**** DONE: 1/48 Fw190 D-9 "Blue 12" - Winter War / Eastern Front WWII

I echo Wayne's post.

I echo Wojtek echoing Wayne.

Very impressive work.

Very nice. Might have to look for a Hobbyboss kit.

Geo

Looks good so far!

Okay <deep breath>... time to start painting the camo! After a couple of false starts and minor setbacks, I've finally passed the hurdle of getting some camo laid down on 500570. Since Blue 12 is such a strange collection of different patterns, I'm looking at the plane in three distinct sub-areas: The fuselage, the upper wings and lower wings. Due to the good fit of the kit, I've elected to bypass putting a primer coat on the whole plane. Patch repairs/touch-ups on this dirty bird won't be too much of an issue.

I will be doing a little bit of paint chipping via the hairspray method. Mostly on the gun cowling where the color archive photo seems to indicate noticeable chipping. I'll probably do a little on the wing roots too. First a little black to serve as a base coat for the Alclad Aluminum...


And then a light mist of aluminum over the black...


This is actually my second attempt at this stage. The first attempt resulted in a very grainy application of aluminum, probably due to insufficient airbrush pressure. So I wiped it off as best as I could with iso alcohol and started again. After the aluminum dries, I sprayed the metalized areas with hairspray (aerosol stuff that was decanted and sprayed through my airbrush).

Now for the pre-shading. I've noticed that not everyone is a fan or proponent of pre-shading and I understand the arguments for and against. I choose to do it because I like the effect but most importantly, I rather LIKE the process itself... something soothing about tracing panel lines.




I've decided to do the upper wings in 77/75. Both colors are handmixed using Tamiya and Gunze paints that I had lying around. After the light primer 77 is roughly laid down in freehand, I utilized Dale's technique of paper stencils and bits of Blutack to mask the darker 75 grey.


I am seeking a harder edge than what Dale was after on his 109 so I used small dots of the blue stuff to secure the masks very close the painting surface.


And here is the result...





Some of the preshading is more prominent than desired and there is a bit of overspray here and there that needs attention but overall, I am happy with the upper wing surfaces. A little bit of touch-up and time to move to the next area!

Looking good John.

Geo

Good start on the paint John.

Looks great, well done

Got a good chunk of painting done this morning. I decided to tackle the bottom of the wings after completion of the top. Trying to order it so masking is easiest. I elected to portray the bottom in a combination of the commonly proposed color suggestions for 500570.

First the front half of the bottom in dark gray (75). This makes the most sense to me because the landing gear doors appear to be dark gray as well.


An odd panel on the port wing is painted light blue (76).


Masking the previous panels off, I spray the next section in black as a base for various shades of natural metal (Alclad).


Spray a few ports/panels in Alclad Chrome and mask those off using bits of BluTack.


The rest of the section is sprayed in Dark Aluminum. The different shades are arbitrary... I just wanted to break up the uniformity of the natural metal section.


The bottom of the flaps are painted in grunblau (84) and the ailerons in light blue (76). The fit of the flaps and ailerons is so good that they remain in place without glue... very helpful when painting!


Once the bottom is finished, grunblau (84) is applied to the lower fuselage. The top colors will be the brown/green late war combo (81/83). Again, masks were fashioned using paper and attached with bits of Blutack.




The camo is primarily done.




Although I was going for a harder mask edge, it was TOO HARD in some spots. And the green was a tad too bright for my tastes. So I made some adjustments without the masks. Also added some green to the spine behind the canopy based on the archive picture.




Frankly, my thoughts at this point...What a weird looking airplane. Hopefully the markings will help tie all of the disparate colors and patterns together.

Looking nice.

JKim said:

Frankly, my thoughts at this point...What a weird looking airplane. Hopefully the markings will help tie all of the disparate colors and patterns together.

Click to expand...

Wouldn't worry about it John. That's the way they builds 'em and that's the way you gotta portray it. Looking very good.

Geo

I love it.

Nice work on the camo. Can't say I know anything about the plane but your work looks great.

Just getting caught up on this build. Excellent work John I really like the attention to detail on this one.

Dave.

Used a free Saturday to hole myself up in my work room and keep working on 500570. Added the red primer per photos and various painting guides.





Took a short break for lunch and psyched myself up for the markings. This is the first time using masks for markings and insignia. Since the late war Luftwaffe fighters have such simplified markings, I thought it'd be relatively easy to use masks. I used bits of paper as a "frame" for the masks. Not sure where I saw this suggestion but it's brilliant and makes using these masks MUCH easier.






The "12" is a more complex mask since it is two colors. The outer mask is applied first and the blue is sprayed on. Took another break to make sure the paint dries thoroughly since the next step involves a mask on top of the blue paint.


Leaving the original mask in place, the inner "1" and "2" are placed so that there is a gap between the inner and outer mask. A bit tricky to accomplish and had to make extensive use of the magnifying glass for this step. White is then sprayed on.


Came out pretty nice!


The Montex masks did not come with a dash so I had to cut my own masks out of Tamiya tape using the kit decals as a guide. The masks looked pretty sloppy under the magnifier and I was worried about a messy result but it came out looking acceptable.


Time to start weathering!

Beauty work John.

fantastic !