2008-08-14 Worth every penny

This book is worth absolutely every penny.

I'm a fairly experienced modeller and my tanks look pretty good.... but they don't QUITE look real. There's always something about a model that makes it obviously a model and I didn't quite realise what it was.

This book has solved my problem: its texture.

Plastic kits always look too smooth and shiny no matter how well you paint them and MIG shows you how to replicate casting marks, chips, different layers of paint and weld marks perfectly. His techniques are straight forward and don't need terribly expensive tools. Obviously he favours the products he makes himself (Mig pigments and Sin industries filter sets) but to be fair they're the best products available, are easily found and are simple to use.

£40 for a book is a lot, but not when you compare it to the cost of a decent model. In the introduction MIG says this book isn't to be kept on a shelf- its a tool to be splattered with paint and solvent and left on your workbench. He's right. This is a proper modelling book for proper modellers who really want to get the most out of the hobby. The sheer size of it and wealth of techniques makes it a far better buy than the cheaper, but wafer thing Osprey books that dominate the market.

If it has one flaw its that MIG writes in Spanish which is a very poetic language and the english translation is quite literal in places which can read strangely. There's a fair few spelling mistakes and 1 or 2 mistranslations, but as this is a mostly pictorial book these won't cause anyone any problems.