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Nice, Dean. Those look suitably burned. :-)

I'm going to try not to stress (too much) and have fun with it--like you guys suggested, light coats, try different shades and mixing and see what I end up with.

Just one photo--as there's nothing too exciting to show--just a lot of tedious masking around and inside the intakes (ah, intakes...fun!) to add detail (blue detail around openings and metallic gray bands). And also added white to the two bits on the side of the intakes and the darker gray on the side part of the gear wells. 

I'm going to let the Future dry overnight then if I have time, attempt to paint the nose tomorrow or Thursday.

Cheers,

PB

PS--Ground crews are hard on those louvres, no? ;-)

I can imagine that those louvers have mangled a few fingers in their time... even yours?

Funny how much masking is on these things.

Unfortunately, the damage was entirely inflicted upon the louvres by my ham hands. :-)

Since we're on the topic of Flankers:

1) T3chDad, ran across this nice topside shot of Blue 56 showing a little wear. Could probably use it as an argument to do some light panel line highlighting. Can also see a glimpse of the engines with the blueing effect in, well, full effect:

2) Apparently an Su-35..? Man, this scheme is siiiiiiiiiick. Anyone know anything about this bird? Could you convert the Academy kit into a 35? I don't see many differences b/w 35 and 27....

There's a few, the SU-35 in reality doesn't have much in common with SU-27 other than outwards appearance, SU-35 has no pitot tube on the radome, the infa-red targeting system is on the right hand side of where the pilot sits like the SU-33, look at the aft end of the aircraft and you will notice the fuselage is slimmer on the stinger section, the production SU-35 has thrust vector Saturn engines, the cockpit has two large multi colour/function screens rather than many instruments, plus SU-35 is a multi function aircraft rather than just an air superiority fighter. also if you look on the underside of the slab stabilisers there are many more antennas, plus SU-35 carries DRFM digital countermeasures which mimic radars controlling missiles fired at it and deflect the missiles away from the SU-35, also SU-35 has twin nosewheel, I have though to of doing  an SU-35 but you will need both the SU-30 and SU-27 kits and you will have the parts required but you will have to do surgery to the aft end to slim down the tail of the fuselage.

I wanted to post a video but I can't post photos or videos at the moment as the rich formatting isn't working for me. anyway have a look at this link Dre.

www.youtube.com/watch

Lol, guess that answers my question, Dean! :-) In short, the SU-35 is even more bad ass. OK, someone needs to make this kit, too.

Yes and the video shows a good representation and pretty good reference if you do make it on what you can use to arm your su-35 as all configurations for anti air, ground and ship are there.

Thanks for the pic Porkbits.  I didn't have that one. I do have quite a few more.  Here's a link to a zip with all of my Blue 56 stuff. (8MB)  t3chdad.com/.../Blue56.zip

Dean, I've seen Java (or lack thereof) cause the problem you're describing.  Also, you might want to try it in another browser.  For example, rich formatting won't function for me with Firefox at work where security software is blocking some specific java libraries from being retrieved from the FSM server...but it works fine with IE on the same machine.

Oh right thanks t3chdad my laptop is from ww2 i think so I just need a new one lol.

Thanks, guys! Some really good reference stuff. T3chDad, couple of interesting photos that show 56 a lot more weathered than I thought it was. Also one great shot of the burner cans that will come in handy soon. :-)

That's a pretty informative video, Dean.   Thanks for the link.    That Su-35 can really haul freight...

Trumpeter, you've got the market for this family in 1/32, when are you going to make the new versions??

One more thing abou SU-35 that's not obvious is the huge speed break is not on the SU-35, instead the vertical stabilisers rotate outwards, or inwards, I forget I think outwards I read. Anyway you would have to eliminate the break on your kit for SU-35, not hard to do though.

Thanks for info, Dean. I haven't done a kit conversion, so dunno, might just wait for Trumpeter to release a proper Su-35. How long could that be? ;-)

OK, another Alclad question: it seems that at some point I might need to mask off certain panels to spray a different Alclad shade. How do you do that without ruining the finish of the previous color? I know that some builders use Post-It notes because the adhesive is not that tacky, but wondering what you guys do.

Thanks!

Well, I tried the Post-It note deal and they just blew away under the air from the AB...  so that's when I tried to use Tamiya tape.   Which melted into the paints I was masking.  

I'm curious to the answer  for this as well, PB.

Well alclad have an aqua gloss sealer which doesn't diminish the shine on the finish, look at the F-15 build by Fly and you'll see he has used it, personally I just masked the panels as normal, I didn't wait long enough like the 24hrs after masking so I had a little residue but I managed to use micromesh which works well to buff the paint so it was ok.

Interesting--well, maybe I'll try the Post-It notes first and hope that a low PSI doesn't blow them off the surface. If that doesn't work, I'll try the sealer (which I didn't know about). Thanks!

I never knew about it either until I saw Fly said he used it on his thread, it's a pretty good looking F-15!

Masking insanity:

Well, as the man says, here goes nothing...!

Hope everyone is well.

PB

I kinda like that Easter Sunday scheme, PB.   Good luck and fun on the camo painting- I'm hoping that the kit has worked out all of its issues and that it will let you finish it without further hassle- you earned an easy finish on this one.

Between the blue and yellow masking, you've got the Ukraine's colors covered.  

But seriously...looking good.

Thanks Dre, and T3chDad. :-) LOL, Dre. It does look like a big ole Easter egg.

Well, I cranked up the Maiden, grabbed my brush, and then dove in. I'll let everything dry then see how my masking held up (after the kids are in bed).

I wish I was on the home stretch with this one, but I still have to tackle painting the engines, which could be the biggest challenge yet. No free lunches with this build, it seems.

You've wrassled it this far, just a bit further to go.

The painting looks great and the finish on the nose is absolutely brilliant, I always think it's a good indication as to how well a model is finished, if the nose has a brilliant smooth gloss finish it will be well made as getting such a finish is not easy, despite being probably the most basic thing to paint there's nowhere to hide mistakes and flaws on that part, maybe I'm just weird lol but it's how I see it. Also PB the alclad is the most rewarding part, when all is done you'll be glad you put in the extra effort! Also PB the SU-27 documentary I posted has an episode dedicated to all the variants of the SU-27 and has a lot of footage of SU-35 it's episode 4 I think you'll like it, well everyone on here probably will.

Thank you, Dean. I just gotta push through these last bits. Glad you like the finish on the nose, but it probably helps that I took the photo from a couple of feet away. Up close you can definitely see some sanding flaws (divots, ridges, etc) but I figured if I put enough Future on it, all the bad stuff would be covered over, right? (thus the really glossy finish). :-)

The basic things are still the hardest for me--I have an awful time with seams, drives me nuts. I think it's partially because I haven't found a good putty/surfacer yet. One of these days I'll try Mr. Surfacer, lots of people swear by it.

Will check out that vid!

use it as a last resort, when sanding i always use straight lines, but when the seam is gone I decrease pressure and then go in circles which eliminates any sanding marks, then use a primer, it usually works every time.

That's exactly what I do! But always end up with a step that I can't *quite* get rid of. Ah, well, guess that's why I keep practicing....one kit a year and by the time I'm 70 I should have it down. 

Well, after 30 minutes of picking and pulling got all the tape and masking off and pretty happy with the results. Just some minor touch-ups here and there:

Cheers,

PB

Looks fantastic PB well worth the time taken!

That looks awesome!  If you don't mind me asking, what are the colors you used?  

I still haven't started my Blue 56 yet.

Thank you, Dean and T3chDad. :-)

For the base coat (light blue), I used AKAN 73033, the blue for the splinter camo is AKAN 77202, and the gray is Model Master Acryl dark gray (FS36176) (for F-15).

If you haven't used AKAN acrylics, I highly recommend them. They're purportedly matched from factory paint samples and spray like butter (bad simile?). You can get them from Linden Hill Imports here in the States (www.lindenhillimports.com --sorry, can't link because this PC doesn't display rich formatting options for posts). AKAN has a whole line of Russian/USSR/Ukraine colors for both WWII and post-WWII planes.

(apologize if you knew all this about AKAN already)

PB