The Black&White Technique. Tiger I 1/48 by JOSE LUIS LOPEZ. (IV, Final)

Another daring step where faith is necessary! There´re a lot of ways for simulating mud: with plaster, with acrylic resin and pigments, with specific products so on. All methods are good ways to achieve an attractive result with the mud, depending on modellers taste or affinity with the materials involved. My favourite: Tamiya´s texture paint. Why? A big bottle can mix it with sand, pigments or acrylic paint and, most of all, fix strongly with any kind of surface:

Adding some dark brown pigment and paint to the Tamiya´s paint, I achieve approximately a nice colour to start adding the mud. Anyway, the colour is NOT important. Just the texture IS important. Must be in scale and as heterogeneous as possible:

Using a bush, I applied the mix to my taste to the wheels and the lower part of the tank. As can be seen in the pictures, the result is anything but nice! But keep the faith! This is just the beginning!:

Once the texture paint is dry (a day or more, do not be impatient), using a colour mix of paints similar to the AK´s dust used previously, I randomly applied a fine coat of dust over the wheels. Be sure that this paint don´t hide all the elements or you´ll achieve a dull and unattractive surface. As usually, do it as heterogeneous as possible:

Remember that this paint can´t be removed, so be carefully when applying the paint with your airbrush:

And, why not, let´s start with the tracks. Use ALWAYS the same colours for dust in all the parts of the vehicle. Of course you can play a little bit with the mix proportions, but do not use different colours to simulate the same effect: dust and dirt:

Now, the final steps for the mud are a mix of techniques and products that I´ll try to resume at my best:

- Using oils: Naples Yellow, Natural Umber and Black, I made 3 mixes of these colours (like I did with acrylics) and using them as a wash, I applied them randomly on the different wheels with different intensities.

- For splashes, I used acrylic paints slightly diluted projected to the wheels with the help of an old airbrush

- Just in the tracks (where the two previous steps were also applied), I added punctually some pigments (a mix of three colours from Iraqi Sand and Russian earth ) to achieve some textures here and there. Remember that if you use a lot of pigments, you´ll spoil all the previous work as the surfaces where the pigments are used, if you´re not careful, will get dull, bored and will hide all the previous work!:

And then ..... finally, at last .... miracle!!! ........... just painting the tools, towing cables ... et voilá!

Many thanks for your attention!

GUEST GALLERY: "Norway-1943" 1/32 by AITOR AZKUE.

This is the latest piece from Aitor Azkue. If you don´t recall the name you´ll may want to check his "Never Ending History?" here, you most likely remember it.
With this work Aitor bring us a dramatic sight of the most bitter side of aviation. As usual in his latest works the central scene attracts immediately the viewer attention making us to focus in the story. From there we can begin a voyage around the surrounding background just to check the amazing level of detail and realism that enhance the emotion of the message. Aitor is a diorama artist that transcends the mere standards of technical skills in modelling and composition and search a way to touch the spectator. An artist in all the extension of the word (a not enough valued modeller in my opinion, but certainly he will be).
Just a thought about one of my favourite elements, the derelict skiff or, as I like to say, the oblivion boat. Why is it there? Is only an element for filling an empty angle? It has some significance? Well, everyone can make his guess but personally I think it is a sour metaphor about the doom of the crashed bird and maybe of the wounded crewmen as well.
It is hard to be original in the qualification of these kind of works; Aitor always makes me to improve my English vocabulary. What about delightful?
I hope this Norway bitter scene moves you as much as it moved me.

Q  

The inception:

The culmination:

 

The Black&White Technique. Tiger I 1/48 by JOSE LUIS LOPEZ. (III)

More steps! .... I see the end!!!!!

Washes ... they always help to increase the perception of the details of the kit. 1/48 kits are not as accurate as 1/35 counterparts. And if there were the same quantity of aftermarkets available for the quarter scale, they´d be more difficult to place that in the bigger scale. 1/35 PE sets are a nightmare by them self so, in 1/48, for not very skilled modellers like me, are just a Chimera. So, in my case, I have to hide this with the paint, showing as much as possible the details available in the kit and bring them to life.

Before the washes, I applied a pair of solid coats of Tamiya´s clear, the perfect base for washes as it facilitates the washes to run easily around the kits details.

For this task, as in the previous steps, I used Tamiya Panel Line Accent colour mixed with KX 52 Flat Earth, using Tamiya´s thinner (blue cap) to keep the mix fluid and easy to handle:

Oils: Modeller´s best friend without a doubt! Easy to handle, slow dry, excellent blur just perfect! Using different oil colours, Naples Yellow, Van Dyke Brown, natural umber, blue, white, red . And using the well-know technique of dots I faded the grey colour trying to reduce the contrast of the different shades of the grey and hiding a little bit the chipping aggressive effect of previous steps:

A couple of detail shots of the weathering so far. After this step, I´m ready for the real heavy weathering with dust and dirt:

I used AK Interactive´s enamel Africa dust (AK22) instead Tamiya´s enamel because I felt that the yellowish dust of this product will suit perfectly to the Kitty. If you have not this product, you can also use Tamiya´s enamel paint to do it mixing buff, white and a little bit of desert yellow.

This technique is used by many modellers and the results are really awesome for me. But you must be strong and have faith on your hands, as the intermediate steps of this technique are, how to say this, difficult to assimilate if you have not clear the final look of the tank finished.

I directly airbrushed the product from the bottle without problems:

Now, using AK´s thinner, I started to remove the applied dust to my taste. I just waited 15 minutes and then, using a brush, I cleaned the kit in the desired areas. Even the next day I was able to do this because of the enamel´s nature of the AK´s product. I must say that I´m happy this product, easy to apply and easy to remove with a tasty colour for me. What else?:

Once the base dust colour shapes are OK for me, I applied a nice coat of matt varnish (Marabu) to seal the dust and to avoid any damage from further steps.

Once dry, a pair of days, be patience, I add some dirt details here and there using acrylic paints. I always use the same colours for this: black, dark mud and buff. Mixing them I got a nice dirt colour series. I added a lot of water to the mix to ensure that the desired effects are subtle and if I want a more intense effect, I have just to insist with the brush more times, that ´s all!

So, using these colours, I made different contrast in the dust for a more attractive look. Important thing in this step: The dust on a kit makes it looks, how to say, diffuse, smashed potatoes. Undefined. Excuse me for my lack of English! The dust makes all the details to disappear. So, we have to help the kit with some washes here and there. For me, a kit without depth in the details is a fool! I made the washes using the darkest mixes of the acrylic paint.

So, finally, I think that I managed to return to a highly contrasted Kitty even with dust:

The only remaining effect is the mud, but that will be in the following chapter. I PROMISE that the next part... will be the last!!!!!

CONTINUE TO PART IV (FINAL)