WW II Ship Painting

Thanks for all the replies. Seems like Sunday evening is when I take the time to visit the forums. Not much time working on models this weekend, but did see 4 of my kids and my 2 grand kids. I think I'll do the superstructure as sub-assemblies and the details later.

Your going to love the Fletcher, its a great kit and think about some after market PE.

I have only built a few ships as an adult myself so am certainly a novice in this. But those taught me that it is best to build and paint in sub assemblies, in order to minimize the masking, overspray, and touch ups. Build the main hull and deck then paint them seperately before gluing them together. Next buils up superstructure(s), stacks, turrets, etc. and paint them, then glue together. Finally paint any small items such as small weapons, masts, etc. and add them.  PE you have to work as you go, some is added early on and panted then. Other PE is added & painted later on.

The latest issue of FSM has an article on building a WW2 German destroyer.  Really good article- the steps show when to paint what, and the author does it the same way I always do. If you have questions on when to paint what when building a warship, this is an article you will want to read.

With any genre of modeling the instructions are only a guide and you must read the instruction sheet(s) thoroughly with the thought in mind of when to paint and when to wait.  I firmly believe most kit mfgs believe most buyers never paint their models.

I am in the early stages of a WW2 cruiser build.  The instructions show adding small parts immediately as one builds an area. I prefer to leave most small individual pieces off if they can be glued on later, especially if they are not the same color as the pieces they are mounted to.

I generally paint the hull and deck seperately and then glue them together.  The trick here is to check fit of deck to hull carefully so the resulting seam has no gaps after gluing.  Correct any gap areas to try to avoid needing putty.

I generally paint major superstructure assemblies as I complete them, before gluing to hull/deck assembly.  If I am using PE, I try to paint as much of the PE as possible while it is still on the fret, and glue it on already painted.  While I paint major pieces with an airbrush, I find it easy to paint very small pieces by brush. It is a pain to have to mask off small pieces, or the area around small pieces. So if there are small fittings on, say, the deck that are different color than deck, I paint these by small brush after airbrushing deck.

These are only general guidelines.  Painting a ship model may be the hardest genre to paint, and you need to do a lot of thinking ahead and planning and visualizing.

I would ask in the ship forum, they are probably much more knowledgeable than I am.  

However, I'll toss my 2 cents in for what it's worth.  Generally I'll look at the superstructure and try to get a feel for the painting order.  The method of your decking also matters.  Either way, I prefer to leave the small bits (gun directors, searchlights, guns, etc.) off and just build the basic structure.  Then I'll mask and paint.  I try to mask the decks to an extent, but I don't care too much if I get a little paint on them.  I always go lightest to darkest color if I can.  Then I either apply a wooden deck (which hides the paint, but they are so thin you want as close to a uniform color beneath as it will show through a little), or I mask the faces of the superstructure where it meets the decks and I hand paint the deck.  If painting a deck, I prefer to hand paint along the length of the beams (with a wide brush covering several at once) as I think the brush lines look a little more realistic.  Then I'll wash the decks in a darker color to add some grain.  Some folks will actually vary colors of the beams by using masking tape to mask off the individual beams and painting progressively darker shades over the deck.  This requires incredible patience and you would have to mask the superstructure or deck at some point.  

For the little bits, just take a piece of masking tape and roll it so you have a loop with the sticky side out, stick it to your surface and put the little pieces on it and then airbrush them.  Then attach them to the model after you have your camo painted and such.  If these items received camo, you'll have to apply a little planning to ensure you paint them the right color.

Honestly, just look through the instructions and try to figure out what will be the easiest for you to do and a logical way to go about it but you will likely have to do a lot of masking!  Good luck!

Groot