ISS in 1/400 (#.1)

Building paper models is great.
It is creative. It clears the mind. It gives one some insight in how stuff works. How flat planes can change into 3D objects. And it is just plain fun.

For those of you who don't know, there's a lot out there to be found. I have specialized myself in space related models, varying in size from 1/33 to 1/400 so far.
This blog will be showing you some things I am working on, some of the ideas I have and my thoughts about space travel in general. Sometimes I'll deviate a bit and make an airplane or even make or write something that has nothing to do with aeronautics.

Although I am very Dutch I decided to do this blog in English because of the paper building communities I am involved in. Perhaps sometimes I will post in Dutch and then you'll have to show some effort and use a translator.
There might also be some double postings here and on the forums I post on.

Here's what I am working on right now. The International Space Station in 1/400. Shuttle Endeavour is being built now and will be added soon. The US/Japanese/European section is made from the model John Jogerst designed. His model is originally is designed in 1/80. A lot of what John makes can be found at Jonathan Leslie's Lower Hudson Valley Paper Model E-gift shop. I did a redesign of the textures of the hulls of a couple of the US/JAXA/ESA modules.

The Russian section and the ATV docked to Zvezda come from Alfonso Moreno. He has a fabulous site called AXM paper space scale models where a lot of Shuttle-related stuff is found - for free! The truss again is mainly John Jogerst's design work but I did a bit of redesigning for this small scale. I work with kind of thick paper, 200 grams per square meter, which is fairly heavy, and a bit too much of it all for this size. But I love its sturdiness and ability to hold itself up without too much reinforcement stuff. Especially in this scale.
All solar panels got a six or so layers of Tamiya gloss acrylic paint. I found the depth and realism of these parts greatly improved with it.

The ISS awaiting finishing

To show how small it is: each square is 1 cm2The whole ISS is modular. The truss can be removed and the ISS itself rests on a stand but can be taken off of it.
The struts for keeping the truss in place are made of brass rods.

Here Russian modules Pirs (up) and Poisk are seen with a Soyuz (upper) and Progress supply ship docked.
The solar panels of Zvezda can rotate. All solar panels on the ISS have a 6-layer coat of Tamya clear gloss for some extra depth.

Now with Pirs and Poisk added, the Soyuz and Progress docked, I am waiting for AXM's Rassvet to come out. In the meantime I started on the shuttle which will complete this diorama.