The worst box art

[TsrJoe]

hehehe, just thinking, someone should turn up with the Buccaneer box and a built NA.39 for the What-if display at Telford this year... 1941 

[Army of One]

As a complete techf**kwit I can't post the box top but....the Trumpeter 1/32 PLAAF boxing of the Mig15bis fighter has an awful bit of box art....I have to admit not noticing the missing engine/prop on the Italeri boxings of the Mig15.......I grew up on a staple diet of action pics on Airfix n Matchbox boxings....still love them......I think that Mr Koike is in a league of his own though....

[James]

As a complete techf**kwit I can't post the box top but....the Trumpeter 1/32 PLAAF boxing of the Mig15bis fighter has an awful bit of box art....I have to admit not noticing the missing engine/prop on the Italeri boxings of the Mig15.......I grew up on a staple diet of action pics on Airfix n Matchbox boxings....still love them......I think that Mr Koike is in a league of his own though....

This one:

[Army of One]

James......that's the one......yuk!!!! Oh...and gratitude..

[Weaver]

hehehe, just thinking, someone should turn up with the Buccaneer box and a built NA.39 for the What-if display at Telford this year... 1941  

Heh - "Built from the box/instructions" eh? A bit like an extension of JHM's "Fontain Cammo" AT-3, or that exploded "as per instructions" Lightning that someone did a while back?   You could have the Bucc and the Zero on a dogfight doubles stand. Zero aside, it'd be quite "interesting" making a Bucc kit look the one in the pic: smooth nose, offset nose gear, v.long main gear, kinked outboard leading edge, ridiculous airbrake cone....

Here's another idea: get two examples of a kit that's split down the middle and glue two right-hand halves together as an "accurate" representation of those split half-and-half top-and-bottom planform views you get in profiles and diagrams.

[sequoiaranger]

I wish I still had one to show/post, but a long time ago I bought up a collection of about 12 Japanese 1/150-scale WWII aircraft just on a whim (I had originally planned to use c. 1/144 models as "background companion" or "distant" 1/72 models for photographing--I sold them off)

These kit boxes, all in Japanese, had ATROCIOUS box art, as if drawn and colored by a 3rd-grader (no offence to 3rd-graders intended). One American's national insignia had the point of the star downward (typical "kid" mistake), but the kits inside were fabulous and accurate.

Did somebody mention the AWFUL Novo boxtops of some years back? Maybe some Novo executive used HIS 8-year-old's crayon renditions for box art to save money. The cardboard was so cheap it would tatter. Some Eastern European (E.German in particular---can't think of the name of the company) were pretty bad, too. I wish I still had some examples to show you.

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

One of the more well known Korean companies released a 1:72 Bf109E in the last coupla years with a truly horrendous box-art. Perspective completely off, laughably so.... cannot remember which company, I'm certain somebody here knows the one I mean.

Yep I remember those Novo crayon drawings too. The East German company Sequiaranger mentioned, could have been VEB. Other notables in the gallery-of-shame could be Lindberg, I vividly recall their Thunderceptor and Crusader in the 1980's on the shelves at BEATTIES (gawdbless'em), the Airfix (nee Esci) 1:48 Viggen in the 'portrait' box (think they did a 1:48 Tornado around the same time in the same  format which also was pretty dire). Revell in the early & mid 70's had a run of truly awful box-art, when they showed photos of the built-up model.... like somebody else mentioned, actually put-me-off buying a couple of kits at the time !

Ian

[Weaver]

How about doing this one with all it's whizz lines painted on and the odd, tailfinless half-Harpoon, half-Martel missiles? I've never seen the Frog Jaguar in the plastic: does it make the same mistake as the Matchbox one, with the extended intake splitter plates?

[Litvyak]

Some Eastern European (E.German in particular---can't think of the name of the company) were pretty bad, too. I wish I still had some examples to show you.

IIRC the VEB Plasticart box art wasn't that bad at all compared to many others! That said, the only one I've recently seen is the Tu-134 art being reused on whoeveritis's 1:144 Tu-134.

It's not box art, but I do seem to recall the Plasticart An-2 having very banana-shaped prop blades - to give the illusion of motion?

I never did see any of Plasticart's military jets, only their airliners, the An-2 the Mi-4 (my first model kit ever, received in 1979, watched my uncle build it for me, then right afterwards watched my cousin break it for me... ).

[Weaver]

This takes some beating   :





From here (right at bottom): http://www.gasolinealleyantiques.com/kits/helicopter.htm

[Weaver]

From the same site:









Good old Starfix......

[PR19_Kit]

It's not box art, but I do seem to recall the Plasticart An-2 having very banana-shaped prop blades - to give the illusion of motion?

The early versions of the real aicraft really did have banana shaped prop blades AFAIK, so just for once they were right. 

As for the Frog Jag, I think it did have splitters like that, but it was a model of the prototype and took LOTS of work to sort out. I built a T2 from  that kit and it took months!

[Litvyak]

This takes some beating   :





From here (right at bottom): http://www.gasolinealleyantiques.com/kits/helicopter.htm

...

...

... this just wins. Nothing will ever beat this.

Though on second thought... all the box says is "helicopter", so for all we know, it's 100% accurate! 

[Stargazer]

Though on second thought... all the box says is "helicopter", so for all we know, it's 100% accurate! 

Not quite... Actually it says "Helicopter builder" ("vertolyet konstruktor")... 

But I do agree, beating this one seems next to impossible... 

[Ian the Kiwi Herder]

This takes some beating   :

Hey look 

Somebody has already boxed JHM's WUH project (Worlds Ugliest Helicopter).... I'm off to eMail Barry right now, hope he has it copyrighted/patented somewhere 

Ian