Melbourne Model Expo 2007 (Australia)
By Matt Gannon
Expo link: (http://www.modelexpo.com.au)
Over the Queens Birthday weekend Saturday 9th – Monday 11th of June modellers and enthusiasts were treated to a bonanza of great models, fantastic dioramas and great vendors.
Having attended most of the last two days we had just enough time to immerse ourselves totally guilt free in our hobby. A BIG highlight was LSP’ers from Aussie (it’s a vast country) meeting up with each other as well as chaperoning our American running back who was particularly effective in the swap-n-sell meet. With three modelers in one car I had to re-stack the boot (in the US you guys call it the trunk?) a couple of times to fit our burgeoning stash of delectable modeling goodies in for the safe trip home. We went all prepared to look for each others special interests (even organized to look for a Grippen for Piet). Incidentally, if you have a Grippen and will part with it for less than the price of a kidney or small child drop Piet a PM.
There were vendors galore at the expo. Some great people demonstrating resin casting techniques and being ever helpful with ideas and tweaks to your own moulds. Kit sellers, book sellers with crazy discounts on rare and unusual topics, die cast toys sellers and lots of vendors with gear you just don’t ever see in a shop in Australia. I met the guys from Modelart (the Aussie modeling mag) and Aussiemodeller.com who are all very keen on building up the hobby in our country with the same sorts of values and ideals as us at LSP. We met many positive thinking people really willing to get in and have a go with their cottage industry business such as Damien from Aussie decals who has some great LSP decal options for some of our favourite kits and lives around the corner from me. We met Dick Hourigan who was the man who owned a Boomerang and liaised with Montex to ensure they got all the right info to make such a wonderful kit. In all an awesome time.
Sad to say (hanging our heads in shame) but we’ll need to call for Aussie reinforcements for 2008 as our American guest comprehensively drank both Aussies under the table. It’s a wonder we made it to the show at all. Meeting up with people you chat to regularly on the web was a great experience. In fact, given the interest in LSPs to begin with there was rarely a time that some common interest wasn’t being explored or discussed.
Unfortunately a situation to be rectified at the show was the absence of large amounts of LSP’s. Wot the?...you say!! As it turns out the cheapest way to get yourself into the event on each day is simply by entering a model. Nevertheless, despite a low number of 1/32 and only 1 1/24 scale planes, I really thought the models that were entered looked sensational.
Luckily it seems more than one LSP’er dragged their camera along on the day. To PacificMustang, Neesh, Tim Carrol et al many thanks for your contributions to this article. I bought along my uber set-up but found it was getting in the way (i.e. an OH&S concern) for attendees so I apologise for the lack of depth of field in some of the shots. Hovering over someone else’s lovely model kit with a 1kg camera kind gets you thinking as well.
So enjoy the photos and a very well done to the guys that organized the event and vendors for their participation. It was markedly noticeable how an effort was being made to incorporate seminars and demonstrations into the event. A top day had by all - and believe it or not - NO combovers and hygiene issues!!!
Additional Images
© Matt Gannon 2007
This article was published on Wednesday, July 20 2011; Last modified on Saturday, May 14 2016