My Finecast review

[SotonShades]

Good Afternoon to all good boys and girls, and the rest of you darker denizens of the lounge.

Like a great many of you I'm sure, I headed down to my local GW to have a look at the new Citadel Finecast range (and also infect a few of the regulars with the Nurgle's Rot that seems to be inhabiting my nose and throat for the past couple of days.) After having a good gander at the models on the website I decided to save my pennies and just get upclose, personnal and get a good look at the models in the flesh. Or at least in the new clamshell packs. Upon entering the store however, the familiar smell of superglue on resin got my blood up. Seeing the last Castellan Crowe reminded me of a convertion I had wanted to do when he was first released, but had shyed away from because i couldn't be bothered with all that pinning...

So before I missed my chance, or common sense could take hold, I snapped up that clamshell and the Techmarine with Servitors box to get started on a Grey Knights Techmarine or two. So where to begin the review? I guess with the first thing I noticed;

Packaging

It seems like an odd thing to mention in a Modelling and Painting Forum, but I really do think it is worth mentioning. Those of you who've seen the new models for yourself or have been on the website may have noticed that each army is colour coded. All the Space Marine Finecast pictures have a yellow background, Chaos a tortured orange, Eldar a pale blue etc. This sounds fairly insignificant, but when looking through the rows upon rows of clamshells and thinking back to the blister packs... well, it's simply staggering! Warhammer, 40k and LoTR still retain their traditional colourings on both the finecast boxes and clamshells, but being able to quickly identify which clamshells belong to your army is a vast improvement over searching through rows of blisters, just to find that the model you've been searching for is out of stock. Having a big, full colour picture of 'Eavy Metal's version of that model is also a massive boon. No more looking at tiny, often poorly printed stickers saying what model was in which blister; you can tell instantly and from a distance exactly what you are going to be picking up. Obviously this is significantly less of an issue with boxes, which have always had pretty piccys on them, but I digress.

The Clamshells themselves are also fantastic. I remember past times where the tiny volume of the blister meant if your model was packed at an odd angle, you often times couldn't work out exactly what you were getting. The much greater clear area really allows you to have a proper look at the model inside. I even saw a couple of customers pointing out a heavilly damaged model to staff so they could be taken off the shelves without openning the plastic case. Speaking of openning, I had been worried that they were going to be more like the clamshell packs you often get electronics like console controllers in; more or less impossible to open without a good, strong pair of scissors. Not exactly what you want if you feel the need to open up your new model and start working on it straight away in store. I managed to tear through the plastic of the clamshell for my Crowe model pretty easilly with my hands, so that wasn't an issue at all. I even saw a young kid getting in to one in store without too much difficulty. That said they do seem to provide pretty good protection to the models and seem reasonably impact resistent, if not tear resistent.

Ok, enough with the boring bit you throw away; on to the toys inside.

Quality

Before I go any further I'd like to say that I am very used to working with resin models, both Forge World complete kits as well as bits and bases from other manufacturers. I've all ready read a few people's experiences with Finecasts, and was well prepared to suffer a plethora of bubbles, dodgy miscasts and a host of other problems. Unfortunately I can't come down on the fence one side or the other. My Castellan Crowe was more or less perfect; only a couple of bubbles in the underside of the feet and the resin was a little thin at one point on the cape, but that was it. The detail was crisp and clear on all of the componants. There was a reasonable amount of flash, but nothing exceptional by the standards of resin character models. Even with all the flash, it took me seconds to clean up the model, compared to the half hour or so I'd usually expect to take working on a Metal GW miniature of that size and detail. If all Finecasts were as good as that, I don't think anyone would have cause for complaint.

The Techmarine though... that would be a different issue. There were quite a few bubble, often on quite prominent details. There were quite a lot of thin spots in the resin, again often close to detail, and a few miscasts where edges of details didn't line up. I also got a lot of latex rubber stuck on the model, which usually suggests the mold was coming to the end of it's useful life. Certainly the next techmarine coming out of that particular mold would have had some size able blobs of resin where there shouldn't have been any. I would hasten to point out, though, that some of the other sprues in that box set, containing the servitors, seem every bit as good as the Crowe model.

I believe the quality of the models is going to be genereally very very good, with the exceptions being those that come toward the end of the end of the mold's lifespan. If GW can keep a tighter eye on the quality of the models, or possibly replace their molds sooner, then I will reall be looking forward to seeing how the finecast range expands. It's worth noting that the detail on the techmarine that wasnt decimated by bubbles or miscasts was significantly sharper and clearer than that on my old metal techmarine. Unfortunately I can't compare the Crowe model to the metal one, but rest assured if I get my hands on one I'll have a good look.

Modelability

As I've all ready said, one of the reasons I bought these models was for a convertion I wanted to do. Very few of my models are unconverted, even if its as little as a weapon swap. As such I've often avoided metals in favour of plastics and green stuff, or Forge World models. I'm happy to say that this new mix of resin GW is using seems if anything even easier to use than their plastics. Unlike the FW model, this resin is definitely not just for expert modellers. In fact, you can be quite brutal with it without damaging the componants. I believe GW have a demonstarion of just how flexible it can be without breaking it. I was skeptical, but having done the same myself with Crowe's sword, I can say I'm a believer. Equally though, you do need to be reasonably skilled with a hobby knife. Files will just eat through the resin and leave you with ruined detail. I'm sure someone will work out how to turn that in to some sort of weathering effect, but for now I'll stay well clear (which is how I prefer to work with models anyway.)

With tiny amounts of superglue, the componants all went toether exactly how they were supposed to without additional trimming, something that rarely occured with metals. The significant convertions I did to Crowe also seem to be fairly strong. I've all ready dropped him twice, and despite having a full servo-harness and a power axe that is made up of 5 separate, unpinned componants, nothing has so far come off or broken. I'm sure time will eventually weaken the joins (I can be quite a clutz with my models) but I am certain my metal Techmarine, who's axe is a single componant, would have had to have been repaired and repainted a few times. Come to think of it, he's waiting in a box to be repaired at the moment... oh well.



Unfortunately that's it from me today. I'll carry on, talking about how the models are to paint, along with a few pictures of my convertions, as soon as I can get round to it. That could be a while given that I have a 60 hour working week coming up and some significant work to do for my Armies on Parade entry... However, please feel free to comment, criticize and question me on what I've said. I'm sure I've contradicted myself at least once in here. No I haven't... maybe. Newho, until next time

Shades

[Grailkeeper]

Very comprehensive review, thank you for it.

[eldargal]

Thanks for the review, very well written. Are you going to exchange the techmarine for a new one? If so let us know how that model turns out.

[fade_74]

Great review! I wish I could have gone to the game store this morning, but the closest one is 2 hours or so away. I did order Ghazkull Thraka from the GW website though. I didn't buy him earlier because I didn't want to spend 4 hours pinning him together.

[sangrail777]

4 hours huh?
Gotta say my Ghazkull has held together with just superglue for several years.
Tempted to get the fincast one though.....

Hey great review, can't wait to get my hands on a fincast!

[UltramarineFan]

Very good review, agree with basically everything you said. Overall, going from my experience, I think Finecast will be a vast improvement on metal and that it was a great decision by GW to do the switch over, even with the price increase of some models in mind.
Also, Eldargal, I'd be very surprised if they didn't swap his techmarine for a new one if he tried considering it sounds quite bad. GW are actually pretty excellent about things like that.

[Zeonic Marine]

Will it stand up to wet sanding with fine sandpaper in your opinion, will sandpaper gouge the surface? I guess I'm trying to guage how soft and springy it is versus it's resistance.

Thanks

[MarneusCalgar]

Well, next week I´ll go to a FLGS store and see it by my own eyes!!

Then I´ll tell you here

[JohnCS]

Thanks for the detailed review. I agree w/ your overall comments. I picked up the techmarine set today and I seem to have receive the matching servitors to your techmarine. My techmarine was immaculate, however the servitors had mis-aligned mold halves and voids. Nothing worse than your typical forgeworld quality, but not quite matching the hype.

Definitely recommend opening in the store and studying each cast carefully before leaving and swap out any which don't pass muster. Bit easier on the blisters than the sealed boxes granted...

[SotonShades]

Cheers for the positive feedback guys. I've not opted to get the Techmarine replaced. Being a very stereotypical Englishman, I've got a stron 'make-do-and-mend' attitude. None of the poor molding was so bad it couldn't be re-carved with the hobby knife. As GW mentions on their website, surface bubbles were easilly covered/filled with a dab of superglue. Obviously the details that were popped by the bubbles were lost, but oh well.

Also, I was too excited about building my new models so ended up with a fully built techmarine before I considered taking it back for an exchange

Hope you get on ok with your servitors, JohnCS. Should be easy enough to repair if my experience was anything to go by, or replace if you have a little more self control than me :P

Zeonic Marine; You might get away with the finest grade wet paper. It's a very, very springy material. While I was converting it had to support a lot of the thinner componants while backscraping to remove the mold lines. I'd deffinitely reccommend trying it out on the sprue frame before having a go at your model.

In case anyone would like to know, I've managed to drop both the tech-crowe and normal techmarine several more times since writing the review (amazing considering I've been at work for more than 13 hours and asleep for 6 in the 22 hours since positng it) and none of the resin componants have broken or come off. The only damage was a powersword I had made from plasticard, which was glued back on easilly enough after one of the first drops, and hasn't come off since! Honest I'm not dropping them on purpose