Another two steps closer to finishing everything from my MCP core set (at least, the first one!) with my long-delayed completion of the two civilian cars. These could have been painted much, much faster if I hadn’t been tempted into using those little taxi lights that came with the kits, and then decided to kit them out with more-or-less realistic(ish) Melbourne Cab livery.
The problem ended up being a need to create a whole lot of custom decals in order to get all of these markings. I actually got most of them together months and months ago, but I still needed to create the licence plates – and for that matter, I needed to make up enough additional custom decals for other projects to make printing out that sheet worthwhile.
So it wasn’t until a little over a week ago that I finally got the sheet printed with the hood decal, the four door decals and then the two licence plates for each. And then it was time to add all of the bastards to the two models!
I think they came out pretty well in the end – they’re an excellent example of models where I really didn’t enjoy the painting process at all, but I’m actually pretty happy with the final result. Of course, with a second Core Set, it means I have another pair of these cars still to paint at some stage. Though I’m thinking that two cabs will be plenty for my modern gaming motor pool, so the second two of these models will just be painted as standard, nondescript civilian cars. Perhaps one in white, and the other in silver grey – the most common and nondescript colours that I see on the roads locally.
These two models really did need the impetus of Dave Stone’s of Season of Scenery Challenge to get finished. In the unlikely event that anyone’s interested in the MS Word file that contains these somewhat niche “print yourself” decals scaled for these models, I can likely work out how to make them available, so if you’re keen, please do let me know.
As you can see, despite the slightly larger scale of MCP models, they work just fine with other modern models in 28mm scale. Maybe a little large for “proper” scale, but close enough for a game of toy soldiers! I’ve got another pair of terrain models to drop in a couple of days, and wish me luck on getting the very last item from the Crisis Protocol Core set finished by the end of August….
Azazel's Bitz Box. 
These both look stunning mate, and great call on the transfers ( having painted a sci-fi taxi, all those details are a pain ! LOL) they would look great in any modern setting, and excellent making them regional to you.
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Thanks Dave! I know many (most? all?) NYC cabs are also yellow, but much like the stop/walk signs and the dark green street furniture, I figure that making these cabs look familiar and local works well for anyone who will ever play with them on the tabletop. 🙂
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Oh these are just simply brilliant (literally and metaphorically)! 🙂
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Thanks John. The decals do a lot of the heavy lifting on these. 😄
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Absolutely awesome work on these Az. Unfortunately I only know of a few super heroes in Melbourne! We will have our work cut out!
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Thanks mate! We’re sorely under-represented in the Superhero genre, that’s for sure!
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Excellent work on these and I like that you made them local as well. Its been a couple years since I was last there, but I think that cabs are not doing as well as they used to in NYC thanks to Uber, though they’re certainly still around. If you want to make them proper NYC cabs, you’d need an ad on top of the car for a gentlemen’s club though! 😀
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Haha well I’ll stick to Melbourne cabs in that Case – though I’ll keep it in mind when I get to some of the larger buildings – maybe a huge rooftop sign for a club, like the one I used to see from the train from Melbourne CBD to Richmond back in the 90’s and 2000s… 😀
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Wow, that’s an impressive amount of detail for destructible terrain pieces! Good work.
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Thanks mate. I like doing those extra details on stuff like this – if I ever finish those road tiles I’ll have a nice table selection that I’m very happy with!
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What spectacular detail on the cabs!
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Thank you, Mark!
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These look excellent, love the idea of painting them as local taxis. How did you do the decals?
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Many thanks, Nicolas!
I used Photo references and downloaded photos from GIS to get the basics, then used Photoshop to make adjustments to the smaller ones and to create the simpler decals with taxi numbers and bonnet decals. The checkerplate strips were made from a small section of it I found online and then repeated in PS.
Once they were all finished as individual bits, I dropped them into a MS word document, then printed and resized until they were the right size, then printed in colour using white decal paper. Cut carefully, then added them in the usual way.
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Very cool! I do want to try custom decals at some stage. Did you do these on an inkjet or a laser printer?
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We have a laser printer. You can get specific paper for each type but laser is a lot better IMO.
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Good to know!
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That’s some very fine decal work! 😀
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