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AFV Modeller Ltd. |
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AIR Modeller Magazine, Issue #5 April/May 2006 |
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Reviewed By Phil Pignataro, #17254 |
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MSRP: £48.28 GBP (6 issues) Just look at the cover and you’ll be impressed. This bi-monthly aircraft modeling magazine from the United Kingdom is a relative new comer to the modeling community, but one well worth looking for. It’s a high quality publication featuring work from several very talented modelers. This particular issue has articles about, and large, high quality photographs of, the Me 262A-1a/U, B-58, F4U-7, and P-38F. The models are in 1/48 scale, except for the B-58 which is the 1/72 Italeri kit. Each article explains with really nice pictures how the builder built, added extra detail, and painted the kit. The B-58 is completed in natural metal and the builder shared his techniques to get that realistic looking finish. He really did a great job. In addition to the feature about the Hasegawa P-38F, there is an accompanying article about the development and operations of the P-38. This article has lots of black and white photos. In keeping with the P-38 theme, the “Xtreme detail” section of the magazine has six pages of close-up, color photos of various parts of actual aircraft as well as some B/W archival pictures of the cockpit. This article concludes with two pages of color profiles of different P-38s. All of this information is very helpful to the modeler. Next, there is a section called “Air Born – new releases.” As you can guess, it has reviews of several new (“born,” get it?) kits and resin accessories. These reviews are the “in the box” type, not reviews of completed kits. Surprisingly, the final article in this issue concerns painting figures. It offers several techniques for achieving realistic looking results. The author details a couple of WWII Luftwaffe pilot figures as a demonstration and contends a well done figure adds to your model or diorama. One thing you won’t find in this magazine is advertisements. The only one there is on the inside of the back cover for interactive CDs about WWII fighters. Another thing I appreciated about this magazine is the semi-matt finish of the pages which I find easy to read. Now for the down side. It’s a little expensive for a sixty-five page publication. A one-year subscription from Wise Owl Worldwide Publications is $90 -- $15 an issue. I don’t know what the price is for a single issue at the hobby shop, but it’s likely more than the subscription rate. So the high quality and lack of advertisements come at a price. Sort of like everything else these days. You can get more information from www.wiseowlmagazines.com and www.afvmodeler.com. My thanks go to John Noack and AFV Modeller Ltd for the review sample. |
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