Now normally I would never do an HGUC, but this isn't a normal HGUC release. This is the HGUC Hazel from the Advance of Zeta series which runs in the Japanese Dengeki Hobby Magazine. What sold me on this smaller Gundam was the amount of detail which Bandai put into it. The hands for one are fantastic. If only Bandai supplied these sort of hands for their MG line-up.

This was done for the AoZ Unlimited Group Build on my forum.

When I recieved the kit I fully expected lots of seam lines to deal with, but unlike most HGUC's this kit had very few. The majority of them were on the arms which required them to be constructed prior to painting. The others were the gun which is to be expected of any Gundam release regardless of grade.

To make construction easier, I painted the internals first. This was done in Alclad Steel. I absolutely love the color for joints and internals. The durability of the paint helps as well when posing the kit. I built and masked the elbow joints then added the arms which I sanded/puttied/sanded some more before painting them. This was easier than having to reposition the arms to make sure the elbow joint was completely painted.

The overall color scheme is a custom one I designed. I like the stock scheme a lot, but wanted to do something different. I wanted a lighter blue and more ellow-orange highlights. The decals were designed and printed by Models4U who did an excellent job as always.

One new thing I tried with this kit was using a wash for the panel lines. I used a mixture of Tensochrom Oil and Brown acrylic washes. I like the look in general as it's much lighter, but don't like the bleedy edges you sometimes get with a wash.

Overall, I really enjoyed building this kit and would recommend it to anyone as a starter kit as it's got a small number of parts, little seams to fill, and is an easy build.