I'd like to thank all of those who kindly submitted their tips, tricks and techniques to help augment
our websites section on how to improve our model building skills. As of today, I have roughly 30
individual items in the collection. Shortly, since the busy summer season is finally winding down,
I plan to post a copy of an article writing template for these techniques and a sample of what we're
looking for. If you're not computer savvy or just don't like to write, don't fret - we'll do it for you.
Just keep those good ideas coming in.
At this month's club meeting, I will be demonstrating how to access internet websites that are
chock full of useful information on models, model building and references on all sorts of topics and
subjects. This just goes to show another benefit of relocating to the Knights of Columbus hall...
wireless internet access.
Justen Hanna, proprietor extraordinaire of Section 8 Hobbies will give us an update on "What's New
In The Hobby", I'm sure there will be an assortment of really cool kits for your perusal to purchase
from our homegrown vendors. Have something you've built or is in progress? Bring it in to show it off.
Thanks again for your efforts and I'll see you Monday evening at the club meeting.
John Zaranek
President
IPMS Niagara Frontier
IPMS USA No. 47993
Notes from the August 2012 Meeting
Well, our new location seems to be working out pretty well. There are still some things that need
some work to control the noise level, particularly during the table discussions. To start, we came up
with three immediate requests.
Justen Hanna gave us a detailed dealers insight into new and coming kits, supplies and publications.
There are certainly plenty of things to spend your cash on these days.
Dave and Patsy Schwab spent some time at the IPMS Nationals in Orlando on their honeymoon and gave
us a short report and some statistics. The Nationals are always a treat and this one sounds like it was
particularly well done.
President John Zaranek reminded everyone that ROCON, the annual IPMS Rochester show, is coming up on
September 16. We had plenty of flyers, so I hope you took one, or you can check it out on line at
www.ipmsrochester.com.
John also reminded us that we are interested in adding more tips and demo material to our website.
We have a pool of 20+ now and John had a handout with some ideas and practices for structuring your demo.
We discussed distributing the club member rosters as we did years ago when the club was smaller.
Everyone seemed to think it is a good idea, but the issue of privacy came up. We decided to pass the
roster around at the next meeting so everyone can update their info and cross out whatever info they
don't want shared. We'll distribute the edited list at the October meeting.
Well, the Tim Horton's Challenge model entries were due at the August meeting. Here are the completed
entries that made the August tables.
For Rich Bernecki's team: 7 completed
For John Doerr's team: 8 completed
Frank's last minute dash to get his entry in won the event for John's team. The entries were all well
done and there is certainly some BuffCon material there.
We also had quite a few non-Challenge models on the tables.
John Zaranek's current project is a 1/35 Trumpeter ASLAV-25, an Australian version of the ubiquitous Light Armored Vehicle. It's got a lot of nicely detailed parts. John's got 16 hours in it so far and it's looking good.
Dan Marafino is again branching out into further fields of modeling and shared some of the supplies
he uses; "Mold Builder" for masking, Sculpey for making figures and stuff, a new and very nice magazine
called "Weathering", several Modelmania figure modeling DVD's and newly finished model of Elvira draped
on a couch.
Mike Butry brought in a neat Bat-cycle that he's been working on. It's a pretty cool little model.
Patsy Schwab showed her Third Place Nationals winner, a vintage Revell Apollo Man in Space model on
a nice base to give that "space" feel. She replaced the fragile plastic umbilical cord with wire for a
self-supporting astronaut.
Matt Keysa showed the new Commander Models all resin French GPF 155mm field gun kit he bought at
Section 8. There's one of these in great condition in the Lancaster Town Park. Matt plans to use this
model to depict one of the German Pont du Hoche emplacements at Normandy as of D-Day. He also showed
some 1/72 photoetched Russian small arms that fold over to beef them up. Matt's got a plan for these
little guys.
John Zachritz brought in a couple of dinosaur models. His Tamiya Brachiosaurus has some great hide
texture that really responds to dry brushing. John used dark red spray primer for a durable base for
the dry brushing. His Lindberg Protoceratops is far less nicely textured but looks fine in a "color
scheme" taken from the Internet.
Tony Gliszczynski pulled a partly finished Monogram 1/24 Lumina he bought as part of a collection
off the shelf and finished it up in the kit supplied Kellogg's Corn Flakes NASCAR colors. The car looks
great in bright red and yellow.
Joe Szczygiel finished up the table models with his in-progress scratch built horse drawn Genesee
beer wagon. He's building it for a new museum in the Rochester area and he's on a tight schedule. Good
thing he's a super-fast builder. It's a pretty good sized model and well detailed. There's still a lot
of work to do, with all the horses and harness work. Should be cool.
Finally, some around the room shots of the meeting.
It was fun evening with lots of stuff to see and talk about. Bring yours next month!
Our next meeting is Monday, September 17 at 7 PM, at our new spot in the Knights of Columbus
Hall, 2736 Union Rd., Cheektowaga. See you then, bring a friend and don't forget to bring in a
finished, in-progress or new kit to show off.
Thanks to Bob Collignon for the photography.
