I have received my first ever pack of upgrade decals.
The RG Sazabi I’m building came with stickers. Don’t get me wrong, stickers have their place, but it isn’t on a nice kit. If you’re snapping together a small, simple model then they are fine to add some detail and colour. But if you’re doing a full paint job on a complex model you want something that properly conforms to the surface and blends in at the edges. Thick stickers just don’t give the same quality finish.
Bandai do lots of kits. The Star Wars range they do is second to none. High detail, great fit of parts, good colours. And they supply BOTH stickers for the “quick job” modeller and waterslide decals for the more “professional “ finish. But gunpla kits? Nope. Stickers. Ohh, we will sell you some water slides. But by the time you’ve added shipping to the cost they are somewhat expensive.
I was pointed towards some decals and went to buy them but for whatever reason they were not for sale in the UK. So I found some others.
Never having bought them separate before I had no idea if they were any good or not. My main criteria was cost and if they would actually supply them to me! It turns out the ones I got are actually quite a good brand.
Now, looking at them next to the stickers, there are notable differences. The most apparent is the fact there are fewer on my new sheet. As you might have imagined, the highly shiny metallic stickers don’t have a waterslide equivalent so I have to decide if I’m going to use them or paint the detail. As I’m going to be painting some detail I will have a look and see where they are meant to go and how they will look.
