AMERICA BUILD: SD Freedom (Painted)

Happy "day after independence day" to all you Americans out there. And to everyone else, hello! 

It might be a day late, but here is my Freedom Gundam build for the 4th of July. 

I love to build Gunpla, that is no secret, but one of my favorite things to do besides building, is buying little projects like these. The SD Freedom is an older SD kit, lacking a lot of detail, and correct colors. Many of the pieces are molded in single color plastic, requiring stickers every which way to complete it. (and even after all the stickers, it leaves much to be desired)

I picked this kit up from a small Toy and Gift shop Moritaya, tucked in the Japan Center in JapanTown in San Francisco, while on vacation. 

I did my very best to try to paint this little guy up, from head to toe, front to back. 

The colors I used were: 

Gundam Markers: 

Red for all red sections

Black for all the navy sections

silver for the gray sections

Blue for blue sections

Metallic green for the rifle lens

White for rifle

light blue for head cameras

ultra fine black and gray for panel lining

real touch for grit

Testors:

Metallic Silver for priming white sections

Flat Yellow for V-fin

It came out pretty nice in my opinion, with a few hiccups. My trashcan looks like the American Flag made out of q-tips because of all the cleanup I had to do. 

I also used a real touch marker to dirty the kit up, because the white was way too bright for my liking. I prefer my Gundams (with the exception of Unicorn) to be more on the dirty white side. 

For the first time I painted up the shield and rifle as well. It came out very nice, but most of my hardship was had here. The shield would run and I would also slip and mark up the wrong places and have to clean it up. After it all, the topcoat ended up ruining some of the paint, so I had to repaint it again after. 

The Freedom is one of, if not my favorite Mobile Suit design. Bash Gundam SEED as much as you want, but in High School, this is what got me back into Gundam. I'm not a huge fan of the Strike Freedom as much, but the Freedom definitely is up there on my list. 

I love picking up older SD kits and really putting in some extra effort in painting it. The simplicity in the build allowed me to really focus on painting and not have to dread putting it all together afterward. 

I wouldn't suggest this kit for a builder. It is much to simple in its build and its colors. If you like to paint, however, this kit is like a blank canvas! Now he is proudly standing on the shelf, in all its glorious red white and blue. 

Til next time!