nmayhew

and then the eyes…whole mask transferred this time, then black surround sprayed and replaced, red bits sprayed and replaced, and finally the whites and there we are - finally!!

cheers guys, and Peter I wish you all the best i opened up the masks - which themselves were about the third iteration - last night thinking i would bash out the wing roundels whilst the Wife was at her fitness class only to find they were 'egg shape' (38mm one way - which was what i had asked for - but 42mm the other) now normally there would have been much swearing and cursing, but then i thought to myself this time last week, I was convinced i had less than a year to live, so having to do the sharkmouth first instead of wing roundels really wasn't that great a hardship! 😃 now back to our silly models ... hope to have some progress later today fingers crossed

hey guys sorry for the lack of updates on this project first of all had to wait a while for corrected masks and then had a bit of health scare which put this - and everything else! - on hold for over a month luckily it was nothing but when you have to contemplate funeral arrangements - and what will happen to your stash when you are gone - it does concentrate the mind somewhat anyway, i now just want to get this done so hopefully wing roundels and shark mouth will go on this week and then final weathering before landing gear and antenna go on cheers Nick

i am soooo excited about this!!

Out of interest (and don’t say the company) but what are they about to do that you think is a no-no? I am fortunate in that I am able to work from home at present and can socialise / be a hermit as I choose.

what's happening with the rear left deck to hull join at the corner? it should not be sitting up at an angle like that

from Der Tigermeister himself... and instructions from Scalemates

first up bit of masking haven't tried this before... ink is super thinned and results look a bit 'pigment-like' but ended up ok in the end i will revert once i get more info on the inks - the good thing is like oils you can just wipe them off and start again (x-20a can do this; US folk use some cleaner stuff called '409') some staining around gun barrels, ammo ejection ports, and the radiator / spine of the aircraft... here is a close up of that pigment effect - not what i was looking for but decided to roll with it! and some oil streaks - i put a wet blob and then drag the brush streaks nearly always need to be straight, and can't magically appear half way down, so you need to keep a steady hand i forgot to use a ruler / similar rest for hand when doing it - a tip I had seen in one of Will's videos just a few streaks in place - the two fuselage ones were done separately ie long one first, hair drier, quick MRP clear... then do the second one that way if you f*ck up a later one and have to remove it, you don't lose everything with hair drier and MRP clear this is all done in minutes btw a little weathering on the inside of the radiator flaps - impossible to do once attached, which is why i have kept the off until the last minute and outside... finally, i blended the underside by spraying some MRP Smoke which 'pulled everything together' (sorry sounds v pretentious lol) so here is where we are now... the flaps are just resting there (not glued yet) thanks for looking

for the underside especially on this model i tried to mix black basing / marbling with old school panel line pre-shading in the end i don't think i got it quite right - i left too much of the pre-shading show through, being reluctant to add more blend coat and end up losing it all, but as always it's a learning process i am not a fan of stark panel lines - they tend to make a model look like 1/48 or 1/72 to me - so given the above i will leave most of them alone; plus the fact that the overall paint job is not a 'block', there is enough variation etc etc but, i will add some panel lines around the flaps, and maybe a few panels closer to the centre of the fuselage / radiator where there would be lots of oil and sh*t accumulating anyway, i usually use Tamiya panel line jars, and the excess can be wiped off with some white spirit here the forward most line has been wiped, the one near the trailing edge (avoid looking at the sh*tty construction please lol) has not) i also advise using better cotton buds than i am using here, but i was being lazy anyway, it's very simple and results are pleasing same process with the gun bay doors and hinge... and an overall look at where we are at the moment... streaks will be next, something i find quite challenging update may be after the weekend thanks for looking Nick

next i added some darker tones (black / near black) around the edges of the gun bay doors they don't look that great when first applied, but you need to keep the faith in the ability of blending to get where you want to be, with the 'emotional crutch' of knowing if you really don't like it you can just wipe it all off and start again and after some blending .. still a bit clunky...but after the stippling with the just slightly damp with mineral spirits sponge and we are getting there... gun bay dark tones have had their final blending in this shot below and although i may add some leaks, i am reasonably happy with the 'dirt' part the next shot also shows mid range dust / dirt being on wings and fuselage from gun bays inwards (just dotted, before any blending) and after some blending...

you can apply oils in varying degrees of 'wetness' depending upon what you want them to do my main aim here is to dirt / desert sand 'stuff' to the undersides - the paint job itself has enough variation for me, but of course if you just spray large blocks of a single colour with no mottling / black basing etc etc then oils can be used to make the finish more interesting / less 'toy like'. in this session most of the oils were applied pretty dry - a small dab with a no.1 sized brush I then use a larger brush to blend the oil into the surface - here is where you have problems if you have a glossy surface! Don’t be scared at this stage if it still looks way too stark i then use a sponge dipped in sans odour but with most of it wicked away on a paper towel and then start gently dabbing away to diffuse the paint even more, and also get some random effects So now we can see it starting to look more like dust thrown up from the wheels… If you are happy, a quick blurt with a hair drier will help you can then either seal with a lacquer / acrylic coat to protect what’s underneath, or in this case, just carry on… In the pic below i have dabbed the lighter colour (working from light to dark is often a good way to go), and just put some mid dirt oil down which has been worked with the dry brush In this one i think i have sponged the second colour And here i have added some of those mid dirt tones to the gun bay doors Hopefully you are getting the idea by now? I’ll try to post more pics of this process tomorrow - the rowing machine is now calling me I’m afraid! Cheers Nick

oils... there have recently been some very good technique videos on the use of 'OPR' (oil paint rendering) on youtube - check out Mike Rinaldi's new series and also Will Pattison's series of 7 videos on OPR for aircraft obviously there are many ways to use oils, and no way is 'wrong' per se, but there are some things that just don't make much sense! For instance, unless you are thinning them down to virtually nothing and using them as a wash, applying them to a gloss surface means you will likely just push them round your model without achieving much. The more matt your surface, the more 'bite' you will get. I spray MRP, and hopefully don't butcher it as i am doing so, thus the surfaces of my models are (should be!) smooth satin to the touch - I tend to find that this is just about right, but your mileage may vary. The other thing i will mention is the whole 'oil dot filtering' thing - putting lots of random dots of random colours all over your paint job. If that works for you then fine, but I try to ask myself what am i trying to change, why am i trying, and what do i want to achieve? For me 'ODF' doesn't figure in the answer to any of those questions. THE most important thing with oils though, is that it's almost impossible to f*ck up, or f*ck up your model! If you don't like what you did / are doing, then mineral spirits will just wipe it off and leave your paint job intact if you are using lacquers (I don't know about / have zero interest in other paint types, sorry). Anyway, before diving in, i like to group my oil colours together to help me visualise which ones will be used for which area / effect etc, so here's what mine looked like... and... i dab some out on cardboard to leach some of the oil out, but this is not absolutely necessary, and not everyone does it; next time i might not do this, and put it on hard copy paper instead to reduce the leaching effect labelling them can help as well if i want to mix colours i usually do it in a foil cup / cake mould, where i can also add some thinner, which for me is always W&N Sans Odour (Mineral Spirit that has had the smell taken out)... next up, application...

TopNotch will make to custom order, and i have used them for three previous projects for this one, they goofed the sharkmouth (only did one side, and that wasn't a close representation of the real thing either) and upper wing roundels too small, which they are working to correct; I should point out that the masks remained unopened by me for 7 months, and only then did i see their errors - I won't make that mistake again! my strong advice is get yourself a silhouette cutter thingy - it's what i've just done. Jennings (from LSP) is the only guy i have ever found to cry 'cant make them work' - I just haven't tried yet lol...i have zero patience to learn stuff, and just want to know how to 'do' i think this Youtube vid may be the solution: https://youtu.be/d2z45-4b7k8 Hope this helps Nick

hey guys thank you for the comments just a quickie today - the leading edge yellow which makes this P-40 a little more interesting / exotic I think? I was in a bit of a rush so just quickly eye-balled the size of the 'stripes' and used Tamiya curved tape for the wing leading edge parts, then a quick pass with some hairspray on the inner most parts MRP yellow followed a few minutes later, building it up in layers / trying to get some randomness / depth in there hopefully the pic below shows it's not just a 'slab' of yellow... then some chipping - done the day after spraying the paint - takes a while to get it going but i only wanted one or two chips it's not my best, but it is sufficient to bring the stripe and the rest of the camo job 'together' next up will be some oil weathering of the underside i am still waiting on TopNotch to re-do the shark mouth and upper wing roundels, so no topside work until I get those - very frustrating! thanks for looking Nick

sorry for the lack of updates over the last week or so - been away on hols and also waiting for some masks to be re-cut for the shark mouth and upper wing roundels anyway, there has been some progress... underwing roundels now on - I haven't done a step by step simply because there's nothing inherently new from the fuselage roundel process and then fuselage codes - these are in white which i think offers a nice contrast on desert schemes once again dark colour applied first to help get some depth and variation... and then using MRP Clear Doped Linen - it's a subtle creamy off white so after a few passes and some squiggling, here is what we have and as you may have noticed in the above i also retouched the yellow in the roundels (same done on both sides) - i wasn't happy that i had enough coverage on the part the i resprayed whether this is correcting the correction to the correction to the correction, I will let Peter confirm once the fuselage codes were done, it was time to add the serial which on the port side was left on the original dark green, so this needed to be added first i used the decal to get a feel for how much i would need to mask off - it's just resting there in the pic below then used blu tack worms for the surround... and sprayed some dark green in the box... i goofed up the A a bit - my fault in not taking care of the transfer of the mask in the same way that i normally would with roundels - very sloppy! and here is the other side which is over the dark earth so no repaint needed next update will be the yellow wing leading edges which will have some very light chipping - I'll do that later / tomorrow hopefully thanks for looking Nick

So pretty much as soon as I had finished spraying the middlestone, i received an email from a researcher and expert and desert P-40s who confirmed that the Barracuda analysis / take on things was actually incorrect - isn’t that always the way?! after analysing better copies of the existing photos and with some modern picture editing wizardry, i was able to clearly see that there was in fact no overspray but there was a different portion of the roundel (on both sides) which was painted when the aircraft was still in pieces that was covered up by the wing fillet after re-assembly. so…luckily i kept the masks and their surrounds so a little re-touching was required Without seeing the surrounding colours sometimes it is difficult to get a proper feel for how much paint you have laid down and unfortunately i think i will have to do another pass when i get back from hols here is where we are at the moment

On holiday at moment so not modelling but i do have a few updates on what i did just before i left… In summary, it was make some changes, and then finding out about 2 seconds later that i had done it wrong! firstly, i did the middlestone overspray which i had thought was clearly visible on the port side, and i also did some educated guesswork for the starboard side Hopefully the pics are fairly self explanatory at this stage i was quite pleased with how it looked

thank you - my pleasure i did the step by step thing also to show people how easy it is with decent masks and decent paint, there is no reason why anyone couldn't do this (or better) to emphasize, it's done one colour after the other with no breaks at all - i'm only pausing to change colours in the airbrush - that gives you more than enough time for the MRP to dry N

So here is how I did the fuselage roundels… First up (and sorry no pic of this) I use a couple of strips to criss cross the roundel and overlap on to the masking surround - this enables you to lift the surround and the roundel *in one go* and place on to the model. This is probably the most tricky bit - it can be fiddly to get it all to come up together, but with a little patience and practice you will come to master it very quickly I think. Placing the mask and surround on the model can also be tricky - and this is why vinyl based masks are better (for this) than Tamika tape type masks where you just can’t see through enough to know where it’s going with any accuracy Once the mask and surround is down, mask around the area as you see fit to avoid overspray, then using your criss-cross bits of tape remove the entire mask from the surround and place on its original backing i then put down a mid grey base - in this case RAF Extra Dark Sea Grey - and then airbrush template with some NATO Black; a sort of half way house black base if you will, and one that’s useful if painting a marking which overlaps camo demarcations Then i put the entire mask back on the kit…the reason for this is that when it comes to removing and putting back various sections, if the whole mask is on the kit you have a natural way to line everything up; if you try to eyeball putting sections in and taking them off one by one it will be a nightmare First up was the blue ring - this was removed and placed on the backing… then RAF Marking Blue mottled in for a gradual build up of colour; the pic below is just before i started spraying the blue (i forgot to take one immediately after)… Then put the blue ring back on, and remove the white one… i wanted to make sure the white looked uneven / had some variation to it… if you lay down too much paint you lose that white ring goes back on so it looked like this… then it was the red centre dot which if did it again i might do first just to get it out of the way - at this point i was itching to finish! and finally i removed the yellow ring and laid down some MRP Marking Yellow i took some in progress shots of this because I wanted to show you how i am specifically *not* trying to get even coverage / even colour outcomes… After first mottling passes… Then some more… And the finished article… Next up will be to replicate the Middlestone overspray - that will be tomorrow i think

hi Kevin, it depends what i am doing... for priming I use MS1500 (for all other airbrushing i use MRP exclusively), i try to make long strokes that finish off the model - rather than do a 180 on the edge where that part essentially ends up getting more paint for large priming areas i use my PS-290 trigger action with 0.5mm needle - it's a f*cking beast! for quick jobs where i am priming add-on parts, cockpit etc, i will use my H&S Evolution with 0.2mm needle (it's a good decent all round brush); primer is usually thinned 1 primer to 3(ish) Mr Levelling Thinner ('MLT') and sprayed at about 18psi - i don't have a digital read out and just eyeball the gauge. i am spraying from no more than 2 inches away - i see videos where stuff is being hosed on from the next village away and cringe! for initial marble coat, i am not too 'careful', and although this stage might be tedious it can also be used as 'free practice' for mottling and the like - if you goof and put too much paint down and get a spider, it's no biggie etc when using the airbrush template again it's just point and shoot basic blend coat / coverage i often thin the paint even more (it comes ready to paint) with some MLT, but this is in no way a prerequisite; pressure is usually a bit lower - say 15 psi; spraying closer now - maybe an inch or so? for mottling or fine detail work, i will usually thin; Mr Rapid Thinner ('MRT') can be helpful here, but i have also used MLT; pressure is somewhere towards 10-12psi maybe, and i am VERY close to the surface for all my blend and mottling i use the PS-771 with 0.18mm needle - it is head and shoulders the best brush i have used, and as a benchmark, is a significant upgrade on my Evolution, which previously i thought was very very good hope this helps Nick

And just quickly before I go ‘up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire’, here’s the first markings masked… all sooo simple with MRP! I tried something new here by providing a dark but not black base of grey with some NATO black through an airbrush template also I find it more interesting to use an off white (or even light grey) instead of a pure white… All this done back to back to back with only the time it takes to clear the airbrush and change paints between colours… I’ll show how I did the roundels tomorrow, as I know some people think the full 4 colour roundel can be a bit daunting.

So the underside is pretty much done - at least pre weathering! - and it was achieved by successive mottling with these 2 colours: It looks a bit too marbled for some people’s tastes, but I quite like it, and it provides enough interest that further weathering with oils is not imperative if one is looking for a less complicated finish.

Progress has been slow recently but here is where we are at the moment… To recap these are the main colours used topside, where I did some extra blending so it looks like this - I must learn to take pics with my iPad because the phone ones make the colours look a bit funky / erratic… And then did some work on the undersides which, if you recall were not Azure but painted in the US as their version of Sky RLM76 *very* rough marbling first, and then some template work with RLM02… the areas of more solid blue / grey on wing leading edges and around the gun bay doors (which hinged and dropped down on the real thing) were given a quick shot of hairspray and to give me the option of doing some chipping later (not sure if I will). that’s all for now. cheers, Nick

Not sure how well these pics show it as the iPhone struggles with the extreme brightness of my lamps but I revisited the port side chipping with the aim of increasing coverage and size of chips I also did some leading edge chipping - outboard of the guns I purposely chipped a very large (unrealistic) section as this will go under the yellow strip ie be chipped again.

Chipping! so hairspray and everything above was done Sunday, and chipping done Monday afternoon. I have found that when I left it 24hrs or so I got better control - you can of course chip pretty much straight after the MRP goes down but the delay helps (I have found) go from micro chips up, rather than having the odd larger one suddenly appear. MRP **will** chip many weeks after btw the brushes I use are just snipped off knackered old ones; I have also used a fibre pen thingy but find they can be too abrasive so be careful key is patience and good light, and keep turning you head / the model to check what is happening because even under magnification you mag find you have actually started chipping - sometimes even larger ones - without them catching the light anyway the pictures are presented in order to show some progression I suggest doing some one side, step back and see what you think , and then do the other side, and if you want more then return to the first etc, but of course there’s no ‘right’ way to do this