ATTITUDE IS EVERYTHING
By Tom Cleaver
In the course of my work on this project we call INTERNET MODELER, I have numerous opportunities to talk with those who are on the business side of our hobby. Unsurprisingly, many of them are personally involved in one aspect or another of the hobby. I say unsurprisingly because I think a person would have to participate to know our hobby was more than collecting toys, as many non-modelers seem to think we are.
That said, there are as many different kinds of modelers involved in the business side of the hobby as there are different kinds of modelers involved in, say, IPMS. There are those who are fun to be around, and those who, sad to say, are not such fun presences. As far as the business goes, I am starting to notice that I can tell which kind of modeler is involved in what by the kind of company they have. On one end is the guy everybody knows who is totally involved in the hobby, he lives and breathes it. He'll take three different models, throw them together in a kitbash to make something even the vacuform companies will never touch, and he'll tell you everything you never thought to ask about the project, with only the question, "So, how did you do that, anyway?" On the other end is the guy who brings in his project, it looks great, and if you ask him how he did it he looks at you like you've just asked for the combination to his home safe. You can respect his work, but he's not someone you're going to call to yak modeling with. Recently, in one two-day period, I had the chance to experience both of these types, as I was searching out review samples for the project here. Modeler A, the guy who will tell you everything, is - no surprises here - running a small company with nine other crazies out of a small building in Charlotte, North Carolina. The only complaints I ever hear about this company is the ungodly long time it seems to take from when a new model is announced to the time we can rip the box open like ravening beasts and have at it. Talk to Modeler A about the delays, and he'll start telling you all the problems they had getting that kit to be just right before they released it. Modeler B happens to run a modeling company not too far down the road from me here in Southern California. When talking to him, we got into a discussion of a recent kit his company had released, a model lots of modelers had been looking forward to, that lots of modelers were pretty disappointed in. Modeler B didn't particularly care. "We're selling well with K-mart," he said, "and those other people can go buy an aftermarket resin set for around $20 and get a pretty decent model if they're going to be so anal about it." I was pretty surprised by the baldfacedness of that statement, and needless to say the conversation ended shortly thereafter. We don't get review copies from that company, and personally I doubt I would go out of the way to pick something up from them at my local shop. For those who don't know it, this attitude here in this country goes all across the planet. In my conversations with people who work in California for the Big Two across the Pacific, I have discovered that Mr. Tamiya and the Hasegawa brothers are serious, life-long modelers. Shows in their products, doesn't it? People like Bill Bosworth (Modeler A), Mr. Tamiya, and the Hasegawas have certainly made modeling fun for me, as I am sure they have for you. With the flow of products from their companies, we can certainly all agree we are living in The Golden Age of Modeling, with quality kits of aircraft, armor, ships and cars many of us thought we would never see even as vacuforms coming out as mainstream releases. What I have discovered with these people is that - like most artists - they work to please themselves. Fortunately, their work pleases us, too.
If you want to make modeling fun again, that's the attitude to stick to: does your work please you? If so, it'll please the people you want to meet in the hobby, believe me. The ones who look down their noses are the guys to stay away from. Most of the ones I've met in our hobby who worry about whether their model is going to win a plastic pot at the local show are like Modeler B - not someone you really want to spend a lot of time with. This is not to say that there are not a lot of prizewinners hanging out here at INTERNET MODELER, it's just that that's not their purpose in life - it’s a pleasing and surprising side effect.