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No problem Scott, gotta keep an eye on google sometimes, especially when it starts switching laguages on you!
Scott, your action underscores the substrate of the topic, we all get lost in the moment.
Now if everyone affected would just to a quick Edit in their posts (as there does not seem to be a way to do this en masse) and delete the image? Pax.
I think “too far” is too subjective to really draw a line in the sand.
I mean, a few months ago there was MIG-something or other in FSM that was crazy-detailed. Hundreds of parts…IN THE WHEEL BAYS! Some elements shaved off and made to scale thickness with PUTTY! I couldn’t even fathom how to do that. The build was stunning, but to an extent I do have to question the builder’s sanity.
That said…I’m totally planning on drilling out the wing guns on my P-51 WIP and replacing them with slide-fit micro-tubing. Which is kind of silly, yeah, but will look oh-so awesome when all is said and done. I’m contemplating filling all the wing panels forward of the gun bays, too, but haven’t made up my mind there. I read recently an observation that the wear and tear of mission hours, plus the various painting and stripping (as with invasion stripes and such) probably knocked a lot of that filler out, but I’m not an expert enough to believe or not believe it.
Glad this has had a happy resolution. I retract my admonishing comment.
I too retract my comment and fully and humbley accept the apology offered as perfectly acceptable.
As for the original intent if this thread. My personal problem I have is when I spend a ton of time on one area then virtually ignore others. Right now, I have 24 1/48th scale B-17 engines on my bench, all of them are gonna get wired up, have the 2 piece metal ring added, AND have scratch built prop governors added, again, 24 of them. BUT…will I add brake lines to the landing legs? Maybe.
I don’t know if there is a “too far” for me. What I have done is try to do the next kit a little better than the last. I can look at my first model through my last and see the progression. I am not to the point where I am ready to put a $20 after market barrel on a $40 tank, but I also don’t just take the barrel off the sprue and mount it to the turret right away either.
I guess I will know “too far” when I get there, but for now there is still much more I can improve on.
Joe
All modelers have what I have come to call “degree of stupidity” when building. For example a person who builds OOB and does a stock paint job has a low DOS and somebody that does the aforementioned MIG build has a very high DOS.
I fall somewhere toward the high end of DOS and have discovered what I call “DOS creep” in that the DOS seems to go up with each model I build as I notice more and more details through my 10x Optivisor. For the life of me I can’t figure out how to stop it! My hat’s off to the people who have a certain point to where they take their builds and go no further but I am also blown away by the person who will spend thousands of hours and dollars to create their perfect opus.
Disclaimer: I am NOT calling any body stupid but for lack of a better word “degree of stupidity” seems to work. But most of all, beware “DOS creep”!
Pat.
Ooooooccasionally I will find myself carefully filing and cleaning off mold seams from things like leaf springs on a 72nd scale vehicle. Yes I know, making a model is a personal thing and a challenge. But eventually you need to realize why you are making the model.
It’s so someone can look at it and go wow did you make that?
And of course that is your moment.
So if the mere idea of them picking it up and looking under it makes you cringe (mainly because they just picked up your friggin model… why do idiots think we want them to pick up our damned models eh?), then it is possible a lot of the work being done, is portentially stupid.
In recent years I have learned to master the art of ‘get real’ when it has come to how far is too far.
I already know how good of a modeler I am. I also know I was a lot more enthusiastic 20 years ago when my eyes were a lot younger too 
I’ve been paid to make things in the past. I’ve even done this hobby professionally for a time.
Today though, it’s about not dying with kits unfinished
Nobody really cares if you have a ‘stash’ guys. It’s the truth. We’d be impressed if you had them all finished.
HisNHer Tanks,
Nobody really cares if you have a ‘stash’ guys. It’s the truth. We’d be impressed if you had them all finished.
Agreed,
I find the more kits I own the harder it is to complete them! Its distracting to know there are fresh canvases molded in styrene when getting bogged down on a current project.
Ooooooccasionally I will find myself carefully filing and cleaning off mold seams from things like leaf springs on a 72nd scale vehicle.
That affliction to me is more personal satisfaction. Knowing I did everything possible to clear the ‘clean build’ phase of the build. On larger scales like 1/25 I ponder how to scratch build the springs instead of just cleaning up the kits offering. The fine line is to just do it vrs cleaning for a few hours only to scratch build anyway.
Learning from past time consuming decisions I weigh the options before commencing scratch building.
1st Will the work be easily viewed & appreciated?
2nd How much better will the part actually be scratch built vrs OOB?
3rd Scratch building is my favorite aspect of model building so why not?
4th Will this deviation from OOB take to long & get shelved or completed?
Sometimes there are no easy answers. One day I hope to build a kit OOB for therapy.
Highly recommended! I recently got myself bogged down in a couple of projects that got bigger/more time-consuming than I had planned. (And then “real work” crept in too lol) A scratch-build that I had never tried before; and a heavily-modified - for me anyway! - P38 nightfighter, the Revell kit. A moth ago when I realized that I had completely stalled both, I cracked open a little “classic” Airfix kit of a subject I’d never built before, went to work on it for a couple weeks & had it finished off in a reasonable amount of time. It was kind of therapeutic knowing that I was able to finish it off in short order.
So, kit taken too far?? Only if you think you’ve taken it too far!