Here's my Starship Modeler's own SSM Logo Ship!

In 2002, Starship Modeler sponsored a contest inviting modelers to build a model of the spacecraft seen only in silhouette on its official logo. The winner of that contest would have his/her design kitted in resin. The winner was Jeffrey Pollizzotto, and in 2006 his design is finally being offered for sale by the Starship Modeler store.

This is a LARGE kit, measuring a full 14 inches in length and sporting a 10-inch wingspan. Smoothly cast and nicely detailed, the model comes with one of SSM's "Alien Text" decal sheets.

I was asked by One Zero to build this prototype and document the process with digital photos for use in the kit's eventual instruction sheet. Construction, which was quite straight-forward, took only about a week.

The ship's overall design and industrial look reminded me of 1960s-era Soviet spacecraft (Even the "wing" placement is similar to where one finds the solar panels on the Soyuz), so I decided to go with a Russian-style "olive drab" paint scheme. Details are in black, light gray and various metallics. The "transparent" panels on the Trek-style engine nacelles -- which are actually molded directly into the resin -- I painted in light blue as per Federation convention.

In addition to the "Alien Text" decals that came with the model, I detailed the exterior with additional decals from my "junk" box. The entire project took about 15 days from start to finish.

This model originally appeared as a September 2005 Model in a Month entry.

Image: Aft port quarter high

Image: Aft starboard quarter

Image: To the stars!