Since several people have expressed interest in a dedicated plastic modelling I have decided to make one. The aim of this thread is to serve as a place for discussing anything related to plastic scale modelling and hopefully, to get more people interested in the hobby.
So if you're looking for beginner tips, want to talk about your current (or completed) builds, ask questions, or if you've ever been interested in this whole thing but didn't know where to begin, this is the thread for you.
What is plastic scale modelling
Plastic scale modelling refers, unsurprisingly, to the process of building plastic miniature models. In practical terms, this means starting from a bunch of plastic parts, like these:
And putting them together, painting them, and adding various details to end up with something like this:
(It's not the same kit, I know, but it hopefully gets the idea across).
Unlike plastic figures, the main appeal comes from building something yourself and creating a very personalised final product.
How to get started
At a first glance, this whole thing might look very intimidating. However, it is not all that difficult to get started - all it takes is a model kit and some basic tools (and time). And while your first model will likely not be a masterpiece, making something that looks decent is not as hard as it might seem. The pointers below should be enough to get anyone going (hopefully), and if not, there is an incredible amount of advice out on the internet, covering pretty much every question you can think of.
The first important dilemma most people face is picking what to build. Going to an online hobby shop is definitely overwhelming, as most contain a very large amount of stuff without any indication of what's good, how difficult it is, and what's needed to build it. Below are some of the more popular categories, with brief descriptions, which will hopefully make the choice a little bit easier:
Considering this is a gaming forum, with a number of people interested in Japanese games and/or anime, the first category I feel like should be mentioned are Bandai's Gunpla kits. Bandai make an absolutely incredible amount of mecha kits based on their Gundam franchise of anime, manga, and games.
Another reason for mentioning these first is that they are slightly easier to build than most models, due to two factors:
Another, although very different, category are aircraft kits. Mostly, these are based on military planes, though there are also plenty of kits of helicopters and civilian aircraft. Unlike Gunpla, there are no general sub-categories would tell you how simple/detailed the kits are, but they do come in different scales:
If you prefer something more grounded, military vehicles are another popular category. It's mostly dominated by tanks, but other military vehicles (APCs, armoured cars, artillery...) also exist in smaller numbers. The main scales are:
As with the above categories, this category mostly consists of military ships, though there are some interesting civilian kits available too. The two main scales are:
For something less combat-focused, cars are a very good choice, with a wide variety of kits ranging from racing cars to trucks and pretty much everything in between. The most popular scales are 1/24 and 1/25, which are basically the same. Larger kits with more detail also exist but are much less common. A thing to note with cars is that replicating their shiny, polished exterior can be quite tricky, and requires a lot of sanding and polishing. Or you can always just forgo all that and go for a super rusty, weathered look.
While I'm not all that familiar with this category, I know this forum has a lot of fans of all things anime so I'm including it on the list. With model building being very popular in Japan, it's really not much of a surprise that there's a lot of anime (and anime-inspired) kits out there. So if Gundam isn't quite your thing there's still a lot to choose from. Things like Macross, Evangelion, Patlabor, Full-Metal Panic (everything with mechs really, including mech-girls not related to any specific series), Space Battleship Yamato, and more. Japanese companies are also quite happy to re-brand their existing kits when the opportunity arises, which means there is a pretty wide variety of Kancolle and Girls und Panzer kits out there.
On a related note, there are also several videogame kits out there, from games like Valkyria Chronicles, Metal Gear, Xenoblade, Armored Core, and more.
Also, Sci-Fi in general gets a lot of love. There's a large number of Star Wars and Star Trek kits out there, for example, but I'm not very familiar with those.
This is by no means an exhaustive list, but hopefully it shows some of the more popular things out there, and it hopefully makes choosing your first kit a bit easier. Personally, I think Gunpla are a great place to start with (and stick around with) due to their consistently excellent quality, and due to the fact they do not require paints or glue. However, those things aren't terribly important (gluing things doesn't really change anything, and while painting can be tricky it's also very rewarding, and getting a satisfying result isn't as hard as it might seem) so if that's not quite your thing every one of the above categories should be fine, and the cheaper kits will all likely be fine even for beginners.
Buying a model kit is, unfortunately, not enough since you also need tools to build them. This section will hopefully clear up what the tools you need are.
The Essentials:
Sprue Cutters: You will definitely need something to get the plastic parts of the injection sprues they come in. The best way to do this is with dedicated modelling cutters.
Hobby Knife: The cutters will often simply not be enough, and will leave small nubs on the plastic parts. These can be cleaned off with a knife or sanded off. Generally, there's two types of hobby knives: scalpel-looking ones with removable blades (x-acto knives) and ones with a segmented blade where individual segments can be broken off when they go blunt (Olfa knives). They are also just really handy whenever you need to cut anything, obviously. Oh, and always cut away from yourself, because these things are much sharper than you might think and will effortlessly cut through your hands or fingers.
Sanding Files/Sandpaper: This is just really useful to have. It allows you to sand off nubs and lets you smooth off the surface of the model. For a start, cheap emery-boards from your nearest drug store should do. For sandpaper, don't buy the very rough ones meant for woodworking or things like that, as they will do more harm than good. Go for finer grits.
Glue: You do not need this for Gunpla or other snap-fit kits. For everything else, however, it's a must-have. Things are actually quite complicated here, as there are different types of glues. Essentially, you need the following:
Basic brush-painting advice: When brush-painting, it's easy to mess up and end up with globs of thick, ugly paint. To avoid that, use the following tips:
Spray-cans: An alternative to an airbrush are spray-cans. They are cheaper (though more expensive than brush-painting), but are a much less fine tool. So while they are useful for putting down a good looking coat of a single colour, they are incapable of painting on smaller details, fine camouflage patterns or for pre-shading. Still, they can be a great alternative, especially for models that come in a single colour (like most cars).
The things that are nice to have:
Something for panel lining: Panel lining is used to emphasize panel lines and other recesses on your model, which can really enhance its overall look. It's pretty much essential on Gunpla and is also great on aircraft. For this, you've got three main choices:
A clear coat: These come in gloss and matt variants (and semi-gloss/satin, but that's less important) and serve several purposes.
While it is by most accounts not quite as good as dedicated modelling products, it is:
Masking tape: Needed whenever you want to paint a straight edge, or when you want to not paint a piece of your model (like an aircraft canopy).
Other things:
Putty: Sometimes, models just don't fit together very well. In those cases, you can fill the holes with modelling putty and sand it off so that it's consistent with the rest of the model.
Hand (pin vise) drills: Some models require you to drill holes, in which case these come in handy.
Fine-grit sandpaper and polishing paste: You'll need this if you want to make things really shiny. You can buy packs of really fine-grit sandpaper (up to 12000 grit), sand the model with them and then apply the polishing paste. It's only really necessary if you want a really shiny finish (like on a car or an airliner).
Weathering products: There is an extremely wide variety of things that can make your model look worn out (weathered), from washes to pigments to filters to rust effects. There's just too many to mention, and weathering techniques would really require a section of their own, but that's a bit more advanced than the things I want to put here. Just be aware that they aren't really necessary for your first model (but go ahead and buy them if you think they're cool. There's plenty of guides covering weathering on the internet.).
Manufacturers
Another thing I want to mention are model-kit manufacturers since an obvious question is "well, I know what I want to build, but there's still so many options and so many companies making them". Hopefully, this section can give you a clearer look on what's good. Unfortunately, the manufacturer's name printed on the box often doesn't really mean much since companies often re-release their old, awful kits, or even re-box kits of other manufacturers. Because of this, it's impossible to say "everything X makes is great". There are, however, still some general things to be aware of for some of the more well-known manufacturers, specifically:
In general, Tamiya is a great safe choice for a first kit, as is Bandai with Gunpla. For others, you'll want to look the kit up, but reviews are generally pretty easy to find so it's not much of a problem.
Where to buy
You'll also need to buy all these things from somewhere. If you've got a local shop that's a great option. Otherwise, here's a short list of online shops:
Amazon has a variety of kits. It's not as comprehensive as other options, but it's still an option.
America:
http://spruebrothers.com/
UK:
https://www.hannants.co.uk/
Japan:
Pretty much the only choice for some of the Japanese kits are online shops like these. They are fully in English, but shipping and customs can drive up the price.
https://hlj.com/
https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/
http://www.amiami.com/
Thanks to deltaplus, Wubby, and xEik for providing feedback.
So if you're looking for beginner tips, want to talk about your current (or completed) builds, ask questions, or if you've ever been interested in this whole thing but didn't know where to begin, this is the thread for you.
What is plastic scale modelling
Plastic scale modelling refers, unsurprisingly, to the process of building plastic miniature models. In practical terms, this means starting from a bunch of plastic parts, like these:
And putting them together, painting them, and adding various details to end up with something like this:
(It's not the same kit, I know, but it hopefully gets the idea across).
Unlike plastic figures, the main appeal comes from building something yourself and creating a very personalised final product.
How to get started
At a first glance, this whole thing might look very intimidating. However, it is not all that difficult to get started - all it takes is a model kit and some basic tools (and time). And while your first model will likely not be a masterpiece, making something that looks decent is not as hard as it might seem. The pointers below should be enough to get anyone going (hopefully), and if not, there is an incredible amount of advice out on the internet, covering pretty much every question you can think of.
The first important dilemma most people face is picking what to build. Going to an online hobby shop is definitely overwhelming, as most contain a very large amount of stuff without any indication of what's good, how difficult it is, and what's needed to build it. Below are some of the more popular categories, with brief descriptions, which will hopefully make the choice a little bit easier:
Considering this is a gaming forum, with a number of people interested in Japanese games and/or anime, the first category I feel like should be mentioned are Bandai's Gunpla kits. Bandai make an absolutely incredible amount of mecha kits based on their Gundam franchise of anime, manga, and games.
Another reason for mentioning these first is that they are slightly easier to build than most models, due to two factors:
- They do not require glue but just snap together. While these aren't the only models like that, the Gunpla line is definitely the largest line of such models, and likely the one with the highest quality.
- Their parts are molded in color, so painting is not required.
- High Grade (HG) - this is the cheapest category. The kits come in 1/144 scale and lack the detail of the more expensive "grades". They are, however, very cheap and are still of very high quality.
- Master Grade (MG) - The more detailed, larger, and more expensive category. The kits come in 1/100 scale and contain much more detail.
- Perfect Grade (PG) - These things are pretty insane. They are huge at 1/60 scale, have an insane amount of detail, and can cost several hundred dollars. It's definitely not something I'd recommend for a first model, but if you can afford them they are incredible.
- Real Grade (RG) - A more recent line of kits which combines the small size of HG with the detail of MG. The smaller scale makes the added detail even more impressive, but naturally also makes them a bit harder to put together (though not by much, really). As the line is rather recent, the amount of kits is rather limited though.
Another, although very different, category are aircraft kits. Mostly, these are based on military planes, though there are also plenty of kits of helicopters and civilian aircraft. Unlike Gunpla, there are no general sub-categories would tell you how simple/detailed the kits are, but they do come in different scales:
- 1/144 - This scale essentially covers two things - very tiny kits of smaller planes, and kits of larger aircraft that would be too big in larger scales (like commercial airliners, for instance). It's not the most popular scale, and the smaller planes will lack the detail of the larger scales.
- 1/72 - This is a very popular scale. The kits are small (excluding some larger aircraft), but still large enough to contain a good amount of detail. They can also be very cheap and the selection of kits is huge, which makes them a great starting choice.
- 1/48 - Another popular scale. The kits are larger and contain more detail, but are also more expensive.
- 1/32 - A less popular scale, with a more limited selection of models. However, the large size allows for some really impressive details.
- 1/24 - These are huge. And expensive. And not very popular. Something you buy to go all-out with after you get some experience
If you prefer something more grounded, military vehicles are another popular category. It's mostly dominated by tanks, but other military vehicles (APCs, armoured cars, artillery...) also exist in smaller numbers. The main scales are:
- 1/72 - Unlike with aircraft, this scale is not very popular. It's simply too small to contain a lot of detail. However, several kits in this scale do exist, and their cheap price might make them a good starting point.
- 1/48 - Another less popular scale, though in recent years Tamiya have started producing a line of very high quality 1/48 kits, which make for good starter kits due to great quality and decently affordable prices.
- 1/35 and 1/32 - These are the most popular scales. They are quite big, but in turn allow for a great amount of detail. Still suitable for beginners, and you'll probably have a hard time finding your favourite vehicle in other scales.
As with the above categories, this category mostly consists of military ships, though there are some interesting civilian kits available too. The two main scales are:
- 1/700 (and, more rarely, 1/720) - The smaller and cheaper scale, although it can still get pretty big with larger ships. Still, the kits here are mostly affordable but can be pretty tricky to do well due to small details.
- 1/350 - The larger, and therefore more expensive scale. They can get absurdly large, and aren't really something I'd recommend for a first model, but there's no denying they look pretty impressive if built well so if you think you've got the time and patience to build one don't let anyone stop you.
For something less combat-focused, cars are a very good choice, with a wide variety of kits ranging from racing cars to trucks and pretty much everything in between. The most popular scales are 1/24 and 1/25, which are basically the same. Larger kits with more detail also exist but are much less common. A thing to note with cars is that replicating their shiny, polished exterior can be quite tricky, and requires a lot of sanding and polishing. Or you can always just forgo all that and go for a super rusty, weathered look.
While I'm not all that familiar with this category, I know this forum has a lot of fans of all things anime so I'm including it on the list. With model building being very popular in Japan, it's really not much of a surprise that there's a lot of anime (and anime-inspired) kits out there. So if Gundam isn't quite your thing there's still a lot to choose from. Things like Macross, Evangelion, Patlabor, Full-Metal Panic (everything with mechs really, including mech-girls not related to any specific series), Space Battleship Yamato, and more. Japanese companies are also quite happy to re-brand their existing kits when the opportunity arises, which means there is a pretty wide variety of Kancolle and Girls und Panzer kits out there.
On a related note, there are also several videogame kits out there, from games like Valkyria Chronicles, Metal Gear, Xenoblade, Armored Core, and more.
Also, Sci-Fi in general gets a lot of love. There's a large number of Star Wars and Star Trek kits out there, for example, but I'm not very familiar with those.
This is by no means an exhaustive list, but hopefully it shows some of the more popular things out there, and it hopefully makes choosing your first kit a bit easier. Personally, I think Gunpla are a great place to start with (and stick around with) due to their consistently excellent quality, and due to the fact they do not require paints or glue. However, those things aren't terribly important (gluing things doesn't really change anything, and while painting can be tricky it's also very rewarding, and getting a satisfying result isn't as hard as it might seem) so if that's not quite your thing every one of the above categories should be fine, and the cheaper kits will all likely be fine even for beginners.
Buying a model kit is, unfortunately, not enough since you also need tools to build them. This section will hopefully clear up what the tools you need are.
The Essentials:
Sprue Cutters: You will definitely need something to get the plastic parts of the injection sprues they come in. The best way to do this is with dedicated modelling cutters.
Hobby Knife: The cutters will often simply not be enough, and will leave small nubs on the plastic parts. These can be cleaned off with a knife or sanded off. Generally, there's two types of hobby knives: scalpel-looking ones with removable blades (x-acto knives) and ones with a segmented blade where individual segments can be broken off when they go blunt (Olfa knives). They are also just really handy whenever you need to cut anything, obviously. Oh, and always cut away from yourself, because these things are much sharper than you might think and will effortlessly cut through your hands or fingers.
Sanding Files/Sandpaper: This is just really useful to have. It allows you to sand off nubs and lets you smooth off the surface of the model. For a start, cheap emery-boards from your nearest drug store should do. For sandpaper, don't buy the very rough ones meant for woodworking or things like that, as they will do more harm than good. Go for finer grits.
Glue: You do not need this for Gunpla or other snap-fit kits. For everything else, however, it's a must-have. Things are actually quite complicated here, as there are different types of glues. Essentially, you need the following:
- Plastic Cement: This is your bread-and-butter glue. It works by melting the plastic and then allowing it to re-harden, which creates a very strong bond and helps cover the seams between parts. However, it only works on plastic. Plastic cement comes in two types. First, there's your ordinary plastic cement, which is pretty thick and preferably comes with a needle applicator (like Revell Contacta Professional). I would not recommend the ones that come in tubes as they can be far too thick and not any fun to work with. The other type is liquid cement, which is much thinner and is applied with a brush. To use it, you just hold the two parts together and then go over the area they meet with a brush. The glue will then go into the area and join the parts together. An example of such a glue is Tamiya Extra Thin. A lot of people swear by liquid cement, but either type is fine.
- Clear glue: Plastic cement has the unfortunate side-effect of making clear parts look cloudy if you use it to glue them (as does super glue). Because of this, several companies make special glues for clear parts. An example is Revell Contacta Clear. You don't really need this right away, but it will make clear parts look much better. Ordinary PVA glue can be used as an alternative.
- Superglue aka Cyanoacrylate aka CA: Since plastic cement only works on plastic, you need a different type of glue for non-plastic parts (or parts that were painted before gluing them). Honestly, clear glue actually works fine for that, as does your ordinary PVA glue, but CA glue has the added benefit of drying pretty much instantly and creating a really strong bond. So not really necessary, but nice to have.
- 3 types of paint: acrylic, enamel, and lacquer.
- Acrylic paint can be thinned with water, and sometimes alcohol and dedicated thinners. Acrylics dry faster than enamels, but are more likely to leave behind brush-marks (which look ugly) when using brushes to paint. I've only used acrylics, since the disadvantages of other types are too much for me, and it's definitely possible to get a pretty good look with them, so that's what I'd recommend.
- Enamel paints need special thinners, dry much more slowly (hours, or even days for them to fully cure), and the solvents used in them are toxic (so keep the room well aired), but they leave behind fewer brush-marks.
- Lacquer paints are also toxic, but dry fast and produce a strong, durable finish. They also need a dedicated thinner. They can be difficult to use and are hard to acquire online due to shipping restrictions. They aren't something I'd recommend for beginners, but their durable, often shiny, finish makes them good in some cases.
- 2 ways to paint them: Either with plain-old brushes or with an airbrush.
Basic brush-painting advice: When brush-painting, it's easy to mess up and end up with globs of thick, ugly paint. To avoid that, use the following tips:
- Thinning your paint is very important. Out of the box, most paint is way too thick to achieve good results. Sadly, it's not trivial to say when your paints are thin enough (a milk-like consistency is often recommended, but that's not very specific, and specific ratios don't work since all paint is different), so this is best learned through practice. With properly thinned paint, you will need to do multiple coats to get a good looking result.
- Only apply a new coat after the previous one has completely dried.
- Getting some good brushes is also important. For fine details, you want a good fine detail brush (say, 000 to 00000 size) and some good larger brushes for painting larger parts. Better brushes leave behind fewer brush marks and aren't terribly expensive, so they a good investment. Go to an art store and pick up some decent synthetic brushes for $5 each for a start.
- Before starting to paint, you can apply some primer from a spray-can. Primers make paint stick on better, and while they aren't necessary, they can make your work easier. This also holds for airbrushing.
- If you are not using a primer, give your sprues a wash in some soapy water before doing anything else. This will remove oils that are left over from the manufacturing process which make it harder for the paint to stick.
- Soft edge camouflage (the one that looks sprayed on)
- Or more specifically, the distinctive mottle camouflage on German Bf-109s (this site has some good examples: http://www.cbrnp.com/profiles/quarter2/bf109e.htm. ).
- More advanced techniques like pre-shading, which adds realistic colour variation to your model
- Using metallic paint (which just generally doesn't look good when brush-painted).
- Airbrushes also just make applying consistent coats of paint much easier, and will never leave behind ugly brush-marks.
Spray-cans: An alternative to an airbrush are spray-cans. They are cheaper (though more expensive than brush-painting), but are a much less fine tool. So while they are useful for putting down a good looking coat of a single colour, they are incapable of painting on smaller details, fine camouflage patterns or for pre-shading. Still, they can be a great alternative, especially for models that come in a single colour (like most cars).
The things that are nice to have:
Something for panel lining: Panel lining is used to emphasize panel lines and other recesses on your model, which can really enhance its overall look. It's pretty much essential on Gunpla and is also great on aircraft. For this, you've got three main choices:
- Fine point Gundam markers: These are cheap, easy to use, and perfect Gunpla. The only real thing to note here is to avoid using the black colour on white parts since it's just too strong. Grey gives a better result. An exception are Gundam mouth vents, which look better panel-lined in black.
- Panel line washes: They are essentially very thin, slow-drying paint that will flow into the panel lines by itself. Just apply it to a point of the panel line, and the wash will cover it (or a part of it, in which case you repeat the process in a different point). After that, you clean up the excess paint with a q-tip. There are several options for this, with Tamiya Panel Accent and MIG panel line wash being two popular examples. However, some people report that using such products on bare plastic results in the plastic becoming brittle and possibly breaking due to how the thinner in the paint reacts with it. If using it on bare plastic, I'd recommend first covering it with a clear coat, which will also make if flow better (more on clear coats later).
- Custom-made washes: Since panel line washes are just thin, slow-drying paint, it's completely possible to make your own. The easiest way is to go to an art store, pick up some artist oil paints and thin them heavily with odourless mineral spirits (there are other alternatives, like turpentine, but odourless mineral spirits are the nicest to work with). Good colours include burnt umber, raw umber, burnt sienna (all variants of brown), payne's grey, and ivory black (to mix with other colours and make them darker).
A clear coat: These come in gloss and matt variants (and semi-gloss/satin, but that's less important) and serve several purposes.
- They protect the paint underneath, which is always nice.
- Decals look much better if applied to a gloss coat.
- Gloss coats also make some more advanced techniques, like washes (a more complete guide is here: http://www.scalemodelguide.com/painting-weathering/weathering/paint-washes/) work much better, and protect the wash from ruining the paint underneath.
- Matt coats make pigments stick on better (one guide is here https://militaryscalemodelling.com/tips-and-tricks/weathering-how-to-the-dust-effect-with-pigments/), in case you want to make your model look covered with dust or something like that.
- They change the texture of your model, giving it a different (better!) look. Even for unpainted Gunpla, people recommend covering them with a matt (or more rarely gloss) coat, as it just makes things look better.
While it is by most accounts not quite as good as dedicated modelling products, it is:
- Dirt cheap - a $5 bottle will last you forever.
- Very easy to apply with a brush, since it will level really well by itself.
Masking tape: Needed whenever you want to paint a straight edge, or when you want to not paint a piece of your model (like an aircraft canopy).
Other things:
Putty: Sometimes, models just don't fit together very well. In those cases, you can fill the holes with modelling putty and sand it off so that it's consistent with the rest of the model.
Hand (pin vise) drills: Some models require you to drill holes, in which case these come in handy.
Fine-grit sandpaper and polishing paste: You'll need this if you want to make things really shiny. You can buy packs of really fine-grit sandpaper (up to 12000 grit), sand the model with them and then apply the polishing paste. It's only really necessary if you want a really shiny finish (like on a car or an airliner).
Weathering products: There is an extremely wide variety of things that can make your model look worn out (weathered), from washes to pigments to filters to rust effects. There's just too many to mention, and weathering techniques would really require a section of their own, but that's a bit more advanced than the things I want to put here. Just be aware that they aren't really necessary for your first model (but go ahead and buy them if you think they're cool. There's plenty of guides covering weathering on the internet.).
Manufacturers
Another thing I want to mention are model-kit manufacturers since an obvious question is "well, I know what I want to build, but there's still so many options and so many companies making them". Hopefully, this section can give you a clearer look on what's good. Unfortunately, the manufacturer's name printed on the box often doesn't really mean much since companies often re-release their old, awful kits, or even re-box kits of other manufacturers. Because of this, it's impossible to say "everything X makes is great". There are, however, still some general things to be aware of for some of the more well-known manufacturers, specifically:
- Tamiya: They are great. Their models are slightly more expensive than most alternatives but are pretty much guaranteed to be good. The exception are their old kits, as well as some of their re-boxes of other companies. Still, if you see a new Tamiya kit, it's a safe bet that it's going to be great. They also cover pretty much every category, so there's a lot to choose from.
- Airfix: A mixed bag. Their new kits are generally good, the old ones are generally bad.
- Aoshima: A company that has a reputation for being pretty good. They make some good car models and ships.
- Bandai: Another great company. Aside from Gunpla, they make a variety of anime kits, as well as some good Star Wars kits and various other things, but don't really dabble in other categories.
- Eduard: A smaller company that mostly focuses on planes, which are great. They started off as a company only providing extra photo-etched brass detail parts. Their profipack line of kits all come with those included, and are generally of great quality.
- Hasegawa: They are pretty great, though a bit pricey. Mostly famous for their aircraft, but they make other things too, like a number of Virtual-On kits.
- Italeri: Mostly a mixed bag, though they do make some specific kits other companies do not (like their line of military boats, and kits of Italian stuff).
- Kotobukiya: Worth mentioning since they make a number of videogame kits covering games such as Armored Core, Zone of the Enders and Muv-Luv.
- Meng: A premium brand that focuses on tanks. The quality's supposed to be generally good, but they are pricey and don't have a large selection.
- Revell: This is actually a bit complicated since there are two Revells. There's the American one, which is a mixed bag and generally not very good (cheap though!). They are also currently in some big financial troubles (http://www.scaleautomag.com/articles/2018/04/revell-has-been-sold). The other one is Revell of Germany, who generally make good models.
In general, Tamiya is a great safe choice for a first kit, as is Bandai with Gunpla. For others, you'll want to look the kit up, but reviews are generally pretty easy to find so it's not much of a problem.
Where to buy
You'll also need to buy all these things from somewhere. If you've got a local shop that's a great option. Otherwise, here's a short list of online shops:
Amazon has a variety of kits. It's not as comprehensive as other options, but it's still an option.
America:
http://spruebrothers.com/
UK:
https://www.hannants.co.uk/
Japan:
Pretty much the only choice for some of the Japanese kits are online shops like these. They are fully in English, but shipping and customs can drive up the price.
https://hlj.com/
https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/
http://www.amiami.com/
Thanks to deltaplus, Wubby, and xEik for providing feedback.
