Steel Cats (Sept. 2012-Aug. 2013)

Thanks Eric! I just finished painting the tracks Black and waiting for them to dry. Then I will put a coat of gray and the steel. Then weather.

MEGAPROPS Mike on your Tiger. Looks fantastic!

Mike that looks sweet. I wish I had now gone heavier on the weathering, it looks a bit underdone in the pictures.

Don't sweat the finish guys, I'll give you a bit longer to finish and then I'll post the builds in the armor forum.

Dave, sorry, I'll fix that.

Dave: Really amazing work! I thought the B&W pic showed a real Panther when I first saw it!

Mike: Very nice weathering and great camo work!

I won't be able to get my kitty done today. Sorry guys.

I'm still working on the streaking (working really slow here). I could just glue the roadwheels and tools in place, slap some mud on and get the tracks on, but I want to take my time with the weathering to get some decent results.... One of the guys working at my LHS took some really nice pics of my Tiger (before I started work on the streaking) and he promised me to send them to me today or tomorrow, so stay tuned for some more pics! I'll post some more up-to-dat pics as soon as I finish work on the streaking effects.

I promise to get her done untill Thursday. If I'm not allowed to claim the badge, I'm OK with it. I participate in GBs for the fun of building with great people like you guys and not for the badges (although the badges for this one look sweet!)

Very nice Mike...great build....love the camo scheme & weathering....well done.

She's close, gents! We're ticking over to September 1st here in Aus in 12 minutes, but a little overrun would be welcome. I've not known many models fight me at the finish, but this one has, in some unexpected ways. I resprayed the tracks this morning in a lighter, dustier mix, which went down over the darker shade subtly but did the job, then did a standard suite of wash and drybrushing, plus worked ground graphite into the track to match the wheel contact zone, applied with a q-tip. There are those who say the tracks cannot be mounted on this kit with the fenders fitted -- well, they're wrong, but in fairness, it's not easy! I rolled the juncture points up under the skirts.

I've fitted the bow MG, finished and fitted the jack block, done the final round of touchup painting, bare metal drybrushing and graphite work, done the pigment work (black on the exhausts and mixed black and Europe dust for a dark dirt effect on the skirts and under the bow and stern.

I also tackled the decals, using the kit serials and the Microscale crosses I found. The serials went on more or less okay over a spot of Future, and after three or four application of Microsol they're snugged into the zim fairly well. But the crosses... I've only applied one so far as I'd have to say they are the least cooperative decals from this firm I have ever worked with. Serious silvering and minimal lay-down... Though after letting it dry out completely and then reapplying sol it's looking better. I have been planning how to stencil paint the crosses instead, but I'll delay that decision until I can take a better look at the result so far.

Having used Future to prep the surface, a flat coat is also required, so I did a test shot with the new Tamiya XF-86. I sprayed a piece of plastic with the track umber I mixed, then brushed some Future over half of it, and finally sprayed XF-86, thus:

Bottom right is the raw paint, bottom left is the Future, the top strip is the XF-86, straddling both with a clear "tidemark." It knocks the shine down completely but clearly lightens the ground, so it must be used carefully, especially over dark colours. I'm very happy with the paint and finishing effects as they stand and don't want to modify them if I can help it.

Here's a look at the decals:

And finally, here she is as of midnight:

What remains to be done? Make a call on the crosses, whether to go with the decals or stencil them, and the final touch of flat to blend them in; attach the main gun and AA MG permanently; cut, paint and fit the radio antenna -- though I'm having trouble finding my .015" wire and might have to hit the hobby shop for more...

Cheers, Mike/TB379

Thanks for all the comments guys!  It has really been fun here. Like I said, I'll post some more pics later on this afternoon. I'm noticing that the track wasn't lying down on the road wheels for these pics - left side is kinda floating... geez.

Eric, this one is the 1:35 Italeri Panther A.  CH Black Knight was the 1st one. (Heck, I scavenged lot of parts, but I didn't think that many! LOL!) 

Dave-that is an impressive Panther-outstanding build, camo, zimm, weathering-attention to detail is great.

Job well done!

My Panther is about 98% done-I need to add....err...make the cables, attach & paint a few parts that were 'overlooked' the first time and maybe add some additional weathering.  Don't think I'll make the 8/31 deadline (the wife is talking about going to a movie and we have some other commitments this pm) but it's all good.

Will try to post some current status pics later today.

Great Panther Dave,this was certainly a fantastic sustained campaign for sure,great work everyone

And oh yeah... 2 pages of posts since mine yesterday... with 2 days to go?  That's butt kickin' GB participation.

2 day? Never was THAT fast  But certainly not now.  I am averaging 10 days between post that show discernible progress these days

Thanks for posting the color wheel Jack.  I just saved that.   I know that black and white are not the best for darkening and lightening color and this should help.  I am not trying to be a smart a$$ but... if reg darkens green, what darkens red?  same 2 colors just a different mix?

While I am not color blind by any means, I do sometimes have problems with color.  Hard to explain.  It has to be, "OMG that needs some blue in it."  before I know it needs blue.  When it gets down to the subtle differences I am lost.  

Dave, brilliant work bud. I really like that B/W shot.

I like how it's all coming together at the end of this GB for a lot of us. In my opinion, having multiple people building and completing together makes these GBs much more enjoyable.

Cheers

Tony

I like it Dave, I like it a lot.

The B&W photo looks just right.

Cheers

Tony

Hassen -- fantastic! Sweet build, tied together by the finishing techniques into a convincing whole!

On my KT front, I just resprayed the tracks into something a little lighter and dustier, hopefully they won't fight me so much now. Also sprayed a test panel to try out the Tamiya new clear flat, which will be needed to overcoat the decals, or more accurately the gloss base for them. The test should tell me whether I need to spray whole areas or even the entire turret, or just spot over the decals themselves.

Am intending to have her done today, let's see what the Fates have in mind!

M/TB379

That looks sweet!  

There are so many good builds in this thread! 

Well fellas, I'm calling it done. I was a little heavy handed for my taste on the dust layer (especially on the turret). Live and learn. I will post more photos tomorrow, but I just wanted to get this up.

1:35 Italeri Panther Ausf. A

Extras: Cavalier Zimmerit, multiple parts from the bin (mostly donated from my 1st Steel Cats build spares), Bronco AM tracks, and a little scratch.

Eric, you can use this photo for the front page completed build pic.

 I just want to thank everyone for the great work and camaraderie. Eric you put together one heck of a GB and I'm glad I was able to take part. It was a ton of fun and, like I said, the people here are second to none. Over 200 pages and 3000 comments. Wow!  

Well done Eric! Like the history lesson too.

Eric - I would appreciate some extended time.

I have both MK tracks assembled. Sunday and Monday and I want to paint them and then late Monday / Tuesday put them on.

Then some light weathering.

Thanks

Certainly glad for the testimony. I don't think modelers should feel bound by any formula. There were tens of thousands AFVs and millions of soft skinned vehicles in WWII and I'd guess that some of them looked quite the fright. And if you want (as I understand Karl Logan's point) to evoke a mood, a little artistic license should be perfectly fine. Folk that make dios could really go to town with rust, dents, smoke and anything else in portraying a knocked out vehicle. Auto modelers have a separate genre for reproducing rusted junkers - and the guys good at it have real skill.  (I remember seeing a photo of a Sheridan in Vietnam that had literally melted down - wonder how you'd handle that. Who'd want to?) And if you want to follow last generation's armor guru Tony Greenland you could certainly argue that you model the vehicle and not the mud it fought in. Those liking a really clean build could also be doing the equivalent of a "commission day" model that ship fans often do. Every tank in the war was deployed "factory fresh" at least once.  (It's very odd, but few ship modelers use heavy weather. Now salt water does attack paint and during WWII some paint jobs were intentionally kept thin above the waterline to keep flammable materials to a minimum. I employ a lot of rust, streaking and fading on ships and many modelers don't like it. They may be right about the model, but they're wrong about the history. The Missouri in Tokyo Bay was a mess - some of the North Atlantic Corvettes looked ready to sink.) But the mass conscription, mass production war fought in WWII would have been bad news for basic housekeeping. I'd certainly argue that dirt, fluids, streaking and dust would be true to the representation of most vehicles used in the field.

Eric

Eric I am with you on that. I spent about 6 years in Mech Infantry units (4 active, 2 in Guard, plus another 15 years in units with wheeled softskins, often alongside AFVs) in varying climates/conditions. I like to base my AFV weathering on stuff I saw firsthand here or there and yes, it does get pretty dulled down. Real operational AFVs rarely have all that artistic contrast stuff that draws the eye and in combat situations draw fire. Modern AFVs have a much longer lifespan than WWII stuff. It was not common at all for a vehicle to see a year or more of combat service then. Most were destroyed or replaced/rotated back for rebuild due to obscelesence. Yes they did get beat up in service, life was rough on them. But the current popular trends are leaning much more towards the overdone, rather than underdone.

One of the few things I do understand about Rinaldi's book is color balancing. I make a lot of paints from primes and have six different color wheels and a Munsell volume. The problem with his idea in my view is pretty simple - you get a better looking kit, but not one that is necessarily true to reality. A real object might indeed be dull and lacking in visual interest. Recall that Rinaldi talks about tank "art" not tank "reproduction." Another Armor-Meister who is good with heavy weather is Karl Logan who has done several pieces for Finescale. He once talked about this and urged modelers to "evoke" an image with a model. I'm pretty sure the model he built that accompanied this was a Tiger II that was weathered to death: and it certainly evoked a very tired tank, a very tired crew and a desperate situation. But frankly I think a real tank in WWII would have rarely looked as rusted, dented, chipped, muded etc etc as pictured by Rinaldi or Wilder.  (I'm rather keen on Mig Jimenez's kits.)  For one thing "wastage" was so high in all armies that I doubt many vehicles were very old and those that were would have been rebuilt. As noted in my text, I am sure a combat AFV would have been really dirty and covered with dust and maybe mud. But the Spanish School gents make marvelous models and create arguably a kind of "art." (I'm satisfied with a blinking hard craft.) But I think they evoke more than reproduce. Every now and then I see someone square the circle. Some gent from Texas won the overall prize at a recent national AMPS convention with a German flak vehicle and it was jaw dropping - and I think very realistic. Maybe it takes talent. If so, there's a limit to what I'll ever do.

Eric

Thank you very much, Jack! I didn't use anything between the clear coat and the white paint.

EB - from your description and from what can be seen, I can tell you put a major amount of effort in the weathering process.  Definitely one dirty cat you have there, great job!  I really like the look of the gun barrel from the top view.

I'm not sure what happened to the camou streaking on the lower ends, they appear to have become grey?  As for dust, I find a good starting point is a heavy dead matt finish.

I've also Rinaldi's first volume of work, and he mention's giving the hull a darker tone to emulate the weight of the vehicle.  Maybe instead of darkening the colour with black or some other neutral shade, take a page from the study of the colour wheel and complementary colours.  For instance, the complementary (or opposite) colour of green is red.  Utilizing red to darken green will give a more vibrant look overall.

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Shatten - white wash is looking right on.  You did not use any hairspray, or other such dedicated product, in between the gloss coat and white paint?

regards,

Jack

stikpusher

SchattenSpartan

How about a round 3? I have plenty of cats in my stash...

me too... my old Panthers were purged during my last move early this year and do think we should open this up to modern kitties as well... Leopard, Gepard, Luchs...

Yep, including all the kittens would be cool! I have a Leopard (German recon paper-tank, not the modern one) in my stash, but I didn't have a reason to build it so far...

Malone, Bitbite: Thanks a lot guys! I neverr thought I could pull that off without any problems, but it looks like it worked just fine!

Looks good to me, Schatten!

EBERG...  GREAT WORK MAN...

SCHATTAN, THE WHITEWASH IS VERY IMPRESSIVE...

TIGERMAN, A ONE WEEK EXTENSION WOULD BE NICE,

SchattenSpartan

How about a round 3? I have plenty of cats in my stash...

me too... my old Panthers were purged during my last move early this year and do think we should open this up to modern kitties as well... Leopard, Gepard, Luchs...

Here's todays update. The pics I am able to show you were taken yesterday though.

I still owe you some pics of the ambush-camo:

I hope the dots look good enough. I never had to paint something that small without a template...

Note the different form on the brown area in the center of this pic:

 ´

The shiny areas are spots where I had to do some tough-ups. 

Painting all those dots was probably the most frustrating part of the whole build so far, but I still had lots of fun!

I applied a coat of gloss varnish (Alclad) to protect the paint:

And now to the part I was utterly scared of: Applying the whitewash. I didn't want to screw up all the camo work, so I had a very bad feeling while spraying the whole kitten with Vallejo Air white:

You can't see it in the pics, but I applied the white paint in a blotchy pattern.

I removed the paint after it was dry using Vallejo AB thinner (it isn't as "hot" as my other solvents, so it didn't harm the Alclad varnish protecting the ambush-camo).

Here's a pic I took after the first side was "weathered":

I made a lot of progress since taking those pics, but I didn't take any pics. I'll post some more tomorrow though.

I "weathered" whitewash on the whole tank, including the fenders. Then I applied a black-brown oil wash to bring out some details. I also got most of the streaking done (black and dark brown oil paint), but I still have to add all the white streaking in the areas without whitewash (just to blend everything together). The tools are mostly painted as well and jsut need a treatment with oil wash.

I still have to add all the mud to the lower hull, roadwheels and track and I only managed to complete one of the tracks, so I need to work on the 2nd one as well. I don't really think any chipping is necessary on this vehicle, because I did a lot of chipping of the white paint already, which is enough IMO.

I hope i can get her done untill tomorrow (it's going to be really close though - 11:59 PM or something like that), but I might need another day or two...

I hope you like it.

Cheers, Clemens

Eric: I have to agree with all the others. Your Tiger looks gorgeous! I think the amount of  weathering is spot on!