Macross "Robotech" SDF-1 Part 1

Alright, here we go again! This time up it's the Revell 1/5000 "Robotech" Space Fortress SDF-1 Aka Super Dimension Fortress Macross. This is a really old 1985 re-issue of the IMAI kit from 1982. At 1/5000 scale it is really small and lacking a lot of detail.

So, my biggest dilemma is what color to paint this sucker. Everybody paints it dark blue, it's dark blue on the box and the toys were dark blue.
But it was a lighter blue on the show, as you can see here! So I think I am going to try and go with the lighter blue and attempt to simulate some tiling with color variations using the extra masks from Aztec Dummy's Excelsior masking set. 

Being this small, it was difficult to see how I could get any lights up into the bridge. The piece is solid so there really isn't any way to light up the "face". But I did manage to run some fiber optics up there as some extra antennas that will light up red at  the tips. This kit had zero detail for the main antenna arrays so I used some spare parts and built a very un-canon one. I just needed it to look more busy, so sue me. :)

I then started to drill out the main thrusters on the "feet". I wasn't sure that I could pull this off, because I thought that the plastic was too thick. To my relief, it wasn't and I was able to drill through and clean up the holes no problem.

I found some old metal grilling from an electric heater and used that for some detail in the spaces that I made. I almost went with white lighting, but once I tried blue it looked too cool, so I went with it.

Next I started on the ships, Daedalus and Prometheus. These suckers are really small!
I drilled out the elevator doors on Prometheus (the carrier) and managed to run some fiber optics as antennas like up on the main bridge. Daedalus will have some lit antennas on it's bridge boom and some lights here and there. At this scale there really wouldn't be too many lights visible, but I want to add a few for some effect. I'll show you all of that in the next installment.