A brief history of panel lining

Hey guys , let me start off by saying im no master builder but i love it and i think im half decent at getting a quality job done. So, i've been building Gundams of all sizes and degrees of complexity since i was 10, ( a good 20 years now) and i've always been amazed at not just customs but just well built and finished standard builds. to that end i've spent countless hours snipping, filing, cutting, panel lining and coating figures. over the years i've got better, (at least i hope i have), at what i think in a standard build makes the most difference, Panel lining. 

That's what this (long winded) post is about. so i started off as a kid not doing it at all and the models were fine mainly toys and i did't care that the white expanses of plastic looked bland and unbroken, hey i was a kid. but then i got older and at about 17/18 managed to get a decent internet connection and was able to see what the good builders were doing. so the hunt started for a byro thin enough to do the panel lines, yeah i know that's not how it should be done but with no model shops and being impatient i tried it. guess what, it was crap. so then i went online and searched for what they used and.....

BEHOLD the Gundam panel liner and markers. so i ordered some up, at great expense, and tried it it. I WAS AMAZED, the tip fitted the panels perfectly and if u ran over some parts it was easy to rub off, led to evenings cleaning blackened fingers. a few years after that my collection shrunk and nudged by my wife to be i brought a PG, thing was huge and amazing and i wanted to do it justice. i went to the local games workshop and brought some paints and tried some washes and paints but couldn't get on with it, paint every where, i wouldn't come off as easily and i had to repaint the white areas and white is a PAIN! so then i went back to the panel markers but when using them found they left some bare lines where the panels were bigger on the PG and running it backwards and forwards left a deep black at one end and a grey bit in the middle.

So ill bring this to a close i tried sharpies, Too thick, brushes uncontrollable, Gundam paint markers just a mess and Gundam panel liners just too pricey and really hard to get in the U.K. so below is a picture of everything i've tried including the recent Tamaiya "panel line accent colour", which is great but hard and takes a lot of time cleaning up, nice for inside panels where the ink like substance can run freely though small detail lines. in conclusion the best, easiest to get hold of and cheapest solution is on the end of the picture Pilot DR 0.1 drawing pens. same as a Gundam marker but a deeper black and a finer point and easy enough to get hold of for a couple of quid.