Ten Years

 

            The first “Modeler’s Musings” column debuted in Modeling Madness on December 1, 1998.  Scott Van Aken, who has been so kind as to host these monthly ruminations of mine, came up with the catchy name and allowed me to entertain my fan base (yeah, right – all six of them) for a decade now.

            I have been a huge supporter of Modeling Madness ever since it blazed a trail on the then relatively new internet in 1995.  From its very modest beginnings, Modeling Madness quickly grew to become one of the premier sites for scale aircraft modelers in just a short time, which is all the more remarkable considering how it’s all done by one dedicated man on a budget that can be characterized as just barely resembling a shoe string.  One thing that I love about Scott is his insistence on remaining true to the mission, which is to provide a full-build review of some kit each day – something that the more popular modeling websites cannot boast.  Even to this day, I read every word of every review.  It is the personal experiences of everyday modelers that make this place special.

            I wanted to give something back to the modeling community as a token of my appreciation for all that I had learned, as my modeling skills had improved immensely because of the daily sharing of the trials and tribulations of building a model.  I had always intended the monographs to be slightly different than a standard editorial, where the writer emphasizes their personal opinion on a give subject.  I have attempted to take a more passive and observational style that unfortunately still somehow manages to ruffle feathers, judging on some of the more irate feedback e-mail that I’ve received over the years.  That’s to be expected, a price to pay for being part of the public arena.  But the back story has always been about the journey and less about the results.  We modelers are different than most ordinary people.  We look at things in different ways, have different motivations, and derive pleasure from tasks that would drive most people up a wall.

            I do have recurring themes based on my core beliefs and they show up frequently in the writings.   I wish there was a way that we could de-emphasize competition in our hobby, as I believe that contests tend to scare more modelers off than they attract.  I think that the current trend of stylized weathering of a model with heavy-handed pre- and post-shading as typified by “The Spanish School” is leading to models that end up being gross caricatures of the real thing.  I believe that efforts to involve children in our hobby (and lord knows I’ve tried by running make-n-takes, taught model building classes, organized shopping mall and history museum displays, and sponsored juniors-only events in local hobby shops) are almost entirely ineffective as the current generation of kids growing up simply aren’t much interested in the craft.  I feel that it is the adults that we need to focus on to bring new blood into our hobby.  I believe that our hobby is not dying, but it is evolving into mostly an adult pursuit, much like model railroading or wooden ship building.  That means kits with high every higher levels of quality, but also much higher price tags and limited outlets for finding them to purchase.  Lastly, I believe that the mythical anti-social Rivet Counter is just that: a myth.  While boorish people exist in all walks of life, the people I personally know that are passionate about a particular subject enough to be considered an expert are more than happy to share their knowledge in a non-judgmental way.

The internet community started as an interesting adjunct to the hobby.  Now it has become a savior as the overall number of modelers shrink and the ability to interact with other like-minded people becomes possible only electronically.  We need sites and forums like Modeling Madness now more than ever.  This is why I wince when I see disparaging comments made about other sites as if somehow the committed readers “over there” are somehow our enemies.  Trust me, we have much more in common with each other than we differ.

            Much about our hobby amuses me.  I still marvel at how many people who consider themselves modelers regularly buy kits, participate in on-line discussion forums, haunt hobby store aisles, and attend contests, yet they haven’t built a single model in years.  I find it shocking that modelers accumulate stashes that number in the thousands.  There’s no harm in it, but one has to marvel at the propensity to collect kits in such numbers that mathematical impossibility prevents them from ever being built.  I also get a kick out of the geeky aspects of the knowledge we have accumulated, resulting in us peppering World War II crew chiefs about the paint color of arcane details of aircraft they worked on half a century before.  I find this funny mostly because it, well, kind of describes me.

            My modeling friend Steven has a motto, which I find to be extremely wise and one that all of us should abide by: stop telling others how to enjoy their hobby.  I’ve tried to be very careful to temper my Musings comments with that in mind, lest I come across as supercilious know-it-all.  If you want to make your model with panel lines that are so darkly accented that it looks as if a bomb went off on the inside, then more power to you.  I can state my opinion, if asked, that it doesn’t look particularly realistic to my eye, but I would never tell you to stop doing it.  It’s your model, to build in a way that makes you happiest.

            The single thing that amazes me the most over the past ten years has been the sheer volume and variety of state-of-the-art kits that have become available to us.  On-line ordering has enabled those of us, like me, who have no local hobby shop anymore to order all our supplies with just a few clicks of a mouse.  Without that capability, I don’t believe I could continue.  Without a hobby shop, I rely completely on the writings and opinions of others through on-line reviews and forum comments.  Since new kits have become relatively expensive, I need to know what I’m getting into before I part with my hard-earned cash.  This is why Modeling Mandess is so important to me, and I hope the readers understand this valuable service that they get for free.

            Lastly, my intention for “Modeler’s Musings” was to not repeat dissertations on the same subject.  While not always possible, for the most part the 120 columns of the last decade have varied in topic to the best of my ability.  For this reason, I’m going to take a little hiatus and see if I can recharge my batteries and gather some new material before returning for another run.  I hope all of us will continue to support Modeling Madness, particularly when it comes to contributing to the annual operating fund that allows Scott to continue publishing this endeavor.

            So, thanks to Scott and thanks to all of my loyal readers (all six of them) for allowing me to share my words with you for ten years.  Who knows what the next ten years will bring?  I, for one, can’t wait to see.