Revell Globemaster III Build Log
Discussion
Thought I'd write a build log of my latest model. I've never done one before for a plastic model, so I thought I give it a go as much to keep a record for myself as anything.
The model is a Revell 1:144 scale C-17A Globemaster III. Wouldn't usually select a model like this; it was a present. Looking forward to building it all the same.
Colour scheme is a very boring overall grey. Because of this I have decided to try some fairly advanced (for me) painting techniques to try to give the model some life. I am also going to use Acrylic paints and the much vaunted Johnson's 'Klear'. I am going to try pre-shading panel lines, pre-tinting for random panels, followed by a dark wash to make the panel lines stand out.
I have never tried these techniques or materials before, and so I have no idea how this will turn out. Any constructive criticism is welcome!
So, here are the component parts of the model:
First job, remove parts from sprues and clean up the gates:
Inner fuselage assembled, cockpit sprayed base grey ready for detail painting. Might just paint the seats and floor by hand to 'brush up' my painting technique. Not decided yet since it's mostly hidden work:
That's as ar as I've got with the kit itself, next post is of a test piece for the panel shading method.
The model is a Revell 1:144 scale C-17A Globemaster III. Wouldn't usually select a model like this; it was a present. Looking forward to building it all the same.
Colour scheme is a very boring overall grey. Because of this I have decided to try some fairly advanced (for me) painting techniques to try to give the model some life. I am also going to use Acrylic paints and the much vaunted Johnson's 'Klear'. I am going to try pre-shading panel lines, pre-tinting for random panels, followed by a dark wash to make the panel lines stand out.
I have never tried these techniques or materials before, and so I have no idea how this will turn out. Any constructive criticism is welcome!
So, here are the component parts of the model:
First job, remove parts from sprues and clean up the gates:
Inner fuselage assembled, cockpit sprayed base grey ready for detail painting. Might just paint the seats and floor by hand to 'brush up' my painting technique. Not decided yet since it's mostly hidden work:
That's as ar as I've got with the kit itself, next post is of a test piece for the panel shading method.
Right, panel shading. I'm using acrylics followed by MIG dark wash which is enamel based. I tried two test pieces, preshading in NATO black followed by clouding with grey, overcoating with Klear and then applying the wash. so far so good, until I tried to remove the excess MIG wash with Revell enamel thinners. It took the base layers off too. Dammit. Tried cellulose thinners too, even worse. Here are the two test pieces (I've scribed some rough panel lines on them):
This was on old Revell Corsair part from about 1975. Plastic colour was grey. Left to dry for an hour or so after Klear was applied: you can see near the wing root where the acrylic has rubbed off. The grey is too dark anyway. the wash itself has worked fairly well:
Next test, an old Airfix spaceship part, same technique, only left the Klear to dry for 24 hrs. Same story - the enamel thinners takes the base layer of acrylic with it:
This is not going well!
OK, try again. Next post is the current test piece:
This was on old Revell Corsair part from about 1975. Plastic colour was grey. Left to dry for an hour or so after Klear was applied: you can see near the wing root where the acrylic has rubbed off. The grey is too dark anyway. the wash itself has worked fairly well:
Next test, an old Airfix spaceship part, same technique, only left the Klear to dry for 24 hrs. Same story - the enamel thinners takes the base layer of acrylic with it:
This is not going well!
OK, try again. Next post is the current test piece:
Edited by dr_gn on Saturday 19th September 15:34
On to today. Decided to try the pre-tinting and pre-shading on one test piece, which will be followed by MIG wash, oil wash and watercolour wash (on three strips of the test piece to give me fighting chance of getting one right!). I also bought some of the LMS 'own blend' enamel thinners to try with the MIG wash. Smells suspiciously like Turps, but they wouldn't tell me what was in it! Only 75p though.
First off, scribe some randon panel lines on the flat plastic plate Here it is with my trusty DeVilbiss Super '63:
Next, pre-tint random panels with dark and light shades of the final colour. I tried very dark and very light mixes along with more subtle shades just as an experiment:
Then, spray the panel lines roughly with NATO Black:
Overspray with final grey colour, gradually building up the colour. It's very easy to go to far with this and obliterate the shading. Having said that, as it dries, the base layers come through again. Make no mistake: it's a lot harder than it looks:
This is it after overcoating with Klear to give a more glossy surface to apply the wash to; this prevents the wash from soaking into the rough texture of a matt finish, and helps with capillary action along the panel lines (in theory at least). It looks OK up to now - very subtle differences in shade, and the edgesof the panels are definitely darker:
As it has dried further, the contrast is getting greater, and the panel tints change slightly as you look at it from different angles.
Comments so far: Acrylics are nice to work with, they are easy to clean, but do appear to give a more dusty finish and build up a residue quickly on the airbrush needle. I'm using Isopropyl alcohol as thinners (recommended by a friend who is a master model builder).
Tomorrow, I will try the wash technique again. This is not easy...respect to the people who have mastered it!
First off, scribe some randon panel lines on the flat plastic plate Here it is with my trusty DeVilbiss Super '63:
Next, pre-tint random panels with dark and light shades of the final colour. I tried very dark and very light mixes along with more subtle shades just as an experiment:
Then, spray the panel lines roughly with NATO Black:
Overspray with final grey colour, gradually building up the colour. It's very easy to go to far with this and obliterate the shading. Having said that, as it dries, the base layers come through again. Make no mistake: it's a lot harder than it looks:
This is it after overcoating with Klear to give a more glossy surface to apply the wash to; this prevents the wash from soaking into the rough texture of a matt finish, and helps with capillary action along the panel lines (in theory at least). It looks OK up to now - very subtle differences in shade, and the edgesof the panels are definitely darker:
As it has dried further, the contrast is getting greater, and the panel tints change slightly as you look at it from different angles.
Comments so far: Acrylics are nice to work with, they are easy to clean, but do appear to give a more dusty finish and build up a residue quickly on the airbrush needle. I'm using Isopropyl alcohol as thinners (recommended by a friend who is a master model builder).
Tomorrow, I will try the wash technique again. This is not easy...respect to the people who have mastered it!
Edited by dr_gn on Saturday 19th September 15:32
Get your washes from here http://www.promodeller.com/buy-the-wash/ , this stuff is so easy to use. Use after the coat of Klear and just rub off with a paper towel. If it goes wrong, it will all come off with a wetter towel, and then just try again.
Using thinners is always going to run the risk of taking of more layers of paint than you want.
Using thinners is always going to run the risk of taking of more layers of paint than you want.
The_Jackal said:
Get your washes from here http://www.promodeller.com/buy-the-wash/ , this stuff is so easy to use. Use after the coat of Klear and just rub off with a paper towel. If it goes wrong, it will all come off with a wetter towel, and then just try again.
Using thinners is always going to run the risk of taking of more layers of paint than you want.
I've seen this stuff demonstrated on Youtube. I do like the idea of water soluble washes. What's the difference between this and Watercolours or Designers Gouache? I bought a tube of both today, and planned to try it on my test piece tomorrow. I figured if it worked, I could lighten or darken it to whatever shade I needed.Using thinners is always going to run the risk of taking of more layers of paint than you want.
Well as far as I know the guy has been tweaking the recipe for it for years. It runs very easily down the lines, and as I said is very easy to wipe of again and get varying degrees of darkness.
I'm no expert modeller but I found it easy and simple to use. There is no way I would want to have to mess around with mixing oils and thinners.
Also, the idea of rubbing any kind of thinners over my painted model at such a late stage in its painting, fills me with dread.
I'm no expert modeller but I found it easy and simple to use. There is no way I would want to have to mess around with mixing oils and thinners.
Also, the idea of rubbing any kind of thinners over my painted model at such a late stage in its painting, fills me with dread.
Hmm, might invest in some then FWIW.
Same here in that I don't want to mess it up with thinners at the last stage. Same thinking with the panels: I believe the tinting should really be done after the final colour coat (ie post-shading), but I don't feel confident enough to do it this way. At least pre-tinting (if that's what it's called) gives me a chance - if it doesn't work it just gets covered up anyway.
I'd assumed the pre-shaded panel lines would be the most difficult, but they are relatively easy. good job I tried this stuff on scrap bits first.
Anyone want some MIG Dark Wash...it's going cheap
Same here in that I don't want to mess it up with thinners at the last stage. Same thinking with the panels: I believe the tinting should really be done after the final colour coat (ie post-shading), but I don't feel confident enough to do it this way. At least pre-tinting (if that's what it's called) gives me a chance - if it doesn't work it just gets covered up anyway.
I'd assumed the pre-shaded panel lines would be the most difficult, but they are relatively easy. good job I tried this stuff on scrap bits first.
Anyone want some MIG Dark Wash...it's going cheap
Edited by dr_gn on Sunday 20th September 12:59
OK guys, Promodeller dark and light washes ordered.
I forgot about the wings and cockpit glazing which I'd also done.
There are some tiny portholes in the fuselage, as well as the larger panes. I'd normally use PVA for stuff like this, but these mouldngs have internal flanges which fit into recesses in the fuselage. Thin glue capillaries around these very nicely without smudging:
Wings went together easily enough, although the t/e's seem very thick, and there are a couple of gaps that will need filling:
The tailplanes have small transparencies in the undersides - presumably lights. One of them was OK, the other, strangely for Revell, was very badly formed and will require some work to fit:
I painted the cockpit. There are FIVE shades of grey according to the instructions. I only know of three: dark, light and mid, so for the 'grey/green' and 'blue-grey' I used lightened solid colours:
I then dry brushed everything with, erm, grey, to tone it down a bit, folowed by a MIG wash (if you're going to try washes, try it on everything!). I did two coats, but should have left it at one: too dark. Ah well. Now it has a coat of pre-mixed acrylic satin (another first for me), it looks fine - better than the photo here to be honest:
I also intended to keep a log of approximate time spent, so here goes:
Trimming main parts: 0.25 hours
Assembling wings : 0.25 hours
Assembling inner fuselage / cockpit : 0.5 hours
Painting cockpit : 1.25 hours
Total so far : 2.25 hours.
I forgot about the wings and cockpit glazing which I'd also done.
There are some tiny portholes in the fuselage, as well as the larger panes. I'd normally use PVA for stuff like this, but these mouldngs have internal flanges which fit into recesses in the fuselage. Thin glue capillaries around these very nicely without smudging:
Wings went together easily enough, although the t/e's seem very thick, and there are a couple of gaps that will need filling:
The tailplanes have small transparencies in the undersides - presumably lights. One of them was OK, the other, strangely for Revell, was very badly formed and will require some work to fit:
I painted the cockpit. There are FIVE shades of grey according to the instructions. I only know of three: dark, light and mid, so for the 'grey/green' and 'blue-grey' I used lightened solid colours:
I then dry brushed everything with, erm, grey, to tone it down a bit, folowed by a MIG wash (if you're going to try washes, try it on everything!). I did two coats, but should have left it at one: too dark. Ah well. Now it has a coat of pre-mixed acrylic satin (another first for me), it looks fine - better than the photo here to be honest:
I also intended to keep a log of approximate time spent, so here goes:
Trimming main parts: 0.25 hours
Assembling wings : 0.25 hours
Assembling inner fuselage / cockpit : 0.5 hours
Painting cockpit : 1.25 hours
Total so far : 2.25 hours.
Edited by dr_gn on Sunday 20th September 12:07
So to the painting test.
Tried three types of wash I had available, Sepia Watercolour, MIG and Burnt Umber Gouache:
Here they are applied:
And removed excess after drying:
Well as you can see, that was a complete waste of time. I probably should have used a 'point wash'. Never mind - all good experience. At least the thinners didn't take the base colour off this time.
Then I reverted to a fine technical drawing pencil:
Perfect! If it wasn't for the fact that I need to wash over decals, I'd use pencil (I used it to good effect on my Boeing X-32, but without the pre-shading and tinting). As I said, Promodeller Washes ordered now, so I will use them on the finished model and hope for the best. As you guys say, at least I can wash it off if it goes wrong.
Tried three types of wash I had available, Sepia Watercolour, MIG and Burnt Umber Gouache:
Here they are applied:
And removed excess after drying:
Well as you can see, that was a complete waste of time. I probably should have used a 'point wash'. Never mind - all good experience. At least the thinners didn't take the base colour off this time.
Then I reverted to a fine technical drawing pencil:
Perfect! If it wasn't for the fact that I need to wash over decals, I'd use pencil (I used it to good effect on my Boeing X-32, but without the pre-shading and tinting). As I said, Promodeller Washes ordered now, so I will use them on the finished model and hope for the best. As you guys say, at least I can wash it off if it goes wrong.
Edited by dr_gn on Sunday 20th September 15:18
Back to the fuselage. Here are the main components. I'm modelling the aircraft with wheels retracted beause it is destined to be hung up in my son's room:
This model has a seperate inner fuselage with some interior detail (which won't be seen on my version). All fits together nicely so far:
Clamped together to let cement cure:
Ended up with a nasty seam on the upper fuselage, which needed filling & sanding:
Followed by re-scribing the panel lines which were rubbed away (another experiment for me!):
Guide coat of grey shows more work required in front of the antenna:
Currently filling and re-sanding the rest of the seams. This is by far the most time consuming part so far. I don't usually bother, but...we'll see how it looks in the end.
Other stuff; Kleared the windscreens by dipping:
Then put under cover for drying to stop dust settling on the surface:
Final thing today: spraying the engine internals and inside the casings. I am going to try the light wash on these when I get it, followed by dry brush highlighting:
Hours:
Fuselage assembly: 1 hour
Fuselage filling: 2 hours (so far)
Engine spraying: 0.25 hours
Canopy Klear: 0.25 hours
Sub-Total: 3.5 hours
Total so far: 5.75 hours
This model has a seperate inner fuselage with some interior detail (which won't be seen on my version). All fits together nicely so far:
Clamped together to let cement cure:
Ended up with a nasty seam on the upper fuselage, which needed filling & sanding:
Followed by re-scribing the panel lines which were rubbed away (another experiment for me!):
Guide coat of grey shows more work required in front of the antenna:
Currently filling and re-sanding the rest of the seams. This is by far the most time consuming part so far. I don't usually bother, but...we'll see how it looks in the end.
Other stuff; Kleared the windscreens by dipping:
Then put under cover for drying to stop dust settling on the surface:
Final thing today: spraying the engine internals and inside the casings. I am going to try the light wash on these when I get it, followed by dry brush highlighting:
Hours:
Fuselage assembly: 1 hour
Fuselage filling: 2 hours (so far)
Engine spraying: 0.25 hours
Canopy Klear: 0.25 hours
Sub-Total: 3.5 hours
Total so far: 5.75 hours
Edited by dr_gn on Monday 21st September 12:28
DAVEVO9 said:
Oh great, just what I needed - something I can never hope to match!Seriously though - thanks for the link. I'm still in two minds about these damned panel lines: look at his finished model, and look at the photographs of the real thing. The panel lines on his model are WAY too dark and wide.
Having said that, I'd be happy if mine looked half as good!
Cheers,
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/TnT_Archives...
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/tnt1/101-200...
I would get a few cheap kits of ebay and just practise on them
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/tnt1/101-200...
I would get a few cheap kits of ebay and just practise on them
DAVEVO9 said:
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/TnT_Archives...
http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/tnt1/101-200...
I would get a few cheap kits of ebay and just practise on them
It was a present - can't get cheaper than that! Like I said I wouldn't have chosen it as a subject myself, but there you go.http://www.aircraftresourcecenter.com/tnt1/101-200...
I would get a few cheap kits of ebay and just practise on them
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