Italeri Macchi C.202 Folgore. FINISHED… well almost!

[Phil88]

Good works on this plane. 

[quang]

@Phil88 Merci cher voisin!

[HB252]

Thank you Mr quang for you detailed answer.

 

For me, the time its important and maybe if I know the time you last in did It I wont frustrant when I Will do the mine

 

Again great work

[quang]

12 minutes ago, HB252 said:

For me, the time its important and maybe if I know the time you last in did It I wont frustrant when I Will do the mine

It took me a few hours to paint the spots but I spent days thinking about how to do it 

[Borsos]

That looks frantastic. The naive person in the back of my mind had thought „maybe light spots on dark green are easier than the other way round“ but there’s of course no rational argument for that. Maybe spots are at least easier to spray than these „smoke rings“ this plane is famous for… however I really like the way it comes out!

 

[quang]

8 minutes ago, Borsos said:

The naive person in the back of my mind had thought „maybe light spots on dark green are easier than the other way round“ but there’s of course no rational argument for that.

In fact, our main problem here is how to control the overspray.
There’s as much overspray with light spots over a dark base as the reverse. Only that overspray of light over dark is less visible or conspicuous.

 

15 minutes ago, Borsos said:

Maybe spots are at least easier to spray than these „smoke rings“

Actually, a blotch is just a smoke ring reduced to a single spot. The blotches I created for the Macchi were not made from a single spurt of the airbrush. 
The airbrush had to be continuously moving during the spurt like you’d do for a smoke ring.

[mc65]

this can mean, in other words, that to create the smoke rings we can make spots of the more-or-less right size and then adjust the internal contours with the base color...
I don't know if it can be considered cheating, but correcting fine lines this way can be a huge help, ask me why I know?

[quang]

12 minutes ago, mc65 said:

this can mean, in other words, that to create the smoke rings we can make spots of the more-or-less right size and then adjust the internal contours with the base color...

Not sure it works that way because in a smoke ring, the spray line must be consistent. You have to start AND finish at the same spot! Otherwise, it wouldn’t be a ring 

 

12 minutes ago, mc65 said:

correcting fine lines this way can be a huge help

It’s the reason why I favour lacquer paint over acrylics. Lacquer is mostly forgiving. Touch-ups with lacquer are (almost) invisible.

BTW nice squiggles on your 109 

Edited October 7, 2023 by quang

[MikeMaben]

14 hours ago, mc65 said:

                     ...I don't know if it can be considered cheating,

 

Cheating ?  Is there such a thing ?  

[Dpgsbody55]

45 minutes ago, MikeMaben said:

 

Cheating ?  Is there such a thing ?  

 

Only if you get caught.

 

 

Cheers

Michael

[dennismcc]

Back after a 2 week holiday and just catching up with this thread, and that paintwork looks fabulous, I really like it and the way you achieved it.

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

[quang]

Thank you Dennis for your kind words.

Sooo, we’re getting to the MARKINGS!

After spending a long time soul-searching, I decided to make one of the following machines shown here for the sake of convenience as digital simulations. They all belonged to 376sq, 51° stormo.

 

 

These four machines all share the same unit Black Cat insignia and code type.
I asked our friend Max a.k.a Mozart a.k.a. 3M (Mad Masker Max) to kindly cut the masks for me. Although the Black Cat insignia is included in the kit, I found the box decals were slightly undersized and the wing insignia too thin, I asked Max to cut the masks for those items as well. Which he obligingly did in his uncanny way.

The masks arrived a week later and were put to work.

The wing insignias behaved immaculately. The big issue was to position them correctly.

 

 

Also note that the left and right are mirror-image and NOT identical.

 

Now the bad news: despite Max’s efforts, we’ve reached the limits of what the Cameo Silhouette can do.

The cat logo is a pain to position and the resulting details are fuzzy.

 

So were the code numerals whose white outline is at best inconsistent.

With a heavy heart, I saw myself forced to remove all the paint and start all over again with a new colour scheme.

Until I found this machine sporting the same camo but belonging to another unit in North Africa.

 

I noticed that the name Annoni and incidentally the code 96-10 are vaguely familiar… as they are the same on the Italeri box-art 

 

Obviously the Italeri plane has a different camouflage than the one on the digital illustration.

I did a quick search and found these AMAZING facts from A History of the Mediterranean Air War 1940-1945. Vol.2 by Christopher Shores.

There must be some modellers’ god somewhere because one moment I found myself in deep trouble and came out the next with an original model plus a tall tale to boot.

Sorry for being so long and thank you all for looking on.

Cheers,

Quang

Edited October 8, 2023 by quang

[Uncarina]

Great anecdote! I’m curious whether this aircraft had both camo schemes. The digital version is annotated Tunisia 1942 while the box art is Sicily 1943.

 

Cheers,  Tom

[quang]

@Uncarina They were two distinct planes with different serials and the same code (obviously chosen by Tenant Annoni who was the 92 sq. CO).

The below profile by A. Brioschi shows the first 96-10 serial 7821 in September 1942 shortly before the Marseille ‘mishap’.

The Italeri version is the ‘replacement’ 96-10 serial 91791 some months later in 1943.

 

 

Edited October 8, 2023 by quang

[quang]

New clothing! The excellent kit decals are applied.

Just checked the Marseille pic posted previously. The cockpit ventilation intake (red) and the armoured windscreen (blue) need to be removed.