Citroën Ami 6 (The Castafiore Emerald)
The Castafiore Emerald (French: Les Bijoux de la Castafiore) is the twenty-first volume of The Adventures of Tintin, the comics series by Belgian cartoonist Hergé. It was serialised weekly from July 1961 to September 1962 in Tintin magazine.
In contrast to the previous Tintin books, Hergé deliberately broke the adventure formula he had created. It is the only book in the Tintin series where the characters remain at home in Marlinspike Hall, Captain Haddock’s family estate in Belgium, and do not travel abroad or confront dangerous criminals. The plot concerns the visit of the opera singer Bianca Castafiore and the subsequent theft of her emerald.
Although The Castafiore Emerald received critical acclaim for making its characters follow a lead of false trails, it was not a commercial success due to the experimental nature of its narrative. It was published as a book by Casterman shortly after its conclusion.
– courtesy of Wikipedia
The finished model:
The story:
The more times I read The Castafiore Emerald the greater my appreciation for it grows. It’s arguably the high water mark for Hergé’s “The Adventures of Tintin” series. It’s not necessarily my favourite of all the albums – I’ve said many times before that spot is reserved for The Blue Lotus – but there’s no arguing with the sheer craftsmanship that went into the construction of this album.
As far as my Tintin 1/72 project goes, this one wasn’t really on my radar. The first project I completed from this album was the Peugeot 403 Taxi that whisks the titular Bianca Castafiore away, and I’ve long had had plans (which have changed over time – especially after getting my 3D printer) to tackle Thomson and Thompson’s comedy-rife Citroën 2CV. However this project leapfrogged its “close cousin” mainly due to the request from a member of the Tintin collectibles group on Facebook.
Much like my Tintin in Tibet project, The Cliff, I hadn’t really considered the Doctor’s misfortunate and forcible ejection from his Citroën Ami 6 by Professor Calculus unplanned ride in Captain Haddock’s wheelchair – but in the end… I’m glad I did.
It’s unlikely to be the final time I visit this album either. Besides the aforementioned Citroën 2CV, I’ve also got plans for one of a trio of truly epic Tintin builds… Marlinspike Hall itself!
The build:
Finding a 1/72 scale Citroën Ami 6 wasn’t easy. However, unlike a few years ago during my Peugeot 403 Taxi project, I wasn’t forced to resort to a complex series of resin casts to get the job done. I was able to find the body of one online and the STL file only needed a few tweaks and fixes to be printable at 1/72 scale. Luckily, I had also already designed and printed Captain Haddock’s wheelchair for my unimaginatively named project, The Wheelchair.
So, the printing itself wasn’t much to write home about. I did have a slight issue with the shell on the first go-round, but that was mostly my fault for forgetting to thicken and re-inforce the diagonal rear-window support to hold up the roof. It printed… but the supports were so thin as to be nearly transparent at 1/72 scale. I think I sneezed and they were gone. After the supports were made thicker… no problemo.
Getting the colour right was tricky. I finally settled on a 10:5:1 ratio of Tamiya XF-2 White, X-14 Sky Blue and XF-18 Medium Blue. Not perfect, but close enough I think. I painted the top with a 2:1 ratio of Tamiya XF-2 White and XF-18 Medium Blue. Only Afterwards did I realize that I was using the nighttime image from the album as reference. In the daylight it should be MUCH lighter. However, since I’d already painstakingly inserted small bits of clear plastic – held by a very light combination of CA glue in a few spots and some Future to to seal the edges – into all the windows, I decided that it was what it was. Experience has shown me that trying to glue something twice with CA is tricky at best and a mess at worst. So we’ll just go with “artistic license” shall we?
The other slightly tricky part was to make the Doctor fully airborne. As you can see from the album image, he’s surrounded by a cloud of debris after he’s ejected from his car by Calculus and the wheelchair. To achieve that look, I mounted the doctor on the thinnest bit of clear plastic rod that I had (1mm) and then used a bit of clear monofilament fishing line to dangle his hat from his head and his bag from his hand. I also used a toned down version of the “looseleaf technique” that I used in my Supermarine Spitfire project. This time I just dabbed a bit of CA glue on a bit of fishing line and then slowly dabbed and added papers until I got a small cloud of them going.
To add a little bit of extra support, I made sure to glue any contact points – doors to shell, wheelchair to door, doctor to door, bag to ground, papers to doctor. After sealing the whole thing with a generous coat of my now sadly dwindling stock of Future, it actually holds together quite well.
All in all, I’m happy with the final result. Feel free to check it out my work below and leave a comment or two.
