We are mid-way through November and about to hit the silly season. Not too long ago it was January and the whole year was ahead of me. I had planned a lot of builds but, as it stands today, I will get 3 across the finish line this year.
This meager output is not what I had planned.
Quite the opposite, actually. I had planned to build a lot more. But here I am, in month 11 wondering where all the time went. It seems that I did a lot of scale model-related things except actually building models! I suppose we all do this from time to time. Some things feel like the hobby…but they are not. Things like buying model kits and stashing model kits, going to shows, researching, watching YouTube videos, collecting reference photos, and simply going down to the LHS to shoot the breeze. Those hobby-adjacent things seem like they are advancing skills and abilities. Maybe they are to a degree.
But let’s not kid ourselves.
I firmly believe that knowledge or awareness of skills, techniques, products, and stuff only takes one so far. Knowing the latest and greatest in supplies and how they should be applied won’t improve your weathering skills one bit. Accumulating the most cutting-edge kits that have ever been produced won’t get you closer to putting the final touches on any of them.
Nope, things like improving skills only come from kit completions. And those require us to actually sit down at the bench. It takes snipping. It takes gluing. It takes assembling. It takes painting and decaling. And if one wants to get a little fancy, well, it takes folding, annealing, chipping, oiling, streaking, and all that other stuff too.
All the way until the kit is complete.
What I am trying to say here is that nothing will get things done better than actually getting things done. Nothing will build your skills faster than trying things out, figuring out what works for you, and perfecting your techniques with building, building, and more building.
What are you waiting for?
MODEL AIRPLANE MAKER 
What am I waiting for? I’m waiting for neurological autoimmune disease to ease up.
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As a wise man once said, “Git ‘er done!”
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Great post . I subscribe to the “do a bit each day” theory. Even if it’s just sticking 2 wheel halves together, a half hour daily session eventually leads to a completed model
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I admire people who post photos of their annual output and then see six or seven of ’em. My build speed could most charitably be described as “glacial.” Sometimes it can take me weeks…or months…to even *decide* what the next project is going to be! And at my age one would think that a sense of urgency might be applicable if I want to build and meaningful portion of my stash (and from what I’ve seen, I don’t have a very extensive stash). But once I’ve decided, I go at my build with single-mindedness, largely because I’m easily confused. One project, one focus, one (eventual) completion. My day starts (after feeding the cat, obviously to anyone who’s in service to one) in the shop. The room is probably 60% east-facing windows. Sometimes (not often) the glare of the sunrise wakes me up. Usually it’s the gallon of coffee I have hanging over my head on a gravity drip. But SOMEtimes I actually have an idea! Because while facing east (whateverthehell that godDAMN bright thing is hovering over the neighbor’s house…and though it only took him explaining to me with rapidly diminishing patience a half-dozen times that no…his house’s roof isn’t burning), where I left off the day before is right there in front of me patiently waiting for my ability to focus my eyes to return. Then the caffeine levels ascend to the cerebral cortex, neurotransmitters reform as a liquid instead of the dust that was there when my bladder (and cat…it takes two) decides that I’m getting up, and I get An Idea, or Solve a Problem, and the day’s work takes off (sorta like the Wright Flier did that first time…).
Sometimes, as with my most recent build, I NEED A BREAK. The eyes get stale, the brain’s wheels go square, and about the only thing I can do at the bench is bleed and spill glue. This year July and August were time-off months.
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good point, well made. I find that the natural ‘lull’ after a completion can extend to weeks if not monitored carefully. When building it has to be five bits stuck together per day. Obviously that doesn’t work when it comes to painting/decalling.
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