AMPS Central SC chapter would like to extend an invitation to everyone out there in Armorama land to come and join us for our annual model show and exhibition, this year, Saturday,10 June, 2017.



This year, we're at a new venue that we're very excited about - the SC National Guard Armory on Bluff Road, in Columbia, SC. The armory (and our show!) is co-located with the SC Military Museum, which is one of the best small military museums that I have ever visited (and I've been to a lot of 'em!).

https://www.scmilitarymuseum.net/

Our show theme for this year is the 50th Anniversary of the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War, and of course, we'll have a special theme award to present to the best work that represents the show theme. Show theme eligibility rules are on our website.

We'll also have the full panoply of regular AMPS categories, skill levels and awards, to include our own special commissioned G-S-B medals.



All judging will be IAW AMPS standard national rules with one exception: We also award a "Best Intermediate" modeler award in addition to the all of the regular AMPS special awards. Judges' training for AMPS certification will be presented on Friday, 09 June. If you're interested in attending, let us know at:

[email protected]

We're filling up our vendor tables, and raffle donations are starting to come in, so in addition to the model show and exhibition, there'll be vendors to spend your money with and raffle prizes to win. (That is when you're not looking at models or visiting the museum!)

If you're a vendor who would like to participate, please contact us at the email listed above and on our website. The same goes for any modeling related businesses that would like to promote their products or business. Please contact us by email. We promote and advertise our sponsors and raffle donors on both our website and with posters at the show, so your show support can be a legitimate business advertising expense.

For complete details, to include entry fees, registration forms, categories, directions, etc., please see our 2017 contest page on our club's website:

http://www.ampscentralsouthcarolina.org/june-2015-contest.html

Check back often as we constantly update our contest page with the latest show info, to include new vendors, raffle donors and awards sponsors.

Hope to see you in June!

Happy Modeling,

Mike Roof
Chapter Contact
AMPS Central SC "Wildcats"

So, after we announced our AMPS show, some of our local modeling friends asked if they could play, too.

Well, hey, it's all about the modeling, so, of course, we said, "Sure!"

We've now expanded the format for our AMPS show to include room for ALL modeling genres - aircraft, civil automotive, nautical, sci-fi, non-military figures, EVERYTHING!

We've also put the word out to our vendors, and non-armor donations are starting to come in for the raffle, so this will be a show for EVERY ONE!



You can find complete details and information for the Flight Deck Open Plastic Scale Modeling Contest on our local AMPS club website:

http://www.ampscentralsouthcarolina.org/

BTW, if you're curious about the King Kong thing...

Our "unaffiliated" modeling friends who are co-hosting with show with us asked one of the local restaurants, the Flight Deck, Lexington, SC, if they wanted to sponsor the "all genres" part of the show, and since the Flight deck folks were so generous, our modeling friends decided to name their part of the show after the restaurant.

Oh yea, the King Kong thing... The Flight deck has an enormous fiberglass King Kong statue inside, complete with a crushed airplane in one big hairy hand, along with manacles and chains. So, Kong plays a large part in the restaurant's vintage aviation and automotive motif.

(Crushed airplanes are my favorite kind, too!)

Anyways, check out their website, and if you're ever in the area, the food and service are also great!

The Flight Deck

Hope to see you in June!

Happy modeling!

Mike Roof
Chapter Contact
AMPS Central SC "Wildcats"

Coming up in two weeks.

Indeed! Only two weeks!

In addition to presenting our custom G-S-B "Wildcat" medals, shown in a post above, here's a sneak-peek at the AMPS special awards for our 2017 show:







For the AMPS show, we will also be presenting the usual AMPS "best of" awards (Best German, Best US, Best Commonwealth, etc). In addition to these, we also present a Best Junior, Best Basic, our annual Scott Amey Best Intermediate, with the Judges' BoS going to the best advanced skill level entry. (Sorry, no Best Master award, this year.)

All of these special awards are also laser engraved acrylic in the style show above.

For those who enter into our companion show, the Flight Deck Open Plastic Scale Model Show, here's a look at those awards.

Note that these cool King Kong motif awards might only ever be issued for this year, 2017, so if you want to add one of these to your collection, you better take your best shot on Saturday, 10 June!







Finally, for this year's show, we have just confirmed the participation of a local group of military living historians, Time Lines Impressions. These guys will be at our show with displays and impressions of 1:1 scale uniforms, equipment, weapons and other artifacts. This should make for an excellent addition to the adjacent SC State Military Museum.

Happy modeling and hope to see you in Columbia, SC, Saturday, 10 June, 2017 at the SC National Guard Armory, 1225 Bluff Road!

Just a quick update:

We're on-track and on-course for Saturday's show!

In addition to the AMPS and the Flight Deck Open model shows, we're please to announce that we'll also have a extensive presentation / display by the "Military Timelines Impressions" group:

http://https://www.facebook.com/groups/284370934975679/photos/

They will be presenting original uniforms, equipment and weapons from WWI to the present in an evolutionary / historical timeline format. Lots of great, authentic 1:1 scale stuff will be there.

This is in addition to the adjacent SC State Military Museum (with free admission).

Finally, we have received a fabulous response to our solicitations for raffle donations, so this year we'll have a great raffle! We have nearly 300 prizes - kits, books, accessories and tools - donated in large part by a lot of gracious corporate sponsors.

Please see our website for the latest list of these "major" sponsors:

AMPS Central SC 2017 Contest Web Page

Hope to see some of you at the SC National Guard Armory in Columbia, SC on Saturday!

Happy modeling!

Mike Roof
Chapter Contact
AMPS Central SC

Good time at the show yesterday. The turnout seemed to be a bit light, but there were still plenty of great pieces to look at. The new venue worked out nicely, with plenty of parking and easy load in. The museum next door was an interesting added bonus.

A big "thank you" to the Wildcats, and anyone else involved, with putting it on. Also, another tip of the hat to everyone who donated items for the 300+ piece raffle.

Thanks for coming to the show, Bob, and a REALLY big thanks for lending a hand with the judging!

We really appreciated all of the folks who stepped up to volunteer for an AMPS judging shift or two. The judging is the "make or break" job at any AMPS show, and it truly is a "team effort"!

I know that several folks have commented that the event was "lightly attended," but the reality is that this was one of the biggest AMPS shows held in the southeast. On the AMPS side, we had 36 entrants with 102 armor models.

On the Flight Deck side, we had 10 more unique entrants and another 55 models. Keep in mind that the FD side of the show was ENTIRELY planned, organized, funded and operated by our AMPS chapter.

So the total participation for the entire 2017 AMPS Central SC show was 46 entrants with 157 models - again, one of the biggest AMPS shows ever held in the southeast.

The perspective that the show was only lightly attended was, I think, mostly a factor of the new venue.

The SC National Guard drill hall was significantly larger than our previous venues (with the exception of our 2013 show which was co-hosted in the Sumter County Exhibition Center with the IPMS R-12 Convention). There was just a lot of space. This made it look emptier than usual, but we just think of it as "room to grow."

Another contributing factor to that perception was that this year's show venue was located adjacent to the SC State Military Museum, so at any given time, a lot of the show patrons were actually next door at the museum and not in the drill hall with the models.

Anyways...

Thanks to everyone who attended the show, whether as an entrant, a vendor, a member of the Military Timelines Impression group (who all did an outstanding job!), or just as walk-in general admission.

You ALL helped us put on one of the largest and best AMPS shows in our area, ever!

Happy modeling!

Mike Roof
Chapter Contact
AMPS Central SC "Wildcats"