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Eduard Spitfire review in August SAMI


Vingtor

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What should a reader expect from a magazine kit rewiew? Here are a few issues that I personally think should be required:

  • The reviewer should have basic knowledge about the aircraft type.
  • The reviewer should be able to read the instructions.
  • The reviewer should be able to discover obvious problems.

The August 2014 issue of SAMI made me wonder, though...

SAMI_Spit.jpg

"… not one single problem was encountered during the build …"

Nils

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Dear oh dear. How did the editor let that one slip through. This has always been my least favourite modelling mag owing to the reduced amount of modelling and the sheer volume of kits, decals and bits 'n pieces listed like a catalogue. That being said the pure modelling content has significantly increased in recent months although if things like this find their way into the pages then you have to ask the question.

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Discovery: Eduard Kit Bends Laws Of Physics

how exactly can a plane with three wheels have one up in the air (I presume the model isn't airborne)? :hmmm: Isn't the principle of a tripod that all three feet are always on the ground no matter what? Interesting...

Jeffrey

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Discovery: Eduard Kit Bends Laws Of Physics

how exactly can a plane with three wheels have one up in the air (I presume the model isn't airborne)? :hmmm: Isn't the principle of a tripod that all three feet are always on the ground no matter what? Interesting...

Jeffrey

Someone fits the undercarraige doors wrongly...

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"… not one single problem was encountered during the build …"

Nils

Actually there wasn't any problem. The u/c doors fit backwards completely unproblematically. I think this is the rare "lawn slicer" test version developed for deep turf.

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Discovery: Eduard Kit Bends Laws Of Physics

how exactly can a plane with three wheels have one up in the air (I presume the model isn't airborne)? :hmmm: Isn't the principle of a tripod that all three feet are always on the ground no matter what? Interesting...

Jeffrey

It is up in the air because its resting on the rear edge of the undercarriage door - which is out of sight behind the port mainwheel.

The undercarriage doors are fitted the wrong way round. :doh:

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone"...... :whistle:

Ken

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Not just the wrong way round but on the wrong sides!! And I don't think everybody has done the same mistake. Maybe poor Andy has been having a bad time if you read the end of his text.

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When i built the Airfix 1/48 Spitfire F.22 I put the outer u/c doors on the wrong sides. It was only the next day when I looked at it and thought "something doesn't look right" that I realised what I'd done. Would also explain why i had to do some trimming to get them to fit correctly....doh! Then to compound matters when decalling the kit I put the 603sqn checks on upside down!!!!!

Andy

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Don't laugh too hard, we've all made a clanger like that at one time or another!

Indeed I have, many times. But I have not published my blemishes to "The No.1 market leader model magazine" ...

Nils

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It is up in the air because its resting on the rear edge of the undercarriage door - which is out of sight behind the port mainwheel.

The undercarriage doors are fitted the wrong way round. :doh:

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone"...... :whistle:

Ken

uhmmm yeah, and there is that as well...

I focussed so much on the floating wheel that I didn't even notice the doors... :whistle:

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Sorry, Im a lot harder than most.

The Spitfire isn't exactly obscure. I would expect ANY reviewer in an aircraft mag to be be vaguely familiar with it. !!

This just shouts to me of amateurishness. Actually more from the editors point of view. He really should be able to pick this up. Its an easy mistake ( well actually it isnt, but lets not go there) to make, BUT the editor should catch this. Thats his job.

No excuses. He's paid to edit the mag. Its a Spitfire - FFS. How hard is that!? Maybe stop looking at all the "info" pages ie freebee adverts for all the stuff, and concentrate on the articles.

Jonners

PS in case you think I'm being harsh. I am

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Sorry, Im a lot harder than most.

The Spitfire isn't exactly obscure. I would expect ANY reviewer in an aircraft mag to be be vaguely familiar with it. !!

This just shouts to me of amateurishness. Actually more from the editors point of view. He really should be able to pick this up. Its an easy mistake ( well actually it isnt, but lets not go there) to make, BUT the editor should catch this. Thats his job.

No excuses. He's paid to edit the mag. Its a Spitfire - FFS. How hard is that!? Maybe stop looking at all the "info" pages ie freebee adverts for all the stuff, and concentrate on the articles.

Jonners

PS in case you think I'm being harsh. I am

Got to agree with you Jon, another poor editorial call, along with the signing off of a proof copy that went to print

misidentifying the front cover photo of a Sea Vixen as a Canberra (or vice-versa).

Excuse, It was signed off after he had left the premises??

Hmm, Mr. Hatcher, due to the 'Buck' stopping at your desk, the only thing I'll say is "Do yer ruddy job".

And Jon, you are NOT being harsh, just correct.

Paul

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To be (maybe) a little bit even-handed... if things are still like they were when I last reviewed for SAMI, reviewers don't get their kits whisked off by courier to a professional photographer: you take your own images and email them in. So a scenario in which Mr Hatcher is under time pressure to get the Eduard Spit review in this issue (a couple of months ago, when it was being put together), and the contributor is under the deadline cosh to get the kit finished and photographed seems entirely possible. He rushes to get it done, picks the wrong leg up at crucial moment ("Spitfire wheels are on the OUTSIDE") whacks it in, photographs it and emails his article off to GH. Then Mr Hatcher sees it in his inbox, breathes a sigh of relief that he's got it, takes quick glance at the first front-quarter picture, on which the undercarriage isn't clearly visible just to check it's OK and mails it off to the designer (an external freelance, no doubt, who may or may not know anything about aircraft) and the page (s) is/are designed. At some point a little later, I expect, the reviewer has a face -blanching "Oh Bother!" moment looking at his model, and gets on to GH, who says "Uh-oh -- I'm sorry, it's too late. We don't have the time before deadline/budget to pay for a re-layout/the pages are already at the printers..." and they just have to go with it, knowing full well that they'll both look like numpties and a bunch of people on forums like this will go on and on about it for some time to come...

Back when I was a magazine editor, any article layout, and especially the cover, would be looked at by the Editor, the Deputy Editor, the Chief Sub, the Art Director and the Picture Editor, and often be faxed to the author to look over as well, before it was finally signed off. There were a lot of people to catch errors. I very much doubt that GH has the luxury of a big team to support him (in fact I know he doesn't). The only way that modelling mazines continue to exist at all these days is if they are done cheaply, if they effectively "outsource" a lot of work to cheap resources -- like us reviewers who will build a model and photograph it and write 600-1200 words about it in return for nothing but a free kit to add to our already bulging stashes that we have to build right away. So maybe the editor "should" catch mistakes, and maybe most of the time he does -- I can easily see circumstances in which he might not. Perhaps, Jon, you'd like to give it a try and let us know "How hard is that?" when you've done it for a few months -- me, I wouldn't touch that job with a barge pole...

Oh, and Paul: "Do your ruddy job" for a magazine editor means "Get the magazine to the distributors on the date you've given them a up to a year in advance and make sure the magazine is put together at or under the budget you've agreed with your publisher and has the right number of editorial pages to fit around the advertising pages that your ad execs have sold, which may grow or shrink anytime up to the print deadline." That's the _job_. (oh, and "don't get sued" is the #1 priority, but I doubt it's such a big problem on a plastic aircraft modelling magazine.) Having nicely written, entertaining text, a good balance of subject matter, and no typos on the cover, mistakes in picture captions or bodge-ups by the contributors is just the icing on the cake; and that icing matters not one jot to YOUR bosses if you mess up your _real_ job...

bestest,

M.

Edited by cmatthewbacon
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Perhaps, Jon, you'd like to give it a try and let us know "How hard is that?" when you've done it for a few months -- me, I wouldn't touch that job with a barge pole...

bestest,

M.

Well with 25 years experience win the print industry, most of which has involved close relations with the publishing industry. I think I understand about pressure, budgets and deadlines pretty well.

I guess they know where I am if they feel they need someone else. LOL

Jonners

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I still do the occasional review for SAMI and I build the model at my own pace, the same as I would my own, take care on the finish and final photo appearance because I know there are very many critical readers out there. Whether I am under pressure to get any done I don't know because I have never been pressured into getting one done by any kind of deadline. At the end, if it gets published, all well and good. If not, so be it!

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That was mostly my experience, too... but I could easily imagine occasionally a different situation arising. I've certainly heard people who "review build" long awaited 1/32 superkits discussing the "race" to be the first modelling mag into print with a full build. It's not so different from the car mags all wanting to be the first to get a LaFerrari drive on to the news-stands...

bestest,

M.

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I smiled at this, not least because I'm sure we have all done something like that before (On my second ever kit, I didn't realise the nacelle halves on the Airfix Mossie were handed until I tried to fit them to the wings....

As for appearing in a magazine, if we wanted to list all the 'inaccurate' or wrong things on models in mags we'd be here all day (I still cringe at SAM putting AA missiles on all 4 pylons on the Airfix Sea Harrier)

Edited by Dave Fleming
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I have to admit that I wondered if this was some kind of joke/test between reviewer/editor. 'Right you [so-and-so] let's see if you spot this one...'

If you have Osprey's Elite Units book on the Paras 1940-84, the colour plates are magnificent. The detail wonderful. And the last plate is of a junior officer jumping. The artist has, with great skill, captured a look of nervousness on the man's face. And has put his boots on the wrong feet...

I have always wondered whether the artist had some sort of issue with the author/editor/publisher and did this deliberately, or whether it was a joke about junior officers' competence which wasn't spotted, or whether it was an unaccountable outbreak of incompetence by the artist which either wasn't picked up (more incompetence) or which was noticed but couldn't be corrected in time for publication in the days when redoing a piece of artwork was rather more involved than breaking open a computer programme and inconveniencing a few electrons.

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