Harry P.

The R-M "Pro Modeler" '58 Corvette has a set of luggage on the decal sheet.

Didn't the "Touch Tone Terror" (disguised Little Red Wagon kit) come with a phone booth?

That's a gimmick they're doing. In every case of kits, supposedly one is molded in that glittery plastic. I guess the execs thought that would be some sort of incentive for people to buy the kit and hope it's the "special" one. We'll have to see how that goes... whether more people think that was a good idea... or a bad idea! Can you find a better shot to post? I can't see the car in this photo... there's a stupid girl in the way....

It's the AMT Buick Electra 225...

I don't remember the exact kit... an old Buick. The one that's just been re-released. It came with a small elephant. Really!

Yeah, you're probably right!

I think 55-56-57 all looked identical, so you're all right!

The car is a 1955-57 Suzuki Suzulight. Who got it right: carsntrucks4you mr chips kataramga MikeMc trogdor Corvair Jim Badluck 13 Ryan S Erik Smith Chris R Almost all of you said 1957, and they looked the same, but actually this is a 1955 model.

Another Danbury model that will blow most plastic kits right out of the water:

The level of detail, the level of quality, the fit and finish of the parts, the perfectly in-scale fidelity of the window glass-by the way, it's real glass, not molded plastic- and other parts (wipers, hinges, etc.) the flawless (and I mean flawless) paint, etc. etc.

Well, technically you're right. But we do cut you guys some slack. There are actually three ways to fulfill the "full name" rule. 1. Use your real name as your screen name, as you and many others do. 2. Post your real name on the left there, under your avatar. 3. Post your real name in a signature line that appears below every post you make. Any one of those three is fine (or any combination). The point is not so much where you post your real name, only that you do post it.

His name is posted in his signature line. Always has been.

Try coming even remotely close to this level of quality with a plastic kit:

Well now... that's different!

The problem is generally not the printer, but the file you're printing. GIGO. Garbage In = Garbage out. Almost any home printer has the resolution to output razor sharp detail, if the file you're printing has the sharp detail in it to begin with, and you're printing on high quality coated paper (photo paper). Printing on plain paper won't do, the paper absorbs the ink and fine detail is lost. If it's vector art you're printing, resolution is irrelevant, vector art has no resolution. If it's raster (pixel-based) art like a jpeg or any Photoshop image, your original file should be created at 300 dpi minimum. Any lower resolution than that will not look sharp when printed, no mater what printer you use. So bottom line: raster art must be created at 300 dpi minimum, and you need to print on coated stock ("photo paper," not plain old copy paper).

A lot of it is decided very simply by what contest coverage we get submitted to us! The only way we can include coverage of a given contest is either someone from MCM (or someone acting on our behalf) actually goes to the contest and shoots photos and writes captions, or we get contest coverage submitted to us. Beyond that, we sometimes get contest photos submitted, but no text or captions. So that contest is out. We can't do contest coverage if there is no text to accompany the photos. Same deal if the photos we get are so bad that they can't be used. That's happened too. And there's no way to go back in time and reshoot the contest photos. So the bottom line is, we take a look at what we have, we eliminate anything unusable (either bad photos or no text/captions), and what's left we divide among the pages available in the contest issue. It's not a scientific process... a lot of gut instinct is involved. For example, if we have a ton of west coast contests and fewer midwest or east coast contests, we'll try to "even things out" and eliminate a few of the west coast contests so we can run more midwest and east coast contests. But some years we have just enough content to fill the pages and not much more, so we basically run with what we have. There are no hard and fast rules in play. Every year we take a look at what we have and put together a contest issue based on the usable material we have on hand. Hey, if we had a corporate-sponsored budget we could send out correspondents to a bunch of contests all over the country, but we don't have that luxury. We rely on you guys out there to provide the raw material for each contest issue.

We used to include coverage of one contest in every issue, all year long. But the obvious problem with that is, which contest is "worthy" of being the one contest that gets covered in the magazine each month? Let's face it, there are a ton of contests held every month. If we include coverage of Contest "A," everyone from contest B, C, D and E will say "hey! Why wasn't our contest covered in that issue?" So what we've done lately is not include any contest coverage in the "normal" monthly issues. That gives us more pages to use for how-tos and informational features every month. All the contest coverage we do is now all contained in the annual Contest Issue, and each contest issue covers contests held in the previous year. Obviously, since the contest issue only comes out once per year, we have to hold all the contests that will be included in that issue until that issue is ready for publication... so contests held early in 2011, for example, will appear in the 2012 contest issue along with contests held much later in 2011.

Coverage of NNL East is included in the February/March Contest issue.

Thanks for fine-tuning my explanation, Tim. If anyone knows what an "NNL" is supposed to be, you do! There's nothing like hearing the story from one of the people who was actually there at the beginning.

The rear end is fighting the overall design. I think you need to enlarge the rear fenders and continue the arcing shape of the roofline. Also, that weirdly shaped front wheel cutout is awkward... it needs to be rounded. This is a quick PS hack job... literally 2-3 minutes,,, but you get the idea. It's a good start, though, and a nice idea. You just need to work out the details and come up with a more cohesive design where all the elements work together instead of fighting each other.

Hint: The "cloud of Fog" hood ornament (along with the blacked-out license plate) was a factory option.

Exactly right. But of course, that level of quality doesn't come cheap. Then again, it's a case of you get what you pay for. The high-end diecasts are not for everyone... they're expensive, but man, they are nice!

Apparently you do lead a pretty sheltered life. There are literally hundreds, maybe thousands, of different diecast models available from several high-end manufacturers that will blow away 90% of the plastic kits out there.

Which moderator are you referring to?

Amen! Boy, do I wish the troublemakers and pot stirrers would read this and have it sink in!