Jack , interesting conparisom . One thing that stands out to me is the wheels in the photo of the actual Panther ........they must of been painted yellow also , look how light they look ..............hmmmm

jgeratic1

Carl, thx for the tutorial on the wing nuts - looks pretty straightforward but at that size not sure how easy it would be.

Marc, the brown camou on your panther looks fine to me, perhaps the dark yellow is a tad light making RB too intense?  As mentioned, weathering will lighten it, and maybe some filters can darken the yellow base.

I took the liberty of switching your photo to b/w and comparing it to a fresh factory made panther,  assuming it too has already been painted dark yellow.   Of course there is also lighting to consider in the comparison.

Again everyone, great work.

I see what Jack is saying as well as Carl. Interesting.

regards,

Jack

Yea it's difficult to judge what the exact tones should be, going from b/w to colour photo, but my main reason for posting was to illustrate that, I think anyways, dark yellow is not necessarily so light. 

In the wartime photo the wheels definitely do look lighter, but so does the front fender as well as the front hull, particularly when compared to the back end.    Don't I think this is from direct  (sunlight?)  as there is no harsh shadow line to match, so I'm thinking reflective light is the culprit.

Anyways, I'm not sure if Marc used a generic colour for the dark yellow and toned it down - if that's the case then the brown needs the same treatment.

A few more photos to give tonal value of the dark yellow:

regards,

Jack

Hey Marc, I think you did a stellar job on the painting. It's always a little nerve racking for me at the camo stage as I don't like to repaint anything... Kinda like "make or break" time.  I think you're right about the darkness of the brown given the scale. (But I'm no expert at scale effect.)

Nice "pro tip" (no pun intended) on the AB needle. How does it work now?

Dave

Carl - Very cool DIY technique. Thanks for sharing. This is something that I will definitely try in the future. I especially like that they end up fixed on the end of the "bolt". Makes them less likely to be lost and far easier to install. Unless there's no hole, of course...

Dave

Hey Jack,

Great photos. Neat concept of turning to a B/W for side by side comparo with wartime photos. I actually think that there is a harsh contrast from the sun in the 1st pic with the Panther parked just inside the door. Like you and others have said, I think the front of the tank and the wheels are definitely lighter and the rest of the tank is in semi-shadow from the building. I think this is apparent if you look at the rear of the tank where the extra links get attached. There is a small patch where it looks like the sun is coming through an opening above.

That being said, my feeling on this whole color thing is make it look right to you. This subject seems to come up everytime something gets painted. I will not debate color for the same reason I do not debate religion or politics. My feeling is that there is enough variation from batch to batch - and as your last photo shows - variation of application and preparation in the field that as long as it is generally correct, and most importantly, you're happy with the way it looks, it's correct. I for one, am not gonna chase that Holy Grail.

Dave

Thanks for all the comment guys.

I am pretty happy with the yellow.  It is really hard to make a comparison to a bw photo since there are so many variables.  Mine is taken under a fairly bright light and i you look at the turret pic with the 3 guys and the one below the yellow is pretty bright in places. i used Tamiya dark yellow and white at about 50/50 with some a little buff thrown in too.  last night i made up some that has more red and oversprayed and it looks better.  Especially with the green added.

Dave, with regard to the needle... that camo was sprayed with that needle.

Carl, thanks for the SBS.  Will be playing around with that one soon.

Here is the redder version with the green.  I have not applied the buff wash yet until all the decals are on.  I use Future to set the decal.  Seals and gets rid the air so no silvering all in one steps.  After they were wet on the paper for a bit I added some Micro Set to soften them a bit for the zim texture.  When I applied the decal to the little puddle of Future on the side of the turret the liquid started to turn white and like jelly.  I have some re-painting to do.

Carl: Great work on the wingnuts, I'll have to try my hands at a few as well. I notice they're all counter-clockwise wingnuts though- do you have any clockwise wingnuts? 

WN: The camo looks good to me! I'd think that after a wash and a little drybrushing the white residue would be tinted and covered.

Marc - Exteremely nice paint job. Well done indeed.

Gamera

Carl: Great work on the wingnuts, I'll have to try my hands at a few as well. I notice they're all counter-clockwise wingnuts though- do you have any clockwise wingnuts? 

WN: The camo looks good to me! I'd think that after a wash and a little drybrushing the white residue would be tinted and covered.

Gamera , good eye my friend  I hadnt thought about that before . I had a friend of mine in Australia make up some and send me a picture of them .

Here's my CCW ...........

And the CW made in Australia ...............

Carl... it's so good to see the old sarcastic you back as strong as ever.

Ya heard of speed dating?  This is turning into speed WIPing.

Turret is fixed and all the huge total of 5 decals... sure as heck not like stenciling an F-15 :o...and the buff "wash" has been sprayed to tone everything down.

Old and sarcastic ?...........yup , thats me !

I like how the camo turned out Marc . The yellow looks just fine to me . Your fix on the A.B. seems to have done the trick since the camo looks spot on ! 

In your earlier post was it the decal setting solution that milked up the Future ? I've had that problem on freshly applied Future and sometimes when i over saturate the decal the Future will get milky . I've had succes with applying a wet coat of Future over it to make the area clear again ............but its a pain and can cause swings in emoticoms .................................... which can lead to partaking of ........ and sometimes ...............just sayin....

Raining here today and i'm spending to much time on the internet ...........dang laptop !

I can't keep up with all the great work going on here.that was fast Marc,looks good.

Carl: should have known you'd be way ahead of me!

Marc: the camp looks great to me.

Guys headed out for a two week vacation/holiday this weekend. Hopefully will be energized to get cracking on the tiger when I get back!

Hey Marc, Do you mind  explaining in a bit more detail your Buff "wash" spray technique? I sure like the effect. Joe

Marc -- she looks spot-on! Makes me want to rip into a Panther myself! Yep, the fade coat ties it all together and the eye is pleased! Great stuff!

I'll try to get my own paintjob completed this weekend, but there's heaps to do, I'll be squeezing spraying in between grading essays and printing the archive copies of my PhD -- about a thousand sheets left to put through the printer at this time...

M/TB379

Gamera , have a good time my friend ............see you later .

Marc, your Panther's looking great.  What did you use for the brown?

Gamera, send us a postcard! 

I added some scratch detail on the hull sides and more welds on the rear .

I decided to go ahead and paint this cat in red primer . I de-canned the paint , thinned it with M M thinner and tested the Krylon primer on the hull bottom and decided it caused to much over spray . To cut down on the over spray dust i mixed in a little MM enamel clear gloss . That helped keep the over spray dust to a minimum . The paint was sprayed with a random coverage to allow the dark under coat to show thru in a blotchy effect .

humm,, guess I missed the start of this,, bad me,.,,,!

looking good fellas !

Hey guys... thanks a lot for tall the nice comments.

Carl, The sarcasm and oldness is working for you because that looks just great.  This was some sort of chemical reaction between the Future and the Micro Set.  I was pulling chick of this goop off the turret.

P38, so you missed the start... just don’t miss the finish.

Greg, The 1st time was straight Tamiya red brown. Too dark. I added some NATO Brown and then some red in very small increments or it gets too red real fast. Lighten with a touch of Buff.

Joe. Where as I thin my Tamiya with lacquer for regular painting, for this I thin the buff about 95/05 thinner to paint. But for this I use alcohol for a fast dry time. Spray light coats and by the time you get to the on of one go round the beginning is dry enough to go again. So you really just keep spraying until you get what you want. The "paint" should be thin enough that you really can't see it the 1st time around. That’s probably something like 5 or 6 coats.

Wingy and Carl: Love the paint jobs guys.

Marc - Thank You for sharing your technique. I do believe this will come in right handy for my finish.

Carl - Very nice take on the prime. I really really like what your doing here.

Hello lads,

Some superb work going on here - impressive!

I've had a really long and busy week at work and couldn't wait to get cracking with my Tiggy this afternoon!

All that remained prior to painting was to get the turret track link mounts fitted to the turret exterior. The whole build has been primed and in another attempt to get the pre-shade method to work I pre-shaded some panel lines in a very random fashion. On the one occasion I managed to get it to work I'd laid down solid well defined lines and they looked 'unnatural' so I'm trying some thicker lines to see how it looks. 

I've tried this technique on nearly every one of my last few builds without success - I always hit it just that bit too hard with one stroke of the ab too many but I'm getting the hang of it.

You'll probably notice the lines doing down the turret roof sloping from the top down to the mantlet - I know there's no panel lines there but I read a great article the other day where a Tiger I was painted like this with shading down the sloping roof section and the effect was brilliant! Subtle but brilliant!

The wheels have all been primed and are ready for paint too.

I'm going to use my usual Tamiya 50/50 mix of Dark Yellow and Deck Tan for the Dunkelgelb basecoat.

I'm really getting into my Vallejo paints at the minute and their Model Air range is superb. I've bought several shades including their own shades of 'Rotbraun and 'Olivgrun' called Tank Brown and German Panzer Green (or something similar) respectively. It is far more easily sprayed, doesn't clog or spatter and will lend itself to the required cammo scheme very well. I'd like to find out a good Model Air Dunky Combo? It's too greenish on it's own but I don't know what other shade to add to it to lighten it up? A Deck-Tan type light shade obviously but Model Air!

I now have my Friuls (Tiger I Late Version) so after painting the basecoat tomorrow I'm going to make up the Lion Roar tow-cables then start on the Friuls. Cammo starts next weekend!

Hopefully I'll have a Tiger with a perfect Dunky Basecoat to show you tomorrow!

Take care guys,

Ben

Hasenpfeffer, I'll agree with you there - I too don't want to get into a 10 page discussion on the colour of dunklegelb because that has already been done.   If not here, plenty can be found on other forums.  Names such as Zaloga and Jentz have come up and I find  their research quite interesting.  Apparently Zaloga worked closely with a hobby paint manufacture when they created their formula for RAL 7028.

Anyways I'll end with this photo, sharing  because I don't recall ever seeing it, so it's new to me and possibly someone else might be intrigued by it too.

regards,

Jack

Ben , good effort on the pre shading . For me i dont get the results from it that i expected . I probably put my final coats of paint on too thick for the pre shading to show thru . I want to see how this works out for you .

A few pages back some one asked if i was going to put the cast numbers on the gun mantlet as it appears in this picture .

I wasnt going to do it but the question stuck in my head so today i removed the gray paint from the mantlet then i cut off some numbers from a sprue tree and glued them on . They are a bit large but this is what was available .

Jack , wow ! Thats must be a rare color picture from 1945 . I've seen some colored film from Germany in its finale days on the History channel  . Thanks .

Marc - Great paint job. Very well done. Hoping mine turns out as well... I think I'll try out that super thinned DY overspray when I get there.

Jack - Cool photo. I think I ran across a series of these (same factory wreckage) on some Russian site a little while ago. Unfortunately I don't remember where. If only they had digital photography back then, eh?

Carl - Glad I could haunt your subconscious... great idea for the numbers. Maybe a little more liquid glue and very light pressure to kinda meld them into the base?

I've been messing around with the side skirts today... found out that the nice metal sheet "skirts" provided in the kit don't fit on the front and rear brackets (different hole/notch locations than the center "skirts"). So, since the front brackets will be exposed, I spent some time scratching up some better ones. I used the extra brass from the PE carrier to make a bracket, hooks and a plate with a hole through it. I then used a bolt head I had as a spare and instead of cutting off the head, I left it attached to the sprue and used that as a bolt. Here you can see the detail of the front bracket vs. the kit parts.

Dave