest cause of frustration for me was the shield. I removed some aspects of the shield to give it a more streamlined Nu Gundam look and filling in these areas was such a huge headache. I can’t even say how many times I filled in the gaps, sanded them, and primed them to only find them uneven. Eventually I came to the conclusion it must have been the materials I was using and if this situation arises again I will use some alternatives.

With all the mods and extra detailing complete I painted the armor and the inner frames in various colors (which I will go into more detail in the follow up post) and ordered some custom decals from Samuel decal which luckily arrived in the nick of time.