How would you weather this?

[1to1scale]

This mix of colors has me perplexed, I’m not sure how to weather such a wildly colored aircraft. Any opinions?

[Clunkmeister]

Now this is a personal opinion, not right or wrong, but just my opinion.

Most WW1 scouts were considered expendable and for many, their last few expectancy was measured in weeks, not months or years. So as a rule of thumb, I weather usually based upon grass and dirt stains from the field they fly out of, plus some oil and fuel stains.  A light wash of dirt to tone down the brightness is good as well.  Aviattic makes some faded lozenge that works well for upper flying surfaces too....

But,... the D.Vll. Was brand new in 1918 and with a liquid cooled engine wouldn’t have showed as much wear.  I’d have lightened up the blue a bit and given it a General very light grime wash to tone down the brightness  Also Aviattic faded to lozenge followed by a bit of a light wash.

 

[GazzaS]

This is the kind of scheme that always troubles me.  What to do with non-earth or grey tones??

Lately I've been trying to add shading, oil splotches, and grime using oils, either by either brushing or spattering, with an eye toward implying that usually the ground crew wipes the stuff off the upper surfaces and what is left is dust that clings to the oily residue using grays and browns.  While the bottom and hard to reach surfaces don't get a loving wipe.

 

I've also been (trying) using oils to imply color differences due to sunlight and shadow.  For instance on a recent T-34 (tank) build, I used a brown filter higher up, and a blue filter further down.  It's a bit of a process to get the shades the way I want, and often, the subtle differences I'm trying to imply are lost on film due to flash, lighting, or my poor camera knowledge.

 

I think that if this were my plane, I'd find my paint hack and spray it the same colors.  Then I'd work the horizontal surfaces with lighter yellow oils and see how that looked.  Then I'd try it with the blue areas.  I wouldn't use a white filter because that often results in a frosted look.

 

Then I'd go back to the hack with some brown filters to add a bit of darkening way down low on the yellow.  Once done with that, I'd try to darken the blue down low, too. 

 

Then, if you like what's happened to the hack, you can try it on the real kit.

 

I was watching this guy over on Aeroscale, and he was doing great things with filters on armor.  Here are a few shots that inspired me to experiment with oils:

He mentioned using a pink filter on this t-72.  I ask you...who would ever think to use pink??

And his use of browns and blues on this T-34 inspired me to follow suit, but without mine looking anywhere near as good as his:

 

I admit that I'm still in an early learning phase when it comes to filters and colors.   But I guess I'll never know what can be accomplished if I don't try.

[1to1scale]

I have been wrestling with the colors, brown would work with yellow, and a dark gray with blue, but the wings leave me scratching my head. I think I may just go with a minimal approach, maybe just a dark gray panel wash, possibly some light gray oils for some streaking on the wings and fuselage? At very minimum, I’ll do a panel line wash. After all, the wings and decals are ruined on the undersides. See upper photo.

[GazzaS]

3 hours ago, 1to1scale said:

I have been wrestling with the colors, brown would work with yellow, and a dark gray with blue, but the wings leave me scratching my head. I think I may just go with a minimal approach, maybe just a dark gray panel wash, possibly some light gray oils for some streaking on the wings and fuselage? At very minimum, I’ll do a panel line wash. After all, the wings and decals are ruined on the undersides. See upper photo.

Most guys that do the wings do some pre-shading on either side of the ribs.  So, your best option there would be a darkening color feathered from each rib.  You could probably do it with a thin mist from the airbrush as well.

 

[Sir Desmond Glazebrook]

What is meant by filters?

[DocRob]

7 hours ago, Sir Desmond Glazebrook said:

What is meant by filters?

Using filters means to apply a very diluted transparent Colour over the whole surface or parts of the kit, to gain a tonal balance. To achieve that you have to choose the right filter color. The Char 1b here is only airbrushed in the first picture and I didn't like the stark contrasts. Among other effects the second picture shows the Char after a treatment with a red brown filter and whoosh, everything blends together and I got a reasonable tonal balance.

Cheers Rob

[Sir Desmond Glazebrook]

Thanks Rob!