Model Fibel - WWII Heavy Tanks & 10,5cm SPG

Model Fibel - WWII Heavy Tanks & 10,5cm SPG
Softcover - 144 pages
Publisher: Model Art
Price: Around £10

Pic 1, Pic 2, Pic 3,

Introduction

The 'Model Art' of Japan is a company that publish a large range of periodical books/magazines that cover all aspects of model making.

The book

The book is subtitled as the biographies of the strongest heavy tanks of WWII, which is slightly misleading, as far as English speaker go at least since all the articles are in Japanese, so I can't really tell what's being said about each of the vehicles depicted. I suspect that there's a short history on each though, followed by a showcase build of a model of each?

There are fourteen builds contained within the book, and although they're in Japanese of course, the articles are mainly photographic in nature, and consist of high quality progress pictures, rather than loads of the finished model. This at least allows those of us who are 'challenged' as far as Japanese goes, to follow the builds and to be able to see what each modeller has done to improve the model he's working on. And improve them they do! Although the Japanese modeller has a slightly different approach to weathering from us in the West, they are extremely 'accurate' modellers, in that they'll go to great lengths to try and insure details are correct.

A good example of this attention to fine detail is the first article in the magazine on a build of a Russian T-35 using an Alanger kit. Not the best starting point I suppose, but Mitsuo Sugimura really goes to town on improving it, and the act that I couldn't understand a word of mattered not one jot!

Other subjects covered are;

Tamiya Char B1
Tamiya Matilda II
Trumpeter & Zvesda KV-1
Tamiya Churchill
Tamiya JS-2
Dragon King Tiger
Tamiya Pershing
Scratchbuilt 10.5cm le.FH.18/40/2 III/IV
Tamiya Wespe
Dragon Heuschrecke
Academy Priest

Pic 4, Pic 5, Pic 6,

At the rear of the magazine can be found English summaries of three of the main articles:

Russian T-35 Heavy Tank
French Heavy Tank Char B1 bis
German Heavy Tank Tiger I

The English summaries aren't perfect translations, yet they serve to clarify what the builders were trying to achieve with their builds and how they went about it. To be honest, The high quality of the photographs, together with their design and the general layout of the book meant that I feel most modellers would get a lot from it even without the translations.

Conclusion

Modelling is a visual craft, and as such a book that contained just photographs of a build without any text whatsoever, could, if done correctly prove interesting and of use to modellers. This book does do it right. I know I'll be turning to it when I'm building one of the models shown in it. Recommended.

My thanks to Model Art for the review sample

To view all publications offered by Model Art of Japan, please see their website: Model Art