The Little World

Never? Always? Something in between? Let us explore…

The classic maxims about workmanship emphasize how you must always strive. ” Any job worth doing is worth doing well “.” A poor workman blames his tools “. ” Go west, young man “…and so forth. Stirring stuff. Makes you long for a moral Mixmaster.

It has also been said, equally seriously, that anything worth doing is worth doing badly. In many arts this is more than evident, as many artists have embraced the idea.

Does the price of the kit dictate the care and artistry that gets used? Often it does, but perhaps this is only a pointer to the venality of the modeller. In truth, people can make either a good fist or a sad hash of any kit they open. They may have to work harder to make an old, cheap item look good, but there are those who put in an equally hard effort to make a a new, expensive one look rotten.

I have to decide when I start a project how much success I want from it, to tell me how much effort I need to devote to it. That is not as crass as it sounds…some models are best sketched rather than minutely finished. You just have to decide your priorities to get them right.