Hey guys! Wanted to give an update on what I’ve been doing lately. I haven’t had much time to the bench, but this past weekend I made the most of a couple free hours. Here’s my F-6B, the photo recon version of the P-51A.
Paint is Tamiya Acrylics. I lightened the olive drab with dark yellow. The neutral gray was lightened with another gray color. I thought the contrast was far too stark so I gave an overspray of the base color. This is probably my best paint job to date. Comments welcome!
Oh!Oh! A mustang!
Love it! Fading is exactly the way I like. Glad to see you getting some bench time and it looks like you made the most of it.
Hey RadMax8 A very nice lookin 51 you have there !!! I understand about bench time I havent had much time for that of late myself, and the BG deadline is getting oh so close. I have to ask though how you did the stripes, as I have a Tamiya P-51B just waiting for some attention.
PS Is your P-51A a Revell kit ?
Quite an honor coming from you, hk! You’re THE P-51 expert around these parts. You’ll be a bit disappointed, I didn’t go for the Ultracast prop. But I wanted this to be a pretty basic build. I will admit, I did dress up the insides with a Quickboost resin gunsite. This is a fantastic addition for any plane, mych better than the plastic blobs, and cheap, too!
Vetteman, Here’s my painting steps:
Very nice paint work Max! The lights/darks look just right. Should be a beauty when finished.
I gotta agree with the others, your AB work is excellent! Just the right amount of shading, and the masking for the invasion stripes is perfect. Well done! Looking forward to the finished photos. [tup]
Very nice painting [tup]. Should be a beauty.
Regards, Rick
Thanks for the comments, guys! It was a kind of tough balance, I didn’t want to fade this one too much because it was a ETO bird, but this model is of the plane around June 4, 1944. P-51As were pretty old by then. A few days after D-Day, they scrubbed the stripes off the top of the fuselage and wings… I wasn’t brave enough to try that look this time…
Vetteman, sorry I missed this last time: The kit is Accurate Miniatures 1/48 F-6B.
I hate to be the rain on anyone’s parade but I’m wondering if the invasion stripes are just too perfect. I always like to make mine just the slightest bit on the “crude” side since that’s how many of the pictures look when you see them. The best Mustang I ever did had mildly rough edges on the black and white stripes. I was actually trying to make them razor straight but, through an accident, they didn’t turn out that way and I thought they turned out so much better for it.
Eric
All true, Eric. In the field most of the stripes were applied with a paint brush and a MKII eyeball. Most of them were a skosh off here and there and I’ve seen that duplicated my modelers using paint as well as a decal sheet for a P-47 that had them uneven intentionally.
But for me, I’ll make them straight. It’s actually easier than trying to make them randomly uneven or rough edged. And I suppose, to be perfectly correct, one would have to have good refs of the actual aircraft to be able to make them rough and crooked just like the originals and that’s just insane. The best way I know to make invasion stripes look good is to beat them up and weather them properly and nevermind how straight or crooked they might be.
One thing I failed to mention (and I really should have said this in my initial post) was that I was speechless as to how well the rest of the plane was done. It far outshines my last Mustang and I only WISH I could have mine look that good. I should have stated that so that it didn’t sound like I was just wee-weeing over someone’s latest creation. I’ve been building models for about 30 years now and I hope that one day I can make mine look as good as Rad’s.
Like I said in my first post, the extremely mild squigly invasion lines I got on another Mustang of mine was purely by accident. I was actually laying down strips of white and black decal stripes which I then applied a coat of MicroSol. The decals reacted practically imediately and I was trying to do some last second moving around of the decals with a paint brush. That’s when the edges got pushed and moved and, in the end, looked like they were actually hand applied hastily in the field rather than with a sharp laser-straight edge. I’ll bet you a million bucks that I could never replicate that happy accident ever again! [V]
Again, a boffo paint job on the Mustang Radmax! If I say my prayers and take my vitamins, and with a boatload of luck, maybe I’ll have an OD over Neutral Gray Mustang (or any plane for that matter) that looks as good as yours.
Eric
Eric,
Just so you know, I took no offense to your previous comments. It crossed my mind several times that the lines are too perfect. If I was any good at brush painting, I’d have painted the base colors, then brushed the white and black over it. Your happy accident with the decals is really awesome. Some neat things can happen when you fiddle with decals after Micro-Sol!!! Could you maybe post some pictures here?
Also, thank you for the compliments. This is by far my best paint job, I was patient and had a game plan. Maybe it’s just a fluke! Who knows. I’ve been trying to hone my skills with my Omni 4000 airbrush. It’s a great tool, that’s for sure!
From what an Uncle of mine used to talk about, the people he worked with during his tour on a P-61 on Sipan (spelling). He always seemed to hold his crew chief in very high reguard as a perfectionist even above the pilot it seemed to me from his stories. He never talked about any of the missions he flew. So in reading here it has me wandering if there weren’t a few planes out there with perfect stripes on them.
So with that said, RadMax you did a fine job on your 51 in my view your fading couldnt have gotten any better I dont think, love the stripes too. You do have masking down I for one still fight with masking and am just now learning to do some fading and weathering.
Max, that’s excellent. The flat finish is top notch, as is the random “fading” effect. Good stuff.
Of course you don’t have time at the bench…you’re making sure those Blue Jackets make it this year. They’re gonna do it!
Max your 51 looks great. The A models are my favorite. The invasion stripes look great. I also wonder how to correctly apply the stripes. I have seen some pic of some planes that the stripes look like they were painted on with a broom and probally were. Like previously stated it probally depended on the crew and how much of a perfectionist the guy doing the painting was or how many planes he had to get done in that short period of time. Without reference pics of the exact plane its tough. I did my F-5 with upper stripes painted out and the lower ones done a bit on the rough side. When it was done it just looked right to me. Not to sloppy but not razor sharp either. Either way that is one nice P-51 you have there. Can’t wait to see her with some decals.
Soulcrusher[oX)]