Posted: 12.01.2024
Buster Doll Gunner
Busted out anotha one.
My entry to the Megami Device Buster Doll line! Gunner! I have her sisters as well (Knight, Tank, & Paladin) but being Gunner is the lowest number out of the batch (22), let’s start bustin dolls with the OG!
Gun-Gun, fully built and sanded. Stock plastic colors. A very cute and well created figure.
My finished product. A less-saturated, “realistic” Gun-chan.
Let’s get ready to bust!
In one of those old blog posts I write once a month (sometimes), I mentioned a new desk! A desk that lives on the ground level of the house! A desk where I can build my lil girlpla and not be locked away in the dark, dank basement!
This is the desk. Bask in its glory.
Bringing my build station top-side did make things easier on myself. This new work station is solely for the building process of my figures. Paint and finish are still done in the basement. I am not bringing that shit upstairs. Borderline-toxic and unsafe materials stay underground.
Watching some Sora concerts, nothing new. Let’s build!
Chest! And not just any chest. This is the chest of Buster Doll Gunner! I bet you’re so surprised right now.
This is the hip joint mechanism and honestly: frick this thing. Super tight tolerances. Lots of sanding.
This is like close to an hour of build? I like to take my time.
Clipped and sanded the hands before moving onto the limbs. Hands are my least favorite part of every kit I build.
After the hands, limb creation begins. In the above photo, you may notice that a limb has begun to sprout out of the torso.
Total monkey-mode. GungirlZ just walks on her knuckles apparently. Two arms down and about as many hours to reach this point.
Most of the body!
All of the body!
If you’re worried, please be assured: I did build her head as well.
For your eyes’ enjoyment: Buster Doll Gunner! This is the fully completed base body. The blushing faceplate is super cute.
I decided to leave this body as-is, no paint applications. I like the look of her white outfit and I sure as hell ain’t painting skin tones.
Look, I’m not a foot-guy. At least I don’t think so..? I’ll have to think on that.
The included feeties with the sculpted lil toes, tho? This was a choice. A good choice, don’t get me wrong. But someone decided the Buster Dolls needed alternate feet with sculpted toes and I mean, who am I to ignore this decision?
It’s not all about the toes, however. Gunther also came with 3 other types of earth-slappers, including these cute school shoes:
Oh and yeah… I may have built all of her other clothes. Sometimes I forget to document the processes. whoopsie
But what I didn’t forget to document is Gundra’s armor parts! Check it out!
Ok, I lied. I built all of these additional parts and didn’t take a single photo during the process. whoopsie x2
Well, anyways, here’s what she looks like when built:
Let the painting begin
If you’ve ever wondered just where, oh where, does this magical painting process take place: here you go. A photo from my basement. I hope you’re satisfied.
Gunathan, post-bath, now torn to shreds. There’s a decent amount of little bits and bobs that need to be painted!
An assortment of parts. Primed, and ready for a new life.
Gun: primed.
Same gun, now with a New Life™.
The start of me base coats. Gunborah’s hair is the first thing I completed.
I’ve been leaning on my gunmetal paint quite a bit lately. It’s a nice color!
Little accessories, painted in an aluminum-like color. Also, some of Gunseph’s clothing.
Like I said, I painted and sealed her hair parts before anything else. I just couldn’t stand to look at her plastic brown locks any longer. The hair color was kept pretty similar to stock, now with the addition of some very light pink tips. I’m mostly pleased with how this came out. Regardless of how well it was or was not painted, simply adding paint and a finish gives her hair so much more texture and depth. If you’ve ever contemplated painting any part of your kit, I recommend going for the hair. A bit of small paintwork can make for some huge differences.
Enough hair, back to Gunberly’s armor parts. Here you can view some arm guards, that fancy neck doohickey, and a limb guard! These parts were painted their respective base colors via the airbrush and the smaller details were done by hand with a regular ole paint brush.
I really don’t know what to call these parts. I’ve been referring to them (to myself, in my head) as Power Pylons, but I’m not sure what they actually are nor what they’re meant to do. Whatever. They got painted. Look and see. I spent way too much time on these annoying fricks.
Various armor parts, tech parts, weapons, etc. As you may have noticed, esteemed reader, my favorite metallic dark blue has shown its face yet again. I really like this shade of blue; I will continue to abuse it.
You agree, tho, right? It’s like a really nice shade of blue?
At this stage, I started adding small accents to these parts. Painting red over blue is not a great experience. I should really look into how to paint properly.
As for color-scheme goes, I was thinking classic Gundam? Public servant? USA…?
The red, white, and blue was kinda unintentional, tbh. Not saying I dislike it. In fact, I quite like this color combo a lot.
Paint begets paint, begets paint… until it’s time to start sealing!
A honest look at what my painting area looks like most days. Devoid of comfort, full of mistakes… but that’s enough about Mori; my desk doesn’t look too exciting either.
A beautiful, kinda gloopy, high gloss finish! The gloss was laying on thicc. 2 c’s. I got these parts to look a bit cleaner towards the end of this build.
I threw a gloss coat over the entire part, then taped the bottom section off so I could matte coat the exposed bits.
Afterwards, I’m left with an armor plate that features both gloss and matte finishes. Neato!
From there, I moved onto Gunemba’s floppy doggy ears. The gloss finish on them looks great in contrast to the finish on her hair.
The glossy ears are so cute! And they feel really good to rub between your fingers. I am 100% telling you the truth. Come touch them.
The lighting in this photo helps to do my sealant job some justice! I find it quite fun to combine sealant finishes like this. Variety, life spices, etc.
It’s at this point where I realized I forgot to finish painting a few pieces. whoopsie³. Even if copper isn’t inductive, I felt it was a good color choice for Gundorah’s Power Pylons as it looks cool, no?
What you see here is the result of many, many, many layers of painting, repainting, painting, repainting. Unfortunate to know that Buster Doll Tank has these same pieces. Frick me.
Anywho, through the power of swearing and sweating, I whipped up one masterclass paintjob and got these suckers sealed. The matte finish really helps these parts stand out.
Everything is going so well! Until you realize that there are more parts you forgot to paint fully.
And wow, check this out! More parts I forgot to finish painting!
I spent way too much time on Gunzilla’s lil foots, applying paint apps to places you’ll never see.
An assortment of fully painted, completely sealed, and loosely set components; Gundoka is nearly ready for reassembly!
Gunna’s well… guns! I think these turned out pretty good, even with minimal work done to them.
And now that all of the hard work is done, it’s time to slap her back together again.
Gunleigh is complete! Check out her slick new appearance:
Buster Doll Gunner!
Suited up and ready for battle.
BD Gunna’ was quite the fun kit to put together and a real pain in the ass to paint and finish. She’s a great example of how fun and accessible modern day Megami Device kits can be. That is, if you don’t plan on doing much with paint after the initial assembly.
I ran into so many issues when painting her armor parts (specifically her leg pieces) and fitting them back together after sealing? Frickin hell, dude. I spent hours trying to get the two halves to fit back together. Heating, drilling, sanding - I was having a hard time… and then I realized I was trying to fit the left side into the right and vice-versa. It’s kinda funny now (only kinda!) but at the time I was not having fun.
Enough bitching, you want to see more photos of the finished figure, right? Hit the big button below to view the full gallery!
Now that Gunnifer is completed, I’ve started working on her sister? friend? classmate?
Say hello to Buster Doll Knight! Hajimemashite!
Expect updates on this next kit sometime in the near future. Hopefully sooner rather than later, but I don’t want to make any promises when it comes to timelines. All in time.