Return of the Girona Gang of 4!

Calvin, Bernard, Paul Quek and Allan Yong returned from Girona last Wednesday...and promptly went home and slept! The slackers! There we were, all waiting and excited to hear the news, but no luck! However, we didn't hold it against them as it was admittedly a long journey home, and oogling world class models for 4 days had to have taken its toll on them!

We finally had the official 'de-briefing' on Saturday (the 12th) and I must say, it was worth the wait! First off, ALL Singaporean entries submitted scored medals. Calvin bagged a gold with his menagerie of Alpine Miniatures' boxart figure collection; Both MWS artists KG Lim and John Tham received silver medals for their armor entries...well done guys!

Here they are, receiving their awards from a proud and happy Bernard..





Paul Quek received a bronze for his figure entry as well..congrats Paul! Allan Yong too received a bronze for his entry, which comprised all animals...that's got to be a first surely! [We're trying very hard to convince him to become a Singapore PR at least...but as he's currently on assignment in Vietnam, it will be a tough call!]

While we were waiting for Calvin Tan to turn up and share some of his experiences and advice for the M Workshop artists, Bernard entertained us with his exploits at tackling..no, not the Spanish women (thank goodness!) but Spanish food, like tapas, chorizos and of course paella. Terrible fellow..made us all hungry! But being the true blue Singaporean he is, we KNEW he must have been missing his noodles and curry. True enough, he confessed to raiding his neighbourhood kopi tiam soon after returning home.



Eventually Calvin came...



..and we had a real in-depth 2+ hour debriefing, via a comprehensive slideshow (over 700 slides!) cum talk of what makes Girona such a premier event! The talent showcased was simply breath-taking!





As usual, Bernard sat in a corner playing with toys and didn't pay attention...just like his Uni days!



Seriously though, the eye-opening slideshow really was a sobering reminder of the awesome talent out there, especially in Europe, and hopefully an impelling force to inspire local modelers to keep pushing our standards to world-class levels. The encouraging news is..we're not far behind! What we need is to keep the passion alive (a real challenge in our work oriented culture), a determination to keep honing and improving our skills, and the willingness to experiment with new mediums, approaches and techniques.

If you'd like to be inspired by some of the awesome exhibits on display in Girona, why not visit Calvin's blog report at: www.zyclyon.blogspot.com

There's also this report by Spanish modeler Jose Azorin, taken from the xtreme modelling site:
http://www.xtrememodelling.com/news.htm

Well, after all was said and done, we couldn't let these medal winners strut around without even giving us home-bound guys a little treat could we?!...so, off we went around the corner to have some gelato!



Ok ok, so gelato's Italian and not Spanish..but hey...at least its a closer deal than Ice Kachang right?!

The Spain trip also had other hidden benefits.

Besides the Expo show itself, Calvin had brought Bernard and the guys to tour the Andrea factory to be amazed by some of the displays (1/35 scale full U-Boot replica, dioramas to drool over...) and they also had the opportunity to speak with some of the stellar personalities of this hobby, like Shepherd Paine, Alan Ball, Adrian Bay, Marijn Van Gills, Jaume Ortiz, Adam Wilder, and many others besides. What all this has done is that it has really given a new life and meaning to preperations for M Con.

We're under no illusions...With the kind of official governmental support the World Expo receives, along with a budget that we locally can only dream of, there's still a long way to go to get even close in scale and impact with a show like Girona. But now there is a definite and tangible standard to serve as a guide. With the whole-hearted support and participation of the local modeling community, much can be achieved with patient determination and time. Never despise the day of small things...they have a habit of growing!

It had been a wonderful, satisfying day, and I went home thinking things couldn't get any better. Then I walked in to this...



Salmon belly sashimi and home-made pickle maki washed down with a chilled Semillon Sauvignon Blanc. Unreal!

You know, sometimes...just sometimes...life gets it right.

Final Prep For Girona!

This past weekend, The M Workshop was abuzz with latent excitement as final preparations were made for the Girona trip. The world expo is a prestigious event held there, and many of the who's who in the modeling fraternity are expected to attend. Standards of competition and judging are high, as well they should be.

Besides Bernard, the others going are Calvin Tan, Alan Yong (a talented figure painter from Malaysia and past Euro-Militaire medal winner) and Paul Quek (Dogtag Miniatures) will be attending. There are definitely 2 clear things on the agenda, besides the obvious catching up with friends, oogling at models and establishing trading partners.

The first would be to study the workings of the Girona show, and look for areas of expertise that could be incorporated into preparations for our own local M Con. Measuring against such international standards might seem a trifle over-optimistic, but it would certainly give the M Con organizers here an opportunity to raise local shows standards a notch or two;

Second would be the opportunity to showcase some of our local talent to the world. There ar so many good modelers out there in Singapore! Veteran Calvin already has several stand alone figures and vignettes to enter, and The M Workshop will be showcasing the work of two of its artists, Chef Lim and John Tham (JT Models). Calvin Tan popped by on Saturday the 28th to see how the guys were doing.

John was putting the finishing touches to his 1/48 Tamiya T-34/76

The Chef was doing likewise with his SdKfz 140 Flakpanzer 38(t) from Dragon. He incorporated foilage using the method Calvin taught in a workshop 2 weeks ago.

Calvin runs through some final tips and suggestions with Chef to make sure that the finished product will hold its own against international competition.

Next Calvin sat with John, offering suggestions with weathering issues, incorporating 'halo of light' visualization techniques often used by artists. It was very interesting! Junior artist Ming Kang gets to sit in and benefit from the lesson. Its always a learning curve at the M!

Of course, all this constructive activity gets Bernard all excited and happy, so...

....when one of Bernard's students comes in with some modeling challenges he needs help with, Bernie gets down to it as well!

When all the work is done, Bernard brings the process to completion with a photo-taking session, keeping a permanent record of the artistry and hard work that goes on behind the scenes here.

If you'd like to take a look at some of the photos Bernard took of the Chef's Flakpanzer, just go to these URLs:
http://www.themworkshop.com/mstudio/img_cheflim2008_gepard_002.jpg
http://www.themworkshop.com/mstudio/img_cheflim2008_gepard_003.jpg

We really had a blast last weekend! Thanks for looking, and hope you enjoyed the visit too!