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Hi I'm QDC. What we're going to build today is Dragon's Panther Model G Late Production.
And this is a part of a comic book series from Japan called "The Narrative of the Black
Knight." It's a comic book series written by an artist. His name is Nortofumi Kuyobayashi
from Japan. I never saw or read any of his comics but I guess in Japan he fairly famous.
So Dragon has made a set of models based on his comics and he's famous for I guess making
comics based on World War Two German armor. So the reason why I bought this was mainly
because it was on sale and I was a little curious about how Dragon would make their
model tanks based upon comic book series. S lets go ahead and start building this kit
now.
Lets take a look inside this box. We have photo etched parts. Commander cupola. DS tracks.
Drive sprockets. Upper hull. Lower hull. Top turret. Gun mallet. Figures. Not sure what
that is. Wheels. And the instruction sheet.
OK. So from my experiences working with Dragon model kits. I learned that Dragon, especially
their Smart Kits, like this one that I'm about to build. It's not the easiest to build because
the instruction sheet are so poor. So what I'm going to do is that I'm going to follow
instruction from one through seventeen and then I'm going to see where this takes me.
I want to show you something pretty cool about Dragon. Dragon has faithfully reproduced the
suspension system for this Panther tank. The Panther tank uses very advanced suspension
system called torsion bar system. And this is the torsion bar right here. During World
War Two, the two prominent suspension system is a coil spring system or leaf spring system.
But the Germans back in World War Two used for this particular tank the torsion bar system
in which this bar when pressure back and forth like this. The bar would twist back to its
shape and thus causing a spring like suspension. Very advance for its time. And Dragon has
faithfully reproduced that suspension system onto this model and it included an interior
as well. Excellent. I like it.
I just finished installing the suspension system and I want to tell you what I think
about it so far. This model kit is very impressive. With all the wheels put together it looks
very well detailed and very realistic. I like the way Dragon offered the torsion bar system
right over here. It's very impressive.
You're looking at the hull of the tank and I'm pointing at the front fender. I'm going
to represent that this vehicle has battle damage so I'm going to bend a fender. I'm
going to use my fingers and simply bend the fender.
Here's quick tip on using photo etched parts. Some of you have never used photo etched parts
or didn't care too much to use it. But photo etched parts its not that hard to use. This
is made out of metal and to remove this it similar to working with plastic parts. I'm
going to use a ordinary hobby knife and simply cut in the areas where it needs to cut. Like
so. And then I'm going to use Super Glue to glue it on to place.
I"m going to talk to you more about Dragon's DS Track system right over here. Above it
is the traditional vinyl track system which I call "rubber band" track system. The details
of the the traditional track system are not that good and it hard to put it on because
you need to use a hot iron to fasten these things together. On the other hand Dragon's
DS Track system is very well detailed and you can well see from the bottom and the good
part about is that you don't have to use a hot iron to actually assemble this together.
You can use ordinary plastic model cement.
When you use rubber band tracks there is a certain challenge you have to overcome. As
you can well see the tracks on the upper part of the track is actually going flopping up
and and not resting on top of the wheels as it supposed to be in reality. So this this
is Dragon's DS Tracks system, I can use ordinary plastic model cement and glue the tracks onto
the plastic wheel right over here. Right over here are three pieces of aluminum foil that
I crumpled up and I'm going to use them as inserts to hold the tracks down and then by
using ordinary cement to glue it in place.
Alright. So I just completed the construction of the model kit and now it's time for me
to show you what I think about this kit that I built so far. Take a look.
This is the completed model kit before painting and I like it a lot. What I'm pointing at
is the instruction sheet. And what made this kit so likable to me is there was only one
mistake I found in the instruction sheet which in quite amazing. Since the instruction sheet
was good it made the entire model easy to build. Now I'm not much of a fan of rubber
band track system but Dragon has made the DS Track very, very easy and very well detailed
to put on. I like it a lot. I also like the photo etched parts that on the rear deck of
this tank. A very good kit and again I like it a lot.
It's time for me to paint my model kit. I installed my home made hood. If you plan to
use enamel spray paints like I do it's always a good idea to use a hood so you can vent
out all the vapors out into the open. So the first step in painting my kit is I'm going
to paint the entire model with a coat of primer.
I want to give my entire model shadows so I'm going to paint my entire model black.
I just removed my hood because from here on out I'm going to use acrylic spray paints.
I want to give my chip effects and the first step for me to have chip effects is spray
the entire model with a coat of hair spray.
I'm going to use my airbrush and paint the main color.
I"m going to give my model a wash. What you see right here is a dilution of black artist
oil paint and mineral spirits. I'm going to put this onto my entire model to give it a
wash.
I'm going to do some dry brushing. What you see right here is a lighter color of the main
color of the tank. What is dry brushing basically I'm taking the color paint taking most of
it out and then lightly brushing on to my model to give highlights.
I'm going to simulate chipped paint. What I have in my hand is a moistened brush with
water and I'm to put onto the areas where I think there's going to be chipped paint.
Then I let it soak into the paint for a minute or two which I already done before and I'm
going to use a toothpick and I'm going to just push the paint around until it starts
to show chipped effects.
I'm going to have mud effects. What you see right here is a dilution of yellow glue. What
you see right here is a cup tile grout. What I'm going to do is I"m going to put some of
the glue onto places where I want to have mud and then I'm to sprinkle on tile grout
on the wheels. Then I'm going to shake it off. There we go.
I just painted the figure and it looks pretty good. The clothing and facial expression looks
very, very nice. It looks very similar to the comic book character and if you're interested
in knowing more about how I paint this particular figure I made another video called "Tamiya
Russian Army Tank Crew at Rest." In that particular video I showed exactly how I paint figures.
OK so I just completed building the kit. I painted it. I weathered it. And now it's time
for me to tell you and show you what I think about this kit. Take a look.
This is the completed model kit from beginning to end and I like it. Now I have to mention
this to you. When I first got this kit I didn't think this was going to be a very well detailed
kit because from my experiences when model makers make a model based upon a movie or
a comic or something like that the details doesn't tend to be good. But this is something
very different. Dragon has really made a really nice kit I think basically what they done
was they had simply used their Panther regular tank and simply changed the decals and added
a comic book figure to make it into a make it into this comic book model kit. The details
are very, very nice and I like the DS Tracks. Very nice. It's quite a nice one because I'm
not much of a fan of rubber band tracks but this DS Track is really good. Very good details
and I highly recommend this for both the intermediate and advanced modeler. I wouldn't recommend
this to the beginner because its complicated even with a very good instruction sheet.
That completes this model kit. This model kit is really good. Now I am very pleasantly
surprised that Dragon has made a very good set of instructions for me to build this model
kit and it turned out to be...it could have been a nightmare for me to build this kit
because I was afraid that the instructions sheet was really bad but it wasn't. I only
found one mistake so it made this entire kit very enjoyable. I highly recommend modelers
from the intermediate and the advance to build this kit. For those beginners that are out
there I'm sorry I don't think this is really the right one for you because there are over
600 parts in this particular kit. If you're a beginner and you really want to go for it,
its doable but have a lot of patience. Have a lot of patience. What you're seeing next
is video slide show of my entire completed model kit but before I go as always. Just
because I put this video here on Youtube it doesn't make me a model kit expert. I am not
an expert. I'm just a regular guy just like you. I hope this video has inspired you to
build a model kit of your own. Either it's a model tank; a model plane; a model ship;
a model train; or even an automobile. It doesn't matter. In the end. It's all about having
fun. I"m QDC thanks for watching and have a great day!