Starfighter

exactly! i had the opportunity to make a base visit with some frieds... it was really a great day!

a real beauty, graham! buit is it possible that you haven't shortened the nose gear strut? revell represented it in destressed position and i have the impression that your tonka's nose is a bit high... and i'm not sure if the inside of the refueling probe has to be completely white. but - i'm not a tornado-expert and i really appreciate your model! PS: i made some tornado pics at florennes last week... email me if you're interested! on this one you can see the inside of the refueling probe (this one has not been reduced... if you want to publish it anywhere, please ask before... i know it's not a great pic, but it's mine):

wow - excellent work on your cockpit, chris! it will be very hard not to buy this kit when i see your and fanch's results - just excellent. it's really an inspiration. i think, after my F-16N it could be the moment to build my first big scale prop...

jean, what should i say? that's just incredible! it looks ultra realistic... can't wait to see this painted!

oh man, that's really impressing! excellent scratchbuilding on the cockpot structures - i love it! can't wait to see more of your racer!

looks great, fanch! your painting skills are just impressive - well done!

wow - i love your weathering effects! and you work quite fast... i'd really like to advance as fast aas you on my models... excellent work in every case - et pour le dire en francais: j'adore ce que tu fais - c'est vraiment du super bon boulot!

very nice work so far - i love the scheme you choose!

i don't know if aires offers the seat without cockpit as well... i bought the aires "late" cockpit, and it looks great. i hope that it will be possible to fit the seat into your cockpit!

looks very good, naminami! i love your paint job! but there's a little problem: the desert-storm-SLUF didn't use the ESCAPAC-seat, it was already equipped with the stencil seat!

just impressive - escellent building, painting and weathering! thanks for sharing!

man, that's really excellent work! thanks for sharing your techniques!

i just can say it again, hans: it's just an excellent model. but there's one big problem with the model - "live", it looks even better than on the pics, yet! just great!

excellent paint job and weathering - very well done, red baron!

i already said it elsewhere - great detailing work, stusbke!

hello folks, i promised you some pics of the finished model - here you are! hope you like it!

wow, excellent work, fancherello - beautiful detailing, painting and weathering!

thanks a lot frederick! don't mind, i'll continue builing 32nd scale models... i'm infected with the large scale virus! you'll be able to use the same techniques as me - there's absolutely no problem to redo them. and if you have some questions - don't hesitate to ask! just continue like this - i'm sure your phantom will be excellent.

thanks again for your nice comments! you don't have to be a master painter to realize your markings using masks - i'm definitely not a master (but i'm working to amerliorate my results)! it all looks much more difficult than it really is - you just have to draw your markings on a paper (or draw it with your pc, using adobe illustrator for example), put a piece of transparent plastic on it, then put the tamiya tape and cut it out - it's really easy. sometimes, i also use decals which have the good shape as a pattern. in this case, i simply put the tape on the sheet and cut it out (with a piece of clear plastic between decals and tape, you can be sure that you'll be able to use the decals afterwards for an other project...). i use a gabbert triplex gun wich is really great, it's easy to clean and i'm very happy with the results. on this bird, i used exclusively enamel paints, not only for the overall painting but as well for the small details in the cockpit and the seat cushions.

just fount this thread... AWESOME work!! great camo, excellent weathering and an amazing finish - just a wonderful eagle!

and two pics of the nearly finished model. the inert sidewinder is missing and i broke off the antennae of the ACMI-pod. if the weather will be good enough tomorrow, i'll take some photos of the completed model. i hope you like it... if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask... my explications are maybe not very clear. your critics ore comments are welcome!

more markings: the nose number is a bit too big compared to the real plane... the red star is a decal, the number is painted. the "LS" marking on the fin was quite tricky to realize because of its very small size. the major problem was the shadows wich i simply painted free-handed with a brush. during the drying-period, i scratchbuilt an ACMI-pod using srues an tamiya-tape.

first coating applied. the sand color is mixed using different testors-enamels. camouflage applied. the green is from testors, the (slightly too light) brown comes from humbrol. the major problem of the scheme i wanted to realize was the fact that there are no decals in 32nd scale. so i had to paint the markings myself. to do that, i cut out the markings from tamiya-tape and apply it on the model. et voilà!

i cut out the ailerons. lowered ailerons are typical for tigers on the ground. the hinge mechanism was built using plastic sheet. the original windshield was too thick, so i vacuformed it using the kit part as master. cut out... glued into place and gaps filled. it's not yet polished at this stage of build.

hello guys, here are some pics of my last finished kit, respectively some in progress pics because i haven't made photos of the finished model, yet. so, i'll start from the beginning: i used a black box cockpit for my F-5. painting was done using humbrol enamels. riveting... quite a lot of work, but i think the result is quite good. this is how i rivet my models: first, i draw a line with a pencil. then, i start to apply them using a caliper gage. to obtain really round rivets, i pierce them again with a needle: to check the result, i use a water resistant marker and that's the result after sanding - looks quite crude at this point...