Spitfire Mk IXc Tamiya 1/32. Cockpit (Part 1)

COCKPIT STAGE 1: I used resin sets from Barracuda Cast for the cockpit sidewalls, seat and control stick. I also used Eduard´s photoetched sheet for the rudder pedals and some details of the seat. The Tamiya photoetched sheet that includes the kit is also useful for some details. Other details are made from scratch with white styrene pieces from Evergreen. The wires are made with lead wire from Plusmodel and electric copper wire.
Appart from the booklet with photos included in the kit I used Modellers datafile # 03 from SAM publication and a wonderful article about this model by Maciek Żywczyk.

Tamiya´s 1/32 Spitfire Mk IXc Merlin 60 series engine (part 4)

Stage 5: Locating the engine inside the cradle & adding more pipes, wires and lines.

Tamiya´s 1/32 Spitfire Mk IXc Merlin 60 series engine (part 3)

Stage 3: Main weathering.

Stage 4: Pipes, lines, wires... there are still a lot more to add but the engine must be fixed into the cradle first.

Tamiya´s 1/32 Spitfire Mk IXc Merlin 60 series engine (part 2)

Stage 2: Painting. Next thing will be to to apply some weathering and attach a whole lot of pipes and lines.

Tamiya´s 1/32 Spitfire Mk IXc Merlin 60 series engine (part 1)

One of my ongoing projects. Tamiya´s 1/32 Spitfire Mk IXc. I want to build it with the Merlin engine quite detailed. This is the first stage of the detailing. I have added some details of the surface elements as well as the couplings for the pipes and wires that will be attached after the painting.

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!

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)