While Kagero has an established reputation for quality books that modelers appreciate and use on their reference shelves, Super Drawings in 3D focuses on ships beautifully rendered in 3D CAD. Number 16056 in the series focuses on the Schnellboot Type S-38 and S-100, the most common of the WWII German Kriegsmarine classes, with the Type S-38B serving from 1939 and the S-100 from 1943, with both variants serving until Germany’s surrender in May 1945.

The book is broken into the following sections

• Overview
• Design, propulsion and armor
• Armaments
• Service and conclusion
• Bibliography

The above sections are contained within the first 11 pages and give a brief overview of the boat’s concept, design, armor and armament, use and service life. While informative, the descriptions are a little rough and the author repeats himself; things that a proficient editor should catch. Being that English is not the first language, this is easily forgivable as the bulk of beauty in this book are the following 58 pages of beautifully illustrated, immaculately detailed 3D renderings of the external aspects of both the S-38B and S-100 Schnellboots. Looking at the renderings, it is very easy to forget that these images are computer generated, especially with the weathering illustrated.

As a fan of WWII torpedo and gun boats of all navies, this book really fills the bill for the Schnellboot as a modeler resource for building this impressive naval vessel. While interior details are lacking, the exterior, particularly the differences between the two series, is impressive and will be on the bench while building the two small and two large scale Schnellbooten in my stash.

These hard-hitting naval craft hit way above their weight, and it is nice to see Kagero give them the attention they deserve. Also covered in another book in this series are the Italian MAS boats. I hope they keep up their progress with future books on the US Navy Elco and Higgins PT Boats and Vosper MTB and MGB.

This book is worth your hard-earned hobby money, and I know it will be reference material for a lot of upcoming projects.

Profuse thanks to Kagero Publishing and IPMS-USA for providing the review sample.