mc65

Mmmmh... I see the JG54 badge rather pixelous, it's the photo, or it's really like that? I guess it's possible to retouch it with brush and gouache to round up the corners, at least...

While we're doing philosophy... the title of this discussion struck me. Approaching the age of 60 I understood that growing old (also) means this: realizing that we can no longer do certain things, due to physical limitations. And we usually realize later, even much later, that we don't do them, it's rarely a fact that coincides with a specific moment. I'll try to explain myself better: when is the last time we sprinted to, for example, not miss a train? It seems normal, we've always done it. Then one day we do it again - we try to do it again - and we realize that at most we lengthen our pace: we will never do that performance again, impossible. We realize it at that moment, but in reality we lost that ability a long time ago, we just didn't know it. Well, all this to say that announcing that this will be the last LSP model, given the expertise and passion you're putting into it, seems like a revisable concept to me. We agree that our performance is unfortunately deteriorating, but at the same time experience, planning and awareness are increasing... I like to think that I will do modeling as long as I want, knowing full well that I have never reached exceptional levels. My next ones will be even less good, never mind, but they will be there, and I hope the same for you: why deprive yourself of one of the few remaining pleasures? I apologize for the length and if I took the liberty of intervening on your decision and/or belief, but I would be sorry not to see more of your future works. Sincerely, Paolo

It's an interesting question... in fact, despite loving the elegant lines of the B17 or the contrasts of the B24 (large fuselage and extra elongated wing, long main landing gear and very short nose landing gear, etc.) the Lancaster has a charm of its own. It may perhaps be in the thin lines of the in-line engines, as Mike says, and the fins associated with a structure of robust proportions, but perhaps what strikes me about the Lancaster is that it was a night bomber, four-engined, tailwheel, single pilot. How much more demanding - and challenging - you can imagine from a piloting point of view. Of course, the whole crew cooperated, navigator and engineer were essential elements to bring over 30 tons of machinery into enemy territory and drop over 6 tons of explosives, but in fact there was a single young man at the controls, who didn't even have the comfort (but if anything the worry) of having a box formation of other bombers and escort fighters around him. Only the darkness, the sound of the engines, the voices altered by the oxygen masks of his crew on the intercom and all around a more than hostile world. I mean, It certainly takes a lot of guts to get out of a trench or jump from a C47, but it takes a gigantic one to study the mission on the table, tell your crew of equally young men "let's go and come back" and then start four engines and begin a sequence of very precise, coordinated and exact actions, necessary to complete even the simple flight, not to mention the war mission, of such a complex machine in such a hostile environment.

This is excellent news as I just bought the same kit! an interesting note is that not only the fuselage is from the PZL designs, but also the wing was from another design, appropriately scaled and adapted... look at the wing plan of the SM79? There is the excellent Radu Brînzan's book on IAR, difficult to find, but fundamental for this model, imho. Cheers, Paolo

of course yes, Matt: from the pics of the real aircraft you can see that the PA944 had the G-type camera setup, with a camera positioned high up in the fuselage pointing obliquely towards port side. later the corresponding porthole was covered with blue PRU paint, evidently they used two cameras F52 (see pag.1 of this wip). simply the aiming system of that camera remained on the canopy side, that's all. thank you all again, I must say that the Revell kit it's a really good base to play with. cheers, P.

thank you all, pals! here I am again. unfortunately I haven't managed (yet?) to take some outdoor shots, the few free days available and the bizarre weather conditions have prevented me from doing so, but I have faith and patience, we'll see. in the meantime, since I took some shots in the lightbox, and since I will be away from home again in the next few days, I propose these to you, a very classic walkaround without infamy and without praise. it seems that with the lens available I can't get a greater depth of field, I'll have to consider taking something less powerful and with greater tolerance. I still have to paint the ventral amber id light. the canopy parts didn't receive the usual bath in the Future, and it shows... and that's all for now, I'm waiting to have a couple of shots with the natural background to put the photos in the RFI section and definitively close this quick job. cheers, Paolo

Definitely extraordinary, Denis! When will you open a school using Cameo? I'll book myself for the basic and advanced courses too!!

Michael, would that heaven would listen to you! In my opinion, the Fiat G55 is very elegant, it's an hard beauty-battle between him and the MC205. as regards the MC200, I follow this wip with passion, especially knowing that Italeri has already announced the release of its 1/32 kit in the short (medium, in my opinion) period. as usual it will be a bit of a disappointment, and as usual I will be the first to buy it. cheers, Paolo

What a damn, crazy camo! And how well you're dealing with, Denis! kudos, sincerely!

must say that Spits in general don't attract much attention to me, as they are very visible and overexposed. especially those with too many blades, after the experience with the venerable Matchbox kit... but -oh boys- this building is making me reconsider all my prejudices! so clean, so eye-catching... great job, indeed! John, I'm starting to think I might like a Fairey Gannet too, if made by you!

I'm far from home once again, but I've seen that, although with some difficulty, I can intervene from the smartphone. therefore last chapter of this subject, net of the final photos that will come, sooner or later. Once the fumes and streaks had dried well, I finally placed the undercarriage, my biggest concern with this kit, both due to the intrinsic fragility of the Spitfire, and because I installed resin wells, and the legs are in styrene. So two-component glue, templates, supports and a night's sleep. The next day I glued the resin arms of the retraction mechanism with cyan black and accelerator. Only to then realize that something wasn't right... the shock absorber compasses should be in front of the legs, not behind! I still haven't understood where I went wrong, the positions seemed and seem to me obligatory! However, there was no question of trying to reverse them, after such a powerful bond. There were two alternatives: carry it out after landing on her belly, or move the compasses. Let's try the second one: cut off with all the supports, also damaging a chrome stem, And move in their place, restoring the damaged stem and adding the brake ducts. Better, I'd say. The doors have also been placed, once again the resin ones. And at this point also the wheels, Eduard resins, the result of a mix of two different sets, obtaining four-spoke hubs combined with a smooth tread. Here I also unpacked the ventral identification light (to be painted amber) and the portholes of the two cameras. He's finally standing on his little legs, and they seem to be holding up, too... The quality control workers take shifts, only I'm always hard at work! Finally the time has come to unpack the transparencies and add the final details. First, canopy complete with locking/unlocking mechanism. And eyesight for the oblique camera. Then the resin door with the separate crowbar... a little gem. Ah, I forgot: fillers and vent pipe of the auxiliary fuel tanks installed in the leading edge of the wing. I went crazy finding certain references, I even wrote to the National Museum of the USAF which has a PR on display to get some certain information, but in the end I had to settle for interpreting as best I could a few blurry photos and a cutaway drawing. Bonus: navigation lights. And finally propeller, antenna (without cable, better). and pitot, end. As usual, only the photos in progress remain of what is in the cockpit. being able to make a finished model decent pics seems to be something beyond my abilities. We'll see if I can take some decent shots with the reflex camera, for the moment I would declare it finished, unless there are suggestions on corrections and/or further interventions. cheers, Paolo

Doh. if memory serves me correctly, when it happened to me I inserted a shim which, taking the entire width of the fuselage, allowed me to adjust the depth of the exhausts and guaranteed that they would no longer fall in attracted by the black hole, a relative of the carpet monster.

the first time I saw some of these films at the IWM there was no web, no cell phones and much less YouTube, obviously. I remained watching the cathode ray tube transmitting in a loop for I don't know how long.

Thank you all, pals! I'm really glad you like her, I'm looking for the "right" paint job, and this time may be I'm in. Let's see if I can do a little update from my phone, I'm far from home again. as I said, oil treatments require long intervals between one and the other, and so it was. Once the first round of effects above and below had dried, I decided to work the surfaces, especially the horizontal ones, with the oil dots technique, in order to make the tones even more wavy. I used light and cold colors, mostly: Here on one side the dots and on the other just washed away with a flat brush moistened with white spirit. And then, once these were dried, I moved on to the airbrush. First I gave a very light and fairly thin and short base of exhaust fumes with the raw umber darkened with black, then with only the raw umber I marked the exhausts more broadly along the fuselage up to the black and white stripes, following the curvature of the wing profile. Shortly afterwards, with the colors still damp, with a fan brush moistened with WS, I pulled down vertically (relative to the position of the plane on the ground) what I had just sprayed. The idea is to have an almost invisible streaking base on which to spray the definitive smokes. Now the top must dry well, so I moved on to the belly where I insisted with a brush with black, then I will add some raw umber. Damn me and when I glued these vents... After several hours I returned to the fumes: on a long and wide raw umber base I sprayed, without waiting long, a thin and shorter strip of a light sand, the equivalent of a lightened buff. It's not very clear nor as clear as in the photos of the real ones, where it indicates the combustion of a particularly lean air/fuel mixture, but I like it. At the moment it responds differently depending on how it takes the light, but when it will be dry, and after a possible coat of opaque clear coat, it should be fine. The exhaust pipes are only placed to evaluate their contrast with the fuselage and fumes. As usual, in the intervals I did other things, such as emulating oil leaks from the propeller hubs, and preparing the landing gear (no photo, sorry). And that's all for today, see you in a few days! cheers, Paolo

you don't have to apologize, Denis, your question was more than logical, in fact I have made huge messes several times by mixing colors from different brands! well, now that I've got the messy part of this model out of the way, I can move on to playing with the special effects, which is a good 50% of the fun for me. in the meantime I placed the Eduard decals, these are the removable film type, and when they work they are wonderful. here just placed, peeling must be done after at least 24 hours. and here 24 hours later. the photo seen on the PC screen is pitiful, damn. also place the grill in front of the air intake and the vent pipes. stupid thing, now they will get in the way of my eyes in subsequent processes. in fact I could have taken the 1manarmy stencils, I thought about it later... Anyway. having put all the stencils (which then having painted signs and walkways, only those and the two serials on the fuselage and tail that I had printed ad hoc were missing) I wanted to experiment with a new (for me) method of highlighting lines and rivets, dissolving pigments in water and brushing them liberally on the model and, once dry, removing the excess with a clean rag. and then fix everything with a coat of transparent. in theory if something goes wrong you just wash the model and you're back to square one. in reality, if the model is not mirror polished, something remains trapped on the surfaces. let's say that it went well and I didn't do any major damage... while the pigments were drying, I carried out the exhausts, giving them some pigments too. the base was black with Alclad2 burnt metal on it, on which I had given some rusty tones with an airbrush, again in the various downtimes. once this phase was finished, quite quickly, I tried to reproduce the fuel halos around the fillers. what characterizes the extremely volatile avgas leaks is the presence of fairly clear halos where the liquid has spread over the metal, washing away the surface dirt. in some cases there is also a discoloration of the paint, a typical example is the Corsair. to try to reproduce this effect I didn't use a dark color as is often done, but I tried with a light color, trying to give that sense of discoloration I was talking about. so I prepared two mixtures: a very diluted one to mark the affected areas, and a slightly stronger one to fill the previously moistened areas. something like that... despite the fineness of the pigments, the effect risks being a little grainy. To remedy this, I waited for them to dry a little-but-not-too much and I rubbed gently with a piece of cotton. at this point I have given just a shade of pigment in the treading areas at the wing root. starboard. port. here perhaps it's possible to appreciate the quality of the Eduard peel-off decals, when they work... an overall view where you can also see placed the customized decals. and to conclude -for today- a bit of healthy, old streaking under the belly. from here on it's mandatory to proceed in layers, leaving the previous one to dry so as not to make a mess. so for the moment a pause for reflection. the menu includes further brush work with oils and then moving on again to oils, but with airbrush for exaust stains and subsequent shades. sequitur, Paolo