I left to pick up paint at a favorite nearby store, Andy’s Hobby Headquarters, and came home with this:

This is absolutely one of my favorite sci-fi spacecraft of all time, and the film is a favorite too. It seemed to run frequently on cable when I was a kid and these machines really sucked me in for their incredible design alone. I can’t recall anything else looking like this from the time period. Utterly unique.

I read some time ago that the floating design of the ships was due to logistics of handling the tripod legs that the Martian war machines had in the original book. The Tom Cruise film opted to use the legs and still managed to create a pretty unique and intriguing alien spacecraft. Yes, I have one of those kits in my stash too. Why I didn’t have this one until now is a mystery even to me.

These used to come plated in a gold-ish color but no more. That’s really for the best, however, as there’s no way to make the seamless body look right without repainting after filling and sanding. The dilemma, however, is finding a color that is both similar in shade (copper? bronze? I don’t think it’s straight gold, right?) and shiny enough to approach the reflective nature of those metals. I’m considering painting gold and then using Micro Mesh to get as close to a glass-smooth finish as is possible. I used Micro Mesh on some small scuffs of the Apache canopy and for a first time effort, it was pretty great. If anyone out there knows of any paint, preferably spray paint, that can accomplish this, let me know. I know Alclad II works well for the silvery metals, but I can’t recall seeing anything like that for the yellow/brown metals. (And I also don’t really want to mess with airbrushing Alclad II in the house…)