1/48 Armor GB (Non Aircraft)

Okay, The whippet looked very plain, so now it is time to enhance the definition of detail. After the dusting up we lost most of the detail definition and almost everything seemed to have similar finish (that is not 100% true though) so in order to gain that visual richness again I worked with acrylics on many small parts and reduced areas to recover some of the lost visual definition. For instance, a very subtle dry-brushing with a dark shade helps to highlight all rivets and edges, the tracks are repainted partially, small and very selected stains in various shades are added here and there to give definitive shapes to dust deposits to my taste... in summary many little touches that make the model look much more complex and visually complete to our eyes.

At that is how it is now. I think the model will be painted completely in the next step hopefully.

Lu

Well, private may be nice sometimes, but I do wonder what happened to the other GB participants - no comments?

Once again, your next weathering step nicely builds on what you have done. In regards to your comments about 'overdoing' an effect, I concur completely. Having built mostly aircraft which in general are not as heavily weathered as armor, I tend to 'underweather'.  The problem is that when I get the shades just 'right', successive coats of gloss, blending coat, and matt coat removes much of the weathering effect.  You really need to 'overdo it' to take into account the effect of those finishing coats.

Guys, thanks for your words much appreciated. By the way, I enjoy the private atmosphere here, as far as it seems we are only three at the GB at the moment.  

Dupes, thank you so much for the input very useful to me because it made me think a lot. I think you are right totally and things are not really well expressed by my side and I am sure this all needs better clarifications. Regarding the former step, bear in mind all colurs were airbrushed very thinned, so you are not spraying pure colour in fact and in that meaning nothing is really pure German Grey, pure Earth Brown or pure Buff but clear shades of them. Also the layering -soft edged- effect caused by airbrushing makes everything blend together smoothly naturally (although you can make hard/strong traces intentionally too). At the end, final shade is a product of those two main causes and it is much less traumatic than you might think reading a brief written description.  

Waikong, derivating form the above remark, I would recomend you to go slowly with any new thing you want to try until you get the experience to use it with confidence. Do not get me wrong I do not mean you have to pass a long training for that, because particularly this technique permites you to go as far as you want little by little. Next time you want to give it a try, just make the process one single time and stop for a second to see how it goes, if you like how it starts, then add a bit more and stop and see again. I am sure you will reach the point you want easily that way. Anyways, you know what? Even the few times I consider I overdid this effect on any of my models, at the end I realized that I had to have made it a bit more still. Can you believe it?.  The weathering is a summ of many things and not the product of one only technique as you well know.   

Now, upper hull must be dusted up in order to balance the former effect made on the lower hull and running gear. Diluted enamels work really well for that purpose used in two different ways. First a very selective light pin wash is given around raised details or recesed lines like a traditional dark pin washs. That is particularly useful for riveted or bolted areas, welding seams, etc. Following heavier dust deposits and stronger colour contrast is added in selected places on the model like the angled joins between the plates composing the hull, by dampening the area to treat with clean thinner to put small drops of enamels there and to blend them with a soft brush dampened in clean thinner.  

As you can see once more the look of the model changed and it became quite plain indeed. I personally believe exactly this is the point many modeller feel panic when weathering theirs models because it seems you have ruined all your previous work, but the truth is that we must be patient because this is just one more necessary step in the weathering process and things will change drastically again soon.  

Have faith.

Lu   

Guys,

Thanks for your kind words. Dupes, as for percentages, note I am spraying those other shades fromt he bottle directly and I am NOT mixing them with the base coat. I just followed painting over the former work and adding new tones to the base freely.  Bear in mind all shades used are quite different to the original Field Grey.

The Whippet is changing quickly.  

Once base shade is done, then I spent little time to add decals and to colour some details. The GasoLine decals were a nice surprise to me because they are excellently printed, are opaque totally and decal film reacted very well to the use of specific liquids, and although it looked thick in the decal sheet it fitted to the model surface surprisingly well. Regarding the accessories, only a few parts are coloured in different shade to base colour, and at this stage they all are primed with Vallejo Acrylics on theirs respective shade and they will be complete on following steps little by little.  

Note that the model became quite dark due to the satin coat I gave prior to decaling, but do not panic because all the former work is still there and the Whippet will recover part of its condition as soon as it becomes Matt again in the course of painting, and finally we can see unmasked here the national white-red-white ID bands painted on step #1.  

The true weathering process starts dusting up the lower hull and running gear by spraying one dark (German Grey) , medium (Earth Brown) and light shade (Buff) to reproduce a basic heavily dusted look. The method followed is the same used on the base coat fading and those three shades are overlapped over and over until they cover the base coat completely. In fact this process can be made on earlier stages if you want because -at the end- the lower hull and running gear end up not being green anymore. I personally love the contrast created on this step and this is just the beginning of the deep change the Whippet will suffer from now on.  

Lu  

mokei wrote:

Dupes,   Sorry for the confussion about gun barrel shade because I wrongly thought it was red primer . please forget my remark about it.

Lu - no worries.

mokei wrote:

Regarding the 251 thing, your guessing is correct and the Tamiya kit is one SdKfz 251/1 version. By the way I made the 1/48th AFV-Club 251 Ausf C some months ago and it is an excellent kit and they will also release one Ausf D version but no estimation when yet. Needess to say I will build the Tamiya kit too, and I am preparing a Hanomag-Mania GB over the M-L forun later this summertime to celebrate the arrival of the 251 family to quarter scale land. Lets see how it works.

Wow, let me know when you start the Hanomag GB, if I'm not able to participate I will at the very least look in very frequently!

Whippet looks great already...can you give me any idea of how much you're lightening/darkening the base coat with other colors? Like, percentage-wise? 

Lu, the basecoat weathering is looking really good already. You were using the same technique with your AFV club 251 and I like any technique that saves me a step.

mg.mikael,  

Sorry I forgot to reply, the muifflers  were made of styrene tube and wrapped with copper rod.

Dupes,  

Sorry for the confussion about gun barrel shade because I wrongly thought it was red primer . please forget my remark about it. Regarding the 251 thing, your guessing is correct and the Tamiya kit is one SdKfz 251/1 version. By the way I made the 1/48th AFV-Club 251 Ausf C some months ago and it is an excellent kit and they will also release one Ausf D version but no estimation when yet. Needess to say I will build the Tamiya kit too, and I am preparing a Hanomag-Mania GB over the M-L forun later this summertime to celebrate the arrival of the 251 family to quarter scale land. Lets see how it works.

The work on the Whippet continues.  

With the intention to get more from this early stages, a tonal variation is made by overlapping lighter and darker green shades over the plain base coat. This step has nothing to do with pre and post shading and -to me- it is some kind pre-weathering that helps to define areas on the model that will be completed with other treatments and techniques in the course of the painting.

As you may guess at the moment I cannot know exactly what will happen to the model and how it will look at the end, but me -like everyone- has pictured in mind one idealized image of the model I would like to make since the beginning, so this sort of base coat fading is oriented in that direction and some areas are enlightened and darkened attending to personal criteria and following my intuition and taste only... well this is a bit hard for me to explain clearly because my weak English expression, but I just hope you can get what I mean. Basically the idea is: it does not make sense to wait for following painting steps to begin the weathering process if we can do it now.

And that is how the whippet looks now.  

Lu  

mokei wrote:

I guess the model is done, but just in case you still have motivation to work a bit more my suggestions are two: 1> I think those big road wheel would benefit of little more weathering that would make stronger difference between runing gear and hull, and consequently greater visual impact too. 2> Although the red primer gun barrel is very cool, there are evidences gun tubes were primed in dark grey which I consider make a nice combination with the ambush camo. That is very easy to correct quickly if you feel like to. If you need a reference, Tamiya box-art depicts that detail correctly and it looks very nice too. PS: Do you know Tamiya is releasing an 1/48th SdKfz 251 Ausf D on July? I think that is great news for one Hanomag-addict like you, brother...

Lu - she is indeed NOT done! I'm with you on the roadwheels needing more weathering. The whole of the suspension and tracks as well. Have yet to address that stuff - spent most of time I did weathering on the hull.

The barrel is actually red/brown - according to the Tamiya instructions? Perhaps they meant it to be primer red, but referenced the wrong color??? I'll have to go back and look again.

As far as Tamiya cranking out a 1/48th 251...I'm there! Do you know which variant it is (I'm guessing they'll start with just a /1)?

Whippet is looking good.

Guys,

Thank you so much for the enthusiastic words much appreciated. Here you have my progress so far...

The paintwork starts painting the National ID bands. Those markings came in use on British tanks in June 1918, as a result of the Germans using more and more captured tanks - and constituted of three stripes of white-red-white on the utmost forward portion of the tracks. On many Whippets those ID bands were often put on other locations as the front of the vehicle or on the engine compartment covers. Fortunately It happens in my brief research I found one photographic evidence of the model I am making (A326) and after close examination it seems the A326 carried ID bands on the top of the fighting compartment too. To paint the ID bands, first I freehand airbrushed Flat White areas and masked them to paint the central Flat Red bands following.  

During 1917, the colourful schemes used on the first tanks gave way completely to a new standardised Dark Khaki Brown overall scheme,  but there are true signs to that shade was never applied to the Whippet and researchers confirm a murky dark green was the original colour of the Whippet, it is impossible to say something about the exact shade, though, Prior to paint the base color, I protected the ID bands with Tamiya masking tape and following I sprayed some thin coats of Field Grey until I could make sure paint covered the model entirely.  

Everything was coloured with Tamiya Acylic paints diluted with Tamiya Laquer Thinner.  

Okay, nothing very exciting so far, but at least the Whippet is moving on.

Lu   

Dupes,

The Turtle  looks very good indeed . I love that elaborated ambush scheme. I think it will look great on a decorated base, so please go ahead.

I guess the model is done, but just in case you still have motivation to work a bit more my suggestions are two:

1> I think those big road wheel would benefit of little more weathering that would make stronger difference between runing gear and hull, and consequently greater visual impact too.

2> Although the red primer gun barrel is very cool, there are evidences gun tubes were primed in dark grey which I consider make a nice combination with the ambush camo. That is very easy to correct quickly if you feel like to. If you need a reference, Tamiya box-art depicts that detail correctly and it looks very nice too. 

What do you think?

Lu

PS: Do you know Tamiya is releasing an 1/48th SdKfz 251 Ausf D on July? I think that is great news for one Hanomag-addict like you, brother...  

mokei- That Whippet looks awesome so far! Just had to ask, what are those mufflers made of brass tubing, copper wire, or something else entirely?

dupes- Hmmm......for some reason I thought that Hetzer was done a long time ago. Anyways lookin' forward to seein' it 100% completed!

Looking forward to seeing that Whippet finished.

dupes,get crackin' on that Hetzer.

Looks good to me.Don't know what else you could add.

Dupes, I was just wondering when you were going to finish her off. You were so closed to finishing in your last post. I thought I missed putting your finished pictures up front. As for additions, how about a little bit of stowage to add interest?

Lu, that kit does look great - unusal for sure. I just came back from a visit to the US Ordnance museum in the Aberdeen proving grounds, they had a whippet there. Can't remember whether I took a picture though.

Hey, it's Lu! I was wondering when you might show up...this GB is right up your alley!

That Whippet is pretty funky! So the Gas.O.Line kit went together pretty well? 

Your build is making me want to jump back onto my Hetzer in a big way. She doesn't need that much more work I don't think. Any suggestions (other than finishing the base!) on how to finish her off?

Waikong,  

Thanks for your warm welcome. It is my pleasure to be here again and meet some old friends too (Hi Dupes!). Thanks for your understanding and flexibility to accept my entry in the GB.  Said that I think it is time to start...  

Let me introduce my victim . That is the GasoLine WWI Tank Mk. A Whippet, a very exotic choice in 1/48 armor I consider.  To me this super ugly thing is really fascinating to make, not to mention it is good to take a break of WWII subjects for while too.

Well, talking of accuracy -I am not a WWI speciallist- I do not think the kit is really good because it has some important issues affecting to main shapes imposible to fix on a resin kit without going for a complete scratchbuilt work, but I am not that kind of picky modeller and I will not permit that ruin my joy.  As far as the kit resembles a Whippet, it is a Whippet to me.

In the brighter side, the kit is very simple but well formed by a few parts very well reproduced in high quality resin easy to deal with. I limited myself to correct the internal sloped walls of the running gear with styrene sheet, and to add some other minor details like side hull stowage boxes and new exhaust mufflers. In order to add a figure later I opened the commander hatch, surely the most tedious work to make because although the resin hull is not solid, the roof was very thick actually.

And that is all for now. Yesterday at late night I started droping some paint on it so I will take a pic later to share.

I hope you like it.

Lu  

Lu, its great to hear from you again in this forum. Of course you should join, would love to see that WWI tank - rare model in any scale, especially 1/48!

I've been meaning to post my autoblinda on your forum for a while, but somehow never got around to it.  I dug out your artilce in MIS as reference for that one. Also my little kurogane has a figure in it because in the back of mind I kept hearing you "add a figure, add a figure..."

Welcome to the GB.

Waikong,

Good to see you are leading the 1/48 GB again and as you may guess I do not want to miss it if I can, because past year The 1/48 military GB was a very enjoyable experience to me, so I would like to join if you do not mind.

My only problem is that I am having a super tight schedule and I feel I do not have time to start a new build at the moment, but I have at hand one GasoLine WWI Whippet Mk. A tank I assembled some months ago and I believe it would be good to share the paintwork with you all here now if you consider it can be a valid entry.

Please do not get me wrong, I do not want you to give me special treatment but I cannot make a model for the group on time otherwise, so if you think this is not good idea I would understand it so and would respect your decission, needless to say.

What do you think?... Can I join under those conditions?

Best Regards

Lu

I see what you mean about the roll, guess from the photos I can't see the shelf its resting on.

Hey, good luck with the FSM hints, always nice to have extra cash for the hobby!

waikong wrote:

Well done! I especially like the little details, like the map. The only constructive comment I have is that on a second look, the roll dioesn't seem to drape quite 'right' over the bag. Other than that, I think the weathering is spot on. I'll update the first page

Hmmm...actually the tarp roll doesn't drape over the bag, it drapes over a tool box of sorts on the rear of the Bren. That's why it may seem to drape over the bag instead.

Glad you like the map, I actually sent two tips on weathering scale documents and on making cheap maps to FSM. Hopefully they'll like the tips and possibly publish one of them.

Well done! I especially like the little details, like the map. The only constructive comment I have is that on a second look, the roll dioesn't seem to drape quite 'right' over the bag. Other than that, I think the weathering is spot on.

I'll update the first page

Yep, my build is finally FINISHED, Tamiyas 1/48 Universal Carrier Mk.II and I'm overjoyed with  how well this kit went together!!! Overall I recommend this kit to anyone with a few kits under their belt(alot of masking), the only problem with this build is the toylike tracks which come in one piece with the roadwheels. I had to mask for about a day to get them ready for painting. However their is a resin conversion set that makes the Bren into the flamethrower variant and it comes with replacement tracks. Thus buying the conversion just for the tracks is well-worth it in my opinion, and the flame conversion is a bonus.

First of all, the washes include a heavy burnt umber wash on the lower hull. Then a lighter burnt umber wash on the sides of the hull, frontal armor, and the fenders. For the interior I first went with a grime wash. After that dryed, I applied a burnt umber/burnt sienna wash over that  in the cabin and interior parts. Then pastel work could happen after I sealed the Bren with a Kryleon Acrylic Matte. After pastel work, I finished off the interior with a small map of Paris on the gunners seat. Then for the final touches I went over some areas with a graphite pencil. All comments and questions are welcome!

I was at the NJ IPMS show this weekend, picked up for Tamiya 1/48 armor kits from one of the vendors selling only 1/48 armor:

US Staff car, 4x2 Kfz.305 Truck, Steyr, and Sd.Kfz.250/3 Greif for $15 each. 

Kicking myself that I didn't pick up the Greyhound and Flakpanzer too. By the time I went back to that same vendor, he was completely sold out and this tabled was cleared. Heck, I should have bought out his complete collection!

The washes are done, and all the parts have been attached. However I can't do any pastel work and final details. Why? Because it's snowin' outside, thus I can't spray on the clear coat. So it will be a few more days before I can finally get it finished up. Though I was able to finish the scratch 1/48 map I made. I simply shrunk down a map of a city(Paris to be exact) I found on the web, and then then folded it like a map. Then to get a more weathered look I simply dipped it in coffee a few times(repeating the process over to get a darker stain) to get a dirty well-used look to the map. Here's a pic of it to show the look and size.

TD4438 wrote:

Us overtaxed Land of Lincoln types gotta stick together.

LOL

waikong- All I did for the weathering was a slight drybrushing of darkened steel. Glad you like it, now I have to do is wash it.

TD4438- Glad your enjoyin' my build!

dupes- Thanks for the comments!