Sparrowhawk’s Sailboat (Tales from Earthsea)
Tales from Earthsea (Japanese: ゲド戦記, Hepburn: Gedo Senki, literally Ged’s War Chronicles) is a 2006 Japanese animated fantasy film directed by Gorō Miyazaki, animated by Studio Ghibli for the Nippon Television Network, Dentsu, Hakuhodo DY Media Partners, Buena Vista Home Entertainment, Mitsubishi and Toho, and distributed by the latter company. The film is based on a combination of plot and character elements from the first four books of Ursula K. Le Guin’s Earthsea series (A Wizard of Earthsea, The Tombs of Atuan, The Farthest Shore, and Tehanu). The film’s title is named from the collection of short stories, Tales from Earthsea, made in 2001.
– courtesy of Wikipedia
The finished model:
The story:
Y’know, Tales from Earthsea (2006), gets a bit of a bad rap. It might not rank up there with the very best of Hayao Miyazaki’s masterpieces, but if you look at it on its own merits, it’s still well above the crowd. So, even though it’s a Goror Miyazaki directed film, I was quite sure I wanted to include it in my Studio Ghibli 1/72 scale models project.
The only real questions was… which vehicle? Being a sword and sorcery story means there’s really not a lot of technology-based transportation to choose from. So, from that perspective, Sparrowhawks small sailboat is more or less it.
Still, it’s legit as far as I’m concerned. The scene where Sparrowhawk sails his way into the story has some imapct, so it’s as good a choice for a model as practically any other subject in the group. Besides… this way I get to build yet another of the awesome little Zvezda medieval life boats. So everybody wins!
The build:
There’s really not all that much to say about the build itself. I’ve built this kit several times before already. First as part of my Tintin 1/72 project – The Karaboudjian Lifeboat (which should really count twice, since I cut two of them in half and glued them together!), and also as the Motorboat from the Black Island adventure. So suffice it to say, I knew what I was getting into.
If I was really serious, I probably should’ve done the same two-kits-in-one build projects, as both the bow and the stern of Sparrowhawk’s little boat come to a point. But… well, I just didn’t feel like spending money on two kits this time. So, yes, it’s not quite accurate (and the rudder doesn’t come off the side like it’s supposed to), but at least I added a bit of polystyrene rod to the prow, to disguise that fact from head on.
I also cut a bit of a corner by cutting up and using the vacuu-formed sail leftover from my Heller Nina kit – which I didn’t use when I turned that boat into an Arabian Dhow. Never throw away the extra bits, because you never know when they’ll come in handy. Then I used a bit of stretched back sprue for the rigging. I think, all things considered, it looks pretty good actually.
To be honest, I really just wanted to stick some eyeballs on the front of the boat and call it a day, so I’m really glad that went off without a hitch. I used homemade decals for the eyes themselves, but I carefully masked out an area to paint white to give it the right background. It actually worke 100% perfectly – a rare and delicate thing worth celebrating all on its own.
Anyway, I got the boat done and then (in combo with my Sosuke’s Toy Boat project) made some “water” by mixing clear silicone caulking with a few drops of Tamiya clear blue/green acrylic paint. And that’s that.
I’m happy, but feel free to leave a comment and let me know what you think:
