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keep stopping at the end of my builds


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i dont know why this keeps happening but it caused me to take a break from modelling for a few years. i am trying to get back into while i still can, but i have this silly problem that keeps happening.

i can never finish a model. either i get so far into building the model and i make a mistake in the painting of the body and i cant fix it perfectly or i get really far into the painting and detailing of the model and then another model takes my interest. 

one of those two things keeps happening and i end up with many mostly done or thrown out models, if the paint is not mistake free.

currently i am working on the dodge ramcharger. i had many issues of the painting of the body, but i was able to correct it to a mostly mistake free finish. Then i let it dry for a few days (probably 3 or 4) and i mask off the body to paint the engine compartment. of course, that is where things go wrong. as i pulled off the masking tape, paint was pulled off with it on one spot on the fender. i tried to sand it down the best i could and re-spray it, but i can still see the mistake. i tried my best, but i can't seem to get it perfect again. 

because of this, i lose interest in the model. since i never display a model that has any visible mistakes, they always end up in the trash. 

i am forcing myself to finish this model because i havent built a model in several years and want to finish it, but i already have my eye on my next build. and because i stopped caring about this build i am making more mistakes and rushing it along to finish it. 

I honestly dont know how to break myself of this because i love building models, but it gets so frustrating that i let myself get to this

any ideas on how to correct this lack of caring/rushing at the end of build? i know i need to stop this perfectionist mentality that i have, but i cant seem to

btw, this is the third or fourth time i have tried to finish a ramcharger, each time something stopped me from finishing it. 
 

Edited by youpey
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I'm also terrible about getting close, but almost never finishing.

For me, it's mostly because the biggest part of the fun comes from establishing the "look" and stance, seeing in my imagination how things will work out, verifying with mockups, getting all the major fitments done, etc.

After that, the rest of the build tends to become "work", and as I HAVE to chain myself to projects in the real world, I tend to allow myself to walk away from models.

My advice: DON'T throw your models away it you're dissatisfied with some aspect. EVERYTHING can be corrected, paint can be stripped and redone as many times as it takes to get it right, etc.

And if you can harness and control the "perfectionist" mentality, you stand to be in a position to build outstanding models.

You can learn SKILLS, but CARING about the quality of the work you do comes from your soul.

Don't knock it.

Edited by Ace-Garageguy
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I think you answered your own question. I have yet to build a kit that turned out perfectly. It's natural to want to finish a build and move on to the next one. I build for fun and relaxation and if it's not perfect then so be it. I have many started kits but I am trying to focus on those before I crack open another kit. A lot of guys on this forum have 2 or 3 kits going at the same time so if you get bored with a kit you can set it aside  and work on another.

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First of all, nobody is perfect.  Second of all, anything hand-built is not perfect.  Third, I just don't see how the hot rod builders can create such beautiful vehicles, guess it takes millions of dollars and thousands of hours by professionals to do that.

This topic is something a psychiatrist would salivate over.  Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, I suffer from it.  It begins with having extremely high expectations, and an unrealistic view of yourself being a God.  Then when you act like a fumble fingered goon, you get mad at yourself, and some people throw out models.  One time, I stomped on one, still have the chassis, as a reminder.

I have three projects waiting for me to overcome some sort of fear.  Just about every project has something I have never done before, so I have stopped, with the hope I'll stumble upon a video or something that will show me the way.  Some have been in the box longer than YouTube has existed, if I just quit watching cute animal videos and hunt down some instructional videos on how to ___________.

Is there a shrink in the house? <_<

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I am the Poster Child for Adult ADD. I have dozens of half-done projects on the bench, and even more on several Shelves of Doom. I'm almost as bad as Ace. :lol:

Last year I finished a model I started (and painted and polished) in 1994. Couple months ago I dragged out and finished a model I started (painted and polished) in the early '90s. It was stalled due to its not being "perfect." I finally decided to just treat it like one of my Toy Show Glue Bomb Rescues and just do what was necessary to get it "done."

Right now I'm working on a model that I must have started in the mid to late '80s. The interior and chassis were done, the body painted and clearcoated. I just finished polishing it out, and all I need to do to call it "finished" is Silver-Sharpie all the body trim and stick the thing together. I'm hoping to kick it through the goalposts this weekend.

Maybe this will be the year when I finish the MPC '69 Firebird that I started when it was a brand new annual kit. :o

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5 minutes ago, 89AKurt said:

...I just don't see how the hot rod builders can create such beautiful vehicles, guess it takes millions of dollars and thousands of hours by professionals to do that.
 

No...all it takes is dedication, assuming you have mechanical aptitude and good eye-hand coordination to start with. And all are NOT created equal in these areas.

Never forget that all the "professionals" began as ignorant "fumble fingered goons". Not one of them sprung fully formed from the mind of Henry Ford or Karl Benz.

This AMBR contender was built by a shop I worked with (I had NOTHING to do with this particular build) for around $300K. But there is also NOTHING on this car that could not have been achieved by a dedicated AMATEUR working in his garage.  It's all a matter of effort expended to develop and apply the necessary skills.

Image result for Josh Mills 32 ford AMBR

 

 

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Model building has always been for me an exercise in patience.

Sometimes it's better to put a project aside for a time.

I have to keep telling myself this is not production work. You don't really have to finish anything as long as you are having fun at the hobby.

Keep modelling!!

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Only by finishing kits will you build the skills to turn out better models. Seeing a build through to the end is a skill all to itself, I'm having to train myself to finish kits after years of jumping to another project when something got difficult on what I was working on. I made my peace long ago with the fact that not every build will be perfect but I can learn from the current build to make the next one better. Don't throw your stalled builds away, you can always revisit them with more skill or a renewed vision. I used to burn my messed up builds and lost many kits is love to have back. 

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2 hours ago, Renegade said:

I think you answered your own question. I have yet to build a kit that turned out perfectly. It's natural to want to finish a build and move on to the next one. I build for fun and relaxation and if it's not perfect then so be it. I have many started kits but I am trying to focus on those before I crack open another kit. A lot of guys on this forum have 2 or 3 kits going at the same time so if you get bored with a kit you can set it aside  and work on another.

This is my approach. I have a few that can't be fixed and a few that have frustrated me but I think I can fix. As Renegade said, "I have yet to build a kit that turned out perfectly". They're all displayed with the best side forward. ;)

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The ultimate key to model building is learning how to hide the mistakes?

it’s supposed to be fun, with no deadlines, if it gets you frustrated, box it up untill the motivation hits you to tackle it.

its all good?

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I love starting projects, not so good at finishing them.

 

You can keep putting problems off until you get to the end, then you have to deal with them. Much easier to put it aside and start something new.

 

 

Another thing I've found is I am much better about finishing models when I have a place to display it. I have had a steep decline since my display case got filled. I had a particularly productive period right after I built it and had a ton of room to fill.

It takes away some of the fun if finishing the model just means you have to find someplace safe to put it. 

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On April 5, 2018 at 8:49 AM, Ace-Garageguy said:

No...all it takes is dedication, ...

I thought it was passion.  B)  I'm sure everyone goes through ups and downs, life throws a money wrench into your life, and that sucks the oxygen out of one's passion.

On April 5, 2018 at 10:32 AM, tbill said:

The ultimate key to model building is learning how to hide the mistakes? ...

I call that Crapsmanship, and usually heavy weathering is a good remedy. :lol:

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57 minutes ago, 89AKurt said:

I thought it was passion.  B)  I'm sure everyone goes through ups and downs, life throws a money wrench into your life, and that sucks the oxygen out of one's passion...

Passion is what gets you started. 

Dedication and guts is what keeps you doing it, day in, day out, for morons who don't understand anything but price. Dedication is what drives you to master skill after skill, to do things over as many times as necessary to get them RIGHT, to not allow your standards to drop to the level of the slipshod hackwork that generates more money for the hackers, because it takes less time to cover bubblegum welds full of holes with an inch of bondo than it takes to get the metalwork almost flawless. Unless you're a top-name builder like Foose, there's very little reward...other than personal satisfaction...for turning out Stradivarius quality in a world that, for the most part, can't discern how it differs from a plastic ukulele. And it's the same rare, almost unknown, dedication that can enable an amateur to build a world-class car in his own garage or backyard shop.

The passion I once had for building cars has been dead for decades. I only hope it returns after my retirement, when I can build exactly what I want to build, when I damm well please.

It's dedication that keeps me going in the meantime. I gave my word I'd finish my part of three last customer cars before I quit.

Edited by Ace-Garageguy
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No argument here!  Someone in my town spent 12 years restoring an Auburn gangster era sedan, in his own garage.  He has taken it to several Cord-Auburn-Duesenburg shows, when they wanted to give him the Best Of Show for the third time, he said to give it to someone else!  Their home has a special garage room dedicated to it.  Can we agree it's a passionate dedication?

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I know I'm just like you. My joy comes from the initial idea, the research and the creative process of building what I see in my mind. It's after that, that I lose my steam. I've had too many messed up paint jobs, too many broken parts after spending months modifying them into what I need, and too many times that bodywork cracks or shrinks after I've finished all that hard work. I'm now reluctant to finish them, knowing that they won't be completed to my satisfaction anyway.

Here's what has saved many of my projects from becoming doomed, parts box refugees...

My son. He doesn't care about the flawless paint jobs, or that the door jamb isn't far enough back, or that the seam I tried to hide with putty still shows. He just wants to see it done. He takes over where I get bored. He finishes it anyway. And you know what? It still looks pretty good on his shelf. He's given me perspective. He's become my inspiration to build it to the point where HE can finish it. That takes the pressure off of me. I create, which I like to do and he completes, which he likes to do. Together we finish what I can't do alone. And we have fun doing it.

And ultimately, I'm passing on the hobby to him. Which is the goal many of us strive for, Right?

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other than the ocd driven attempt for perfection, there are other factors as well.  back in the day when we had only one or 2 unbuilt kits-we finished them.  now we own hundreds of unbuilt kits.  also, the internet gives us access to huge amounts of modelling subjects and ideas which causes us to generate more projects in our minds faster than we can build the kits.

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On 4/5/2018 at 11:36 AM, 89AKurt said:

First of all, nobody is perfect.  Second of all, anything hand-built is not perfect.  Third, I just don't see how the hot rod builders can create such beautiful vehicles, guess it takes millions of dollars and thousands of hours by professionals to do that.

This topic is something a psychiatrist would salivate over.  Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, I suffer from it.  It begins with having extremely high expectations, and an unrealistic view of yourself being a God.  Then when you act like a fumble fingered goon, you get mad at yourself, and some people throw out models.  One time, I stomped on one, still have the chassis, as a reminder.

I have three projects waiting for me to overcome some sort of fear.  Just about every project has something I have never done before, so I have stopped, with the hope I'll stumble upon a video or something that will show me the way.  Some have been in the box longer than YouTube has existed, if I just quit watching cute animal videos and hunt down some instructional videos on how to ___________.

Is there a shrink in the house? <_<

I don't usually admit to this in social forums but yes, I am a board certified PhD Psychologist. We don't salivate over a person who truly suffers from OCD. Us model builders jokingly say we have OCD when it comes to our hobby but I find my patients who struggle with it are so debilitated by it they become essentially non-functional. For your sake I truly hope you do not suffer the profound and all encompassing effects of OCD.

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3 hours ago, jeffdeoranut said:

other than the ocd driven attempt for perfection, there are other factors as well.  back in the day when we had only one or 2 unbuilt kits-we finished them.  now we own hundreds of unbuilt kits.  also, the internet gives us access to huge amounts of modelling subjects and ideas which causes us to generate more projects in our minds faster than we can build the kits.

Sorry, but this idea always raises my hackles.

It's the striving for perfection that separates craftsmen from hackers, and winners from also-rans. It's what made the Wrights keep working until they had achieved powered flight, and Edison until he'd found that tungsten would last as a lightbulb filament. 

Striving for perfection is why there's ANYTHING of quality in the world, provided by people to whom sloppy, slipshod, second-rate just isn't good enough.

We'd all be sitting in the dark, on dirt floors, eating our food raw, if "the OCD-driven attempt for perfection" didn't exist.

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Great inspirational thread!  Must keep it in mind when I stumble down to the shop later. 

I have that problem with starting out full of enthusiasm, then "hitting the wall."  At some point I not only lose the enthusiasm, I start to actively hate the kit I'm working on.  And it goes onto Snake's well-named Shelf of Shame (and Incompetence, in my case).

Example:  right now I'm ALMOST done with 2 builds.  Both started as "quick, fun 2 or 3-day projects." And both have dragged on for weeks, without quite hitting the actively-hate phase. But it was close.

Example of why I fail:  one project is a diecast.  The steering wheel had a flat back with no "finger grooves". So I found a wheel of the same diameter in the parts box, sanded it down flat and glued it to the kit part. Then I noticed the steering-wheel center hub was wrong and fixed that by hacking up a different parts-box steering wheel.  The hub center needed an emblem but was way too tiny for a decal. So I recreated it, sort of, with red and gold paint over a black base.  Etc. Etc.  And since the car is a hardtop, most of this detail will be nearly invisible when done.  I should probably see a shrink, but am afraid of what we might find...

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1 hour ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Sorry, but this idea always raises my hackles.

It's the striving for perfection that separates craftsmen from hackers, and winners from also-rans. It's what made the Wrights keep working until they had achieved powered flight, and Edison until he'd found that tungsten would last as a lightbulb filament. 

Striving for perfection is why there's ANYTHING of quality in the world, provided by people to whom sloppy, slipshod, second-rate just isn't good enough.

We'd all be sitting in the dark, on dirt floors, eating our food raw, if "the OCD-driven attempt for perfection" didn't exist.

whoa dude, I wasn't knocking the idea of striving for perfection...when I make the first tiny little boo boo on a kit im building it really bugs me.  merely pointing out that some builders, like myself get project overload in their brains and move on to a different kit before finishing the first one.  example is where im at building now...a year ago or so I obtained a rebuildable model of one of my grails-the charger III kit-hours of carefully disassembling and prepping parts-its ready for paint.  then I stumbled on another grail-unbuilt jd farm tractor...charger III back in the box-worked on jd-its ready for paint when I found a can do wrecker at a very good price, so jd back in the box and have worked on the can do(ive stretched it and added 2nd steering axle and 2 helpers) since.  however the kit I really want to build is a 1/35 german tank transporter but wont let myself start it until I finish the ones ive got going.  then I got some 1/25 mpc trike  kits from a member here so the idea of 58 tbird bubbletop stretched hauler with twin engines for the trikes is floating around in the brain and am having to resist putting can do in the box and starting on t bird hauler.

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1 minute ago, jeffdeoranut said:

whoa dude, I wasn't knocking the idea of striving for perfection...when I make the first tiny little boo boo on a kit im building it really bugs me.  merely pointing out that some builders, like myself get project overload in their brains and move on to a different kit before finishing the first one.  example is where im at building now...a year ago or so I obtained a rebuildable model of one of my grails-the charger III kit-hours of carefully disassembling and prepping parts-its ready for paint.  then I stumbled on another grail-unbuilt jd farm tractor...charger III back in the box-worked on jd-its ready for paint when I found a can do wrecker at a very good price, so jd back in the box and have worked on the can do(ive stretched it and added 2nd steering axle and 2 helpers) since.  however the kit I really want to build is a 1/35 german tank transporter but wont let myself start it until I finish the ones ive got going.  then I got some 1/25 mpc trike  kits from a member here so the idea of 58 tbird bubbletop stretched hauler with twin engines for the trikes is floating around in the brain and am having to resist putting can do in the box and starting on t bird hauler.

:D I know exactly what you mean.

 

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