Gino Dykstra’s Moldy Crow

Here is another model made for my Italian customer — the Moldy Crow. Although I’m not personally familiar with this craft, I can only assume it was shown in the animated Star Wars series, especially as the references for this ship on the internet are nowhere near in agreement as to details. As with most 1/72nd scale resin kits, I had to whip up an interior of my own, although they do provide the flooring and a single oversized seat, which I didn’t use. The crew were cobbled together from a number of pilot figures and the rest of the interior was scratchbuilt. For the most part, the model went together quite well and served as a good basis for painting.

The hardest part of the model was the canopies, which come as extremely thin resin casting which, if an interior is going to be shown, need to be carefully trimmed out.I added the single forward window as it’s visible in a lot of pictures and my customer really wanted it. The top canopy frames were scratchbuilt, as the kit item was too narrow, but the side canopies fit very well once trimmed. Gun barrels for the turret were made from the supplied tube as well as the probes for the engines.

The color was a bit hard to decipher, as once again references don’t agree. The closest I could come to the basic tone was a sort of Israeli armor tan/grey, which at least is distinct. All the markings were masked and airbrushed and I made stencils to give a little panel patterning to the model. Some light washes, paint chips and airbrushed weathering and it was complete.

As my customer likes “in flight” models with not modifications, I had to fashion a plastic cradle for the kit with some space plastic rod and sheet, which I cannnibalized from an old CD case.

All in all, an interesting ship for any Star Wars fan.

Gino Dykstra