HGUC Unicorn Destroy WIP

I've had this Unicorn laying around for a while now, and figured it would make a fitting next project, seeing as I recently completed the HGUC Sinanju. I'm trying some cool stuff with this kit, and I'm really excited for the final product! Read on for the details.

When painting the Unicorn and Banshee Models, you're confronted with the question of what to do with the psycho frame pieces. A lot of modelers choose to leave them untouched. Personally, I think that it makes the kit look unfinished. The psycho frame glows brightly in the anime, and the clear pieces just look sort of dull in comparison. For this reason, I'm going to be painting the psycho frame with a sort of candy finish. The above picture was a test spoon I used to dial in the right color saturation for my frame. However, the spoon is redder than the pieces will be.

Here's the "X" from the shield with the paint job I'm using. This piece has been primed with Alclad Gloss Black Base, sprayed with Alclad Chrome, then with Mr. Color Clear Red until I reached the shade of pink I thought looked good. I outlined all the steps to this in a recent tutorial, if you'd like to look at how to paint "Candy" finishes.

For the joints and exposed frame pieces, I used Alclad Airframe Aluminum. Not as shiny as chrome but still a nice looking color.

I also mixed a custom dark blue for the backpack and feet parts. I actually really like the shade of blue I chose, I think it will contrast the white and pink nicely.

Alcad pale gold for the V- fin. Yellow just doesn't shine like I would envision the real V-fin would during NT-D.

Painting the eyes was interesting. The eye piece comes cast together with some of the psycho frame. If you don't paint your psycho frame this isn't a big deal, just paint the eyes as normal. For my color scheme though, I want the eyes to be black and green while the surrounding area is metallic pink. First step was priming.

Followed by Alclad Duraluminum and a some Mr. Color Clear Green.

I then sprayed the whole piece with gloss black enamel and used lighter fluid and a Tamiya cotton swab to reveal the eyes. After that I masked the eyes off using the included eye sticker and sprayed one more coat of gloss black enamel to be sure I didn't miss anything. The eyes are masked in this photo but you can't see the sticker due to the extra coat of paint.

I sprayed the cured black enamel with Alclad Chrome, and then used clear red to paint the metallic pink I've been using for the psycho frame.

And the finished product, after peeling off the eye sticker. Pretty long process, but definitely the result I wanted! This will probably be the only WIP for the Unicorn since all I have left are the white pieces, and painting a bunch of white pieces is pretty straightforward. I'm also going to decal this kit a little bit, and assuming all goes as planned I'll post a finished album Thursday or Friday. Thanks for reading!