- Joined
- Dec 1, 2016
- Messages
- 5,136
- Points
- 728
have always been interested in building model ships from the age of about 8 onwards, but kits never gave me any satisfaction, or sense of achievement. When I found Plank on Frame Models, by Harold A Underhill, in 1964, it was like a breath of fresh air. My first serious model was the Leon, and the satisfaction that I had built all of it, started me on a lifelong hobby of scratch building ship models. In the 21st century, scratch building has virtually died out. I have recommended those two books to lots of new modelers, but very few have ever taken it up, preferring large, expensive kits. Admittedly, a well-built kit far surpasses most scratch built models, but their value is diminished by the fact that they are confined to the same old subjects and duplicated in their thousands.
there use to be a magazine Model Ship Builder which stopped publishing years ago and it was bought out by Ship in Scale. Now Ships in Scale has closed its doors and stopped publishing. This leaves the hobby with no magazine or worth while publication. Times they are changing and forums such as this one is the new information source for the hobby.
It all sort of makes sense printed magazines are obsolete. Take a how to article in print, part 1 is published and you have to wait 3 months for the next part in a quarterly published magazine. Any magazine can not afford an in depth article as space is limited. Now a forum build log is updated as the build continues and as a reader you can post a question and get an instant answer.
I agree the scratch building in the hobby has died out and replaced by better and better kits. Kit builders do not need to go deep into research, they do not need long winded articles just good kit instructions. As a matter of fact you don't even need instructions because all kits are built the same, all you need is one good article on planking a hull and that covers just about all the kits out there.
to go forward from here people interested in model ship building need to support and most of all contribute to this forum. Why this forum? because it is the only international forum that allows all kit regardless of who manufactured it and where, with kits being over 90% of the hobby it is very important that ALL kits are included. Secondly this forum does not block build logs from the general public and guests to the forum it is wide open for everyone.
so with the last printed magazine now gone and no other publication that covers kits, scratch building and from rank beginner through intermediate builders to the pros this is it so let us all add our 2 cents worth the future is E-publishing and not old school printed magazines and journals. This is a sign of the times printing is a thing of the past.
there use to be a magazine Model Ship Builder which stopped publishing years ago and it was bought out by Ship in Scale. Now Ships in Scale has closed its doors and stopped publishing. This leaves the hobby with no magazine or worth while publication. Times they are changing and forums such as this one is the new information source for the hobby.
It all sort of makes sense printed magazines are obsolete. Take a how to article in print, part 1 is published and you have to wait 3 months for the next part in a quarterly published magazine. Any magazine can not afford an in depth article as space is limited. Now a forum build log is updated as the build continues and as a reader you can post a question and get an instant answer.
I agree the scratch building in the hobby has died out and replaced by better and better kits. Kit builders do not need to go deep into research, they do not need long winded articles just good kit instructions. As a matter of fact you don't even need instructions because all kits are built the same, all you need is one good article on planking a hull and that covers just about all the kits out there.
to go forward from here people interested in model ship building need to support and most of all contribute to this forum. Why this forum? because it is the only international forum that allows all kit regardless of who manufactured it and where, with kits being over 90% of the hobby it is very important that ALL kits are included. Secondly this forum does not block build logs from the general public and guests to the forum it is wide open for everyone.
so with the last printed magazine now gone and no other publication that covers kits, scratch building and from rank beginner through intermediate builders to the pros this is it so let us all add our 2 cents worth the future is E-publishing and not old school printed magazines and journals. This is a sign of the times printing is a thing of the past.