Photos by the author
This is one of a series of birds that have been around for many years. The series includes the Kingfisher. A little owl, Swallow, Robin and about 6 more. The kit comes in a polythene bag with an A3 sheet of parts and a thinner sheet with instructions in English French and German.
This particular kit has 24 nicely colored pieces. For someone like me who generally makes buildings this is a bit disconcerting because there are almost no straight lines! To ensure there are no black lines showing on the completed model the exposed edges are either the body colour or just not there. This makes cutting out a little difficult
This Shows part 2 which is a little misleading in that the lines on the tabs clearly show the position of the next piece.
This is a little more like the other pieces. The only indication of the position is the tip of the arrows and a general position shown by the grey stripe.
This Shows the other main technique used in this kit. Here the part is folded on the dotted line and glued onto it's self. The piece is then cut out following the line of the blue side. Other similar pieces have such light colours that it is difficult to tell where the feathers end and the card starts.
This is where I got my revenge! Once the 6 piece wing is glued to the body I left it in this uncomfortable position until the glue had dried properly. Many aircraft modellers will be familiar with this arrangement!
The completed model. This model took about four evenings. At times I was not sure that it would look anything like a Kingfisher but I am reasonable pleased with the end result. It needed a great deal of careful painting on the edges because the colour changes are quite subtle.
Certainly not for beginners but it makes a change from the more "straight edge" approach for my usual buildings. It brings back memories of my earlier modeling days when I made 'planes and hung them from the ceiling. Perhaps I should recreate the old days but with more "natural" flyers.
