I'd put off finishing them for no better reason than that I don't really enjoy painting figures. There, I've said it. I find figures rather tedious, especially in large numbers. But now that I've done them and added them to the boat, they seem to make all the difference, giving it a context and some scale and action.
So, with the boat now fully complete, it's time to let it go. If I had a suitable cabinet or display case where I could light it, I might be tempted to keep it. When I get such an enjoyable build as this, I want to put in a lot of extra effort and time, really push the boat out, as it were.
It wasn't a straightforward build - the references are conflicting in places and since authenticity is important to me, it was hard to make some colour decisions. For example, the torpedoes; the box art shows them as orange, but various sources mention red, black or white. Photos of the boat in service are all in monochrome, of course, so they didn't support any one colour conclusively. I mixed what I felt was the closest shade, a sort of off-white. The same with the life ring - some feel it should be grey and the box art gives bright orange. In the end I chose what gave the best artistic effect - it's my boat and I want it to look good. I often think that if you gave the same kit to any two builders to put together, you would get two quite different interpretations of the same model. Remember, this is a blog, feel free to comment here if you feel strongly!
All building issues aside, I am enjoying it for what it is, and I hope you do too: an attractive scale model which is representative of the real boat, and which captures the spirit of the time in which they fought.
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