Media: One Galoob Action Fleet™ TIE Interceptor.

Tools: 1/8" styrene, 1/32" styrene, 1/32" transparent styrene, Krazy Glue, hobby knife, hobby saw, model filler, sandpaper, spray enamel, Testors model paints.

Basic construction: DON'T GLUE PARTS TOGETHER BEFORE YOU PAINT. Start with a TIE Interceptor. Unscrew the wing struts. Twist the wings off (snap, crackle, pop!). Use the hobby saw to slice off the outer portions of the wings (practice on one, do it right on the other three). I cut directly along the angle join, perpendicular to the outer portion up to the raised gun at the end, and then I angled out. This gets you a "free" wonky gun at the wingtips that looks spiffy. YMMV. Split the cockpit, remove the wing/gear attachments (which are trash) but keep the wing extension dial/fusion reactor. Sand the back of the cockpit so it's flat (the engines protrude). The aft hull (which you should glue together!) is scratch-built - the 3 sides are thick styrene and the front, back, and everything else are thin styrene. Detail with boxes and slivers of styrene as desired. The black portion of the intakes/cloak projectors are transparent styrene painted on the back side to retain the reflective quality. On the back side are 3 engines built up to resemble the Interceptor's. The dial goes in the center, with the refueling port up or down at your leisure. Fit everything together and trim/sand off any parts that are "icky" (the wings have some funny sticky-outy bits I cleaned off). Use hobby filler where appropriate.

Painting: Mask off the black portions of the wings with masking tape, and leave the cockpit disassembled so you don't accidentally paint the canopy (window). Mask off the back side and windows of the hatch. Mask off the black hexagon in the center of the dial. Spray everything with an appropriate color of enamel (intermediate blue works for me). Then sand/scrape the paint off of the surfaces that are gonna get glued together. Glue everything together - Krazy Glue is much nicer than waiting and is nice and strong, but be careful. Paint highlights - weapon ports and engine piping should be dark gray, the engines themselves red, and otherwise copy the Interceptor or go wild.

If you want to be really cool, make more than one and have one "uncloaking" - half black with purple/white streaks of plasma across it.