Looking good as usual.

the doog

Thanks, Hugo--you're just in time for another update! While these oils are drying, it will be a good time to do the figures tutorial. Stay tuned!

looking good. i need a figure lesson since it's the next logical steep after adding bases to builds.

Gamera

Looks great Karl, studying your work here to try to learn a little something for my own stuff.

I might have to pick up some of the dark brown filter for olive drab, I really like the results you got there. Have you used and would recommend his shadow washes?

Now to be honest, Adam is a good friend of mine, and I am trying to help him promote his line, so I am not 100% unbiased, but honestly, his products are top notch, and his modeling speaks for itself. ANd of course, he uses his line as well. I can honesty say that they are a great product.

Thanks for looking in, Wayne, RX, Bish, ansd Steve!

STEVE!!! When are you going to post something new?!!?

nice grimy weathering and forced scale visual effects 

the doog

Thanks for looking in, Wayne, RX, Bish, and Steve!

STEVE!!! When are you going to post something new?!!?

Hey Karl,

     WELLLLLLL  ............ goes like this.

 My Porsche VK45.02 has been sitting on the counter for quite some time now. I'm building it with a radical yet feasible look that hasn't been depicted anywhere before. It should be interesting, not to mention conveying a "Mean and Dark" look (or at least I hope it does). All I have to do is get motivated and decide how I wanna paint it.

 I'm tired of looking at it and I will not start another kit until I finish it.

Here's why It's been so long.

 Was dealing with burnout, then my mom passed away 63 weeks ago as of today (in total agony), then dealing with memories and guilt, THEN, boxing up and moving out everything from the house (basement included) and loading into a storage facility by myself and spending nearly the whole last year fixing up the place out of my pocket without any help (except for when my son was home from college - which wasn't too often).

At the end of the day I still went to the gym as always (I never miss that) and afterwards went home to an empty house too tired to work on any model. I just wanted to sit down in front of the TV and doze off. Anyway, bit by bit - I finally got it all done. Now I'm dealing with getting it sold. It's all been on me, every single detail.

Tomorrow, I'm going out with my boy to see that new Hobbit movie he wants to see.

 And now, the recent really cold weather in the unoccupied - unheated house has caused the sheetrock to contract and caused small cracks to return as tiny hairline fractures in the areas I fixed, so I'll have to go back over them when the weather gets a bit warmer...... nothing major, just aggravating since I had repainted all of it and now I'll have to go back and re-mud and match-in the paint on a dozen affected areas.

                                      I'm so sick of it.                                         

 I'm hoping to have all of this house business done and behind me by this May.

                                               And well .... that's the story.

 Good to see 'ya putting up some good quality stuff with all the tricks doog.

 Being involved with the house and all, I guess I missed that finished Takom Objekt 279 you were working on. It was surely looking super and I was looking forward to seeing the finished outcome. Do you know what page it is finished at so I can see the result?

Rest assured, I'll get this one up  .......... eventually.

Sure hope you and yours have a great Christmas season too.

The doog, Excellent and always loved how you present your technics, it is like an online book, except we have the chance to make questions and get quick answers. Thank you for that.

It is looking more and more nice we come here. 

Im so anxious to see the figure painting,.. I have seen veru good figures in the web, that I want to add to so many of my armor ideas, but so afraid to ruin them that I just dont go there, it is an obscure scary place for me to go... 

Anyway, I guess I just need to practice and practice.

I'll sure be back for the figures...and everything else...hehehe..... maybe for now I should say, hohoho.

Disastermaster, so sorry to hear about your loss, but life always gives us experiences that we can handle and make us stronger and better persons.

I have also gone through several periods of "what the heck", but at the end we should be thankful of what we have and learn to live with it.

This is hobby and at least for me, I only do "work" on my kits when I really feel Im inspired and in the mood, remember is a hobby and it should be enjoyable. If I dont feel I want to deal with PE, glue, paints, etc..I just leave it for another day. Theres nothing wrong on relaxing after a bad day or week, I also leave my kits sometimes a couple of weekends without anything done to them unti I feel I want to do some fun work, you may be in the mood to watch a movie, go out do shopping, or for now I like watching my Dallas Cowboys play.... 

So, here we are for you and just enyoy life, I some times think.."wow, so many kits, very short time"

Cheers and have fun!!! 

Karl: Thanks for the help! All this filters and new techniques are a little confusing to me, I'm slowly sorting it out. I checked and found some AK Interactive and MiG Productions stuff I already have that should work. I did bookmark Adam's site and if I don't get the results I want just might order a few of his items and see how they work out.

DM: Ouch, I'm sorry to hear about your mom and all this mess you're going though. Don't know if you saw but just before Thanksgiving I got t-boned totaling my six-month year old new car and putting me in the hospital for two weeks. I'm slowly recovering now but I know what you mean, I feel like rewarmed krap and don't want to do much of anything. Just hang in there till things turn around.

And btw guys you can call me Cliff or Gamera- either is fine!

Steve, wow, man--sounds like you took a real shock to your system and had a bout with clinical Depression. Been there, done that. That can knock you fro a loop. I genuinely hope you're through the worst of it. You put out some of the coolest stuff on these forums, ever, and that's a sincere comment. Thanks for keeping tabs on what I've been doing here!

Here's a shot of that Obiekt 279. I was going to do a dio of it, but realized that my concept wouldn't have made immediate visual sense. I put it off for a while to build some more stuff. It came out pretty cool, for what it as worth. I'll put it in a dio some day..

Thanks for commenting, Hugo and Cliff! Cliff, nice o know your name after all this time. Hope I remember it, but forgive me if I need reminding once or twice! ;)

Thanks, too, SPrue!

garzonh

Im so anxious to see the figure painting,.. I have seen veru good figures in the web, that I want to add to so many of my armor ideas, but so afraid to ruin them that I just dont go there, it is an obscure scary place for me to go... 

Anyway, I guess I just need to practice and practice.

I'll sure be back for the figures...and everything else...hehehe..... maybe for now I should say, hohoho.

hey garzonh

i know the feeling about not wanting to screw up with a filter after putting all the time into a build. i'm the same way. this year i did a 1/76 MK-1 FEMALE. decided to try freehand camo with my new detail airbrush. didn't look awful but not great either. so WTH i tried filters with 4 layered colors and a pin wash. damned thing took 2 firsts in local contests against some good competition. 

maybe try something really different on a 1/72 kit. they are less expensive and time consuming.if it works great if not you haven't lost a lot. glad you're able to get back to the bench after the accident.

i have that whole inspiration thing going too. some famous author was asked "how do you get inspired to write?" he replied. " i only write when i am inspired. and i am inspired every morning at 9 o'clock when i sit at my desk." sometimes just sitting at the bench is the only inspiration you need.

hey dm

that is a lot to go through but it sounds like the worst is over. 

 garzonh, You're right about it being just a hobby - I feel the same way about that and also build only when inspired - that being said, it has been a difficult year for getting inspired. I believe some small part of it is leaving it where I see it everyday and in doing so losing my spatial objectivity. Know that such positive feed back from you guys is a big boost.

 Cliff, I knew nothing of it - that combination is plenty enough to get you depressed. Getting hurt is bad enough especially over the holidays, not to mention getting your new car tore up. Hopefully the insurance will cover all your losses and hopefully get you back on track with a new car (and not a salvage title) to boot.

 Karl, Except for the waiting game of getting the house sold, I really think the worst part is behind me now

 Your comment about cool stuff - that's way over the top man. I sure do thank you and want you to know that when I DO get this VK built,                      I believe all of you will be extremely pleased.

 I always watch your stuff and this subject has a lot of potential - I love those colors and the artistic license. Eventually, I'm sure it will come together just as you want it to.

 waynec, I believe I see it in the rear view mirror now. I remember the pm you sent me about this. That was very nice of you....  I remember.

 Again, I want to thank all of you for your compassion in regards to my recent predicament.

Very well done, Karl - both the S51 and the Soviet Project 279 tanks!

Your doog Gerhardt is cute, please let him see my 3-year-old "James Bond":

falconbbs.com/m79-117.jpg

DM hang in there, do the things that make you most happy because theres not much to be done with those that hurt. Keep building, every model is a work of art and your creating something from pieces of plastic, thats something very cool. All the best. Terry

Doog I'm seeing something in your modulation that I haven't tried. I often modulate my builds but its so slight it gets lost especially when weathering, but yours is right out there and I think I'll work on that and make it more of a highlight than a slight color change. Thanks Terry

Model Maniac

Very well done, Karl - both the S51 and the Soviet Project 279 tanks!

Your doog Gerhardt is cute, please let him see my 3-year-old "James Bond":

falconbbs.com/m79-117.jpg

And your doog "James Bond" is SOOO cute as well! I love his big smile!

jibber

Doog I'm seeing something in your modulation that I haven't tried. I often modulate my builds but its so slight it gets lost especially when weathering, but yours is right out there and I think I'll work on that and make it more of a highlight than a slight color change. Thanks Terry

OK< onto the pigments now...

I mixed up some Celluclay, real dirt, white glue, pieces of modeling vegetation and Adam Wilder's Nitro pigments of Russian Brown Earth + Black to get a dark, gritty earth color...

When I slopped it on, it dried in a rather lighter color than I expected...I had slurred it across the walkway, and now it was too monotone. OOPs... You can see on the other side that I've already started to try to rectify this by using oils to tint the results...

The suspension got a good coating...

The tracks got it too..

...and wheels...

The front....I used a splatter method to whip some of it onto the upper parts.

The sides with the splatter. To effect this, I loaded up a stiff brush with MIG's Light Mud oil, and used a toothpick to "fan" the brush bristles, which flung the paint in little drops onto the model. PRACTICE THIS FIRST before you try it--the splatter can go places you don't quite expect, and you must learn to control it!!

Now, to rectify the monotone walkways, I used the same oil colors I did before: Raw Umber, and MIG's Light Mud and Industrial Earth. I used a thin brush to judiciously add splotches and lines of color to the walkway, breaking it up and adding color tone..

I toned the dried mud as well...the whole bottom hull got a treatment of mud too..

I had Modeling Doog Gerhardt's complete attention!

After adding some streaks and runs, here's where I am so far..

I'm kinda peeved at myself because I forgot to chip the vehicle before putting all this nice weathering on it..I"m going to do a little chipping tomorrow and patch up the weathering where needed.  After I get this looking like I want with the dirt, it's going to get snow...stay tuned....BRRRRRRR!!

Thanks for following, guys!!

Man,  I Love the mud .....

Mud, mud, glorious mud.

                                    Makes me as content

                                         as a pig in the stye.

                                                                                       (when done right)

Spectacular build...looking forward to the big finish...

Doog,

Outstanding work! So many great ideas and techniques! Definitely going to use some of these techniques on my Tiger II.

Looking forward to seeing this build when finished! 

Yes, thanks Karl for showing us step by step how you do this again. Mentally filing all this away for reference!  

Dang Karl that is something else

Mine is not that far along:

Thanks, Steve! You'll like my next update then! :)

Thanks too, Rob S. And you too, Bruce and Cliff! I appreciate you all taking the time!

Tony, this is a momentous day for me only in the fact that I managed to get a particular  model to the forums before you have started or even finished it! lol! You're a machine, my friend!

Anyway...thanks for the comps, and I am looking forward to your version of this as well! And I hope that you also had a wonderful Holidays!

Looking great karl, I like the mud mix. Is the only liquid in that the white glue.

Bish

Looking great karl, I like the mud mix. Is the only liquid in that the white glue.

Thanks, I think I will give that a try next time round,