WIP: Resistance X-Wing (Bandai)

Continuing my Bandai kick of Star Wars models!

I bought this kit a few months ago, as one can never have too many X-Wings (I have a Fine Molds 1:72 scale built, and a Fine Molds 1:48 scale still in the box). However, I did not have any Resistance X-Wings, which are somewhat different in design than those from the Original Trilogy, even if my wife can't tell the difference and wonders why I need to buy another model kit. Ahem.

Anyways. I was originally going to do the Bandai Millennium Falcon next, but once I discovered the fine folks over at Paragrafix were releasing a photo etch set very soon for it, I put it on hold to do this. The next reasonable question is, what color do I paint it? Do I do the standard gray/blue for the Resistance, or do I do the "hero" ship and go black/orange for Poe? I had trouble deciding until I finally found a way to make a choice. I bought two!

So I'm doing side by side builds at this point. I'm also documenting for Youtube, so keep an eye on my channel and subscribe here and there for updates.

I started with the wings, which were pretty straightforward, even if the instructions are in Japanese. With Bandai's fantastic BB-8, all the parts that needed to be different colors could be separated and painted as such. Not the case here. Some of the blue parts are already molded on detail, and this kit wants you to do decals for the blue paneling instead. So instead of painting the parts then building, this is going to be larger subassemblies and masking.

After building four wing sets, I decided to skip ahead and do the pilot and cockpit interiors, as they'll have to be built and painted prior to airbrushing everything else. I started by putting the pilots in an uncomfortable situation:

Then I built most of the interior, leaving the final panel console that slots in above the pilot as a separate piece, and primed the figures in light gray, and the interior in black. The helmets have dedicated decals, but only for the standard Resistance pilot, not for Poe, so I had to hand paint Poe's helmet. I then drybrushed the interior with some metallic paint, and picked out some random details. I mixed the orange jumpsuit paint with About 3 parts Troll Slayer Orange to one part Mephiston Red, then slotted the pilot down and put the console on it.

And that's where it stops today! A weekend's worth of work, even despite Tabletop Day (yay!), so I feel like I got a decent chunk accomplished. Next up I'm going to assemble the fuselage and work on masking off the already painted interior. Until then! Thanks for tuning in.