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propforward

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Everything posted by propforward

  1. Wooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow! That is a shiny Lightning! That is GORGEOUS! That's one of the best model Lightnings I have seen in a long while. If I didn't know better I'd claim that was die cast and chrome plated. Superb job! And I have a real soft spot for the bare metal and white fin Lightning schemes. Stunning.
  2. Jolly nice Lightning - you've captured the shape and the essence, and it looks the biz!
  3. That's what it's all about! Great build, I love a Lightning, yours looks great. Some things to be very happy about on that build - NMF can be very difficult indeed, and yours looks very realistic.
  4. That is absolutely OUTSTANDING. I love it. The presentation is superb, the weathering and paintwork is very realistic. Very nicely done - inspirational. Cheers!
  5. I can confirm that smugmug allows hotlinking. I use smugmug - switched there after the photochuckit debacle. I have been very satisfied with smugmug, and all my photos are hotlinked from there. 👍
  6. Top marks on this - really like it. Great job on the paintwork and weathering especially, as well as very crisp paintwork on the canopy. All comes together to make a very realistic model. I'll be experimenting with silver pencils today because of this build - very keen to try that effect.
  7. I think you have a point there - in fact I'm going to try exactly that for black on a night fighter and on bombers. It stands to reason that the same technique would work for dark green and grey. Basically it's just a matter of choosing the background to suit the amount of tone variation you want. It is a very flexible technique - it is still entirely possible to have very string shading around panel lines if that's the desired approach.
  8. Thank you! I really appreciate that comment. I’m liking this approach to tone variation a lot. It’s very controllable. I think I may have slightly overblended the green layer, and lost some shading, but I’m not going for a super faded look either. In any case, I’m happy with how this has turned out. I’ll keep playing around with the technique for sure.
  9. Started priming today - but was in for a day of disappointment. Some of the seams still aren't properly closed up. Canopy joint and the spine immediately behind need attention. Biggest issue is the wing root. Got to do better than that - that will stick out like a sore thumb. More filling and sanding needed - but I couldn't face it today, so that will have to wait. Oh well. Two steps forward, one back.
  10. Had a long overdue tidy up of the workbench today. It was getting all cluttered, with too much risk of sharp and abrasive things finding my fresh paintwork. Then got on with painting and masking some of the smaller parts. GAH! Oh well, that will be repaired easily enough. Started cleaning up the Barracuda cast wheels. Starting to feel like the finish line is in sight, but there's lots to do. Just got to keep on keeping on. Next weekend I plan to touch up a few areas of paint work, and mask and paint the walk way strips, then see about some paint chipping.
  11. Thank you! I have had fun today. These paints dry masking tape ready in no time as well, which is fantastic. I am lucky - I have a couple of those little cheapy paint booths, vented through the wall of my shed so that I don't stink the place up. The fact that these particular paints are lacquers and therefore stink is the only downside - but that also means they adhere to the plastic really well. I masked up for the green Then I applied some more black for shading purposes And started marbling the dark green on. This is usually when I start having doubts and wondering whether I've taken the right approach. But I kept on at it. Blending in the green I gave it all a few minutes to dry, then it was on to the great unwrapping event of the day, and finding out how well I masked it. For the most part I'm pretty happy with it. There are a couple of areas to touch up where there were minute gaps in the masking, but overall not too shabby. In future I'll do the sky tail band after it all though. I thought I was being clever doing that first, but it's best left until last.
  12. Progress! Got some masking done, touched up the undercoat, and then got busy with some MRP Ocean Grey. Oh how I LOVE MRP! So easy to control. Doesn't clog the airbrush - sprays fine or broad. I call it MiRacle Paint. Marbling layer first: And then some blending: Off out for a hot lunch, then I'll mask up for the green. I'm going to use some masks I've used these before, and they're quite good, although I'm not really sure they are worth the expense. I already had these, so I'll use them, but most likely in future I'll just stick to blu / white tack worms for demarcation.
  13. Not too much progress - but did a little more sanding and scribing this morning, and added the windshield vent, which is simply a teeny piece of flat plastic. Probably a little large - but the intent is there anyway. A reference pic
  14. Thanks Jonny - good find. Must be this place: https://www.hmhobbies.co.uk/4-adjustable-display-work-base-stand-flightpose.html The stands are a bit pricey, but their adjustability is great, makes them a very nice work holder. Haven't done much on the Lightning over the past week - I never seem to have the time and energy weeknights, although I need to make more effort. However, I'm off down the shed shortly. I confirmed that the production T4's did indeed have a windshield rain clearing vent on the port side, so I'll add that, and also hope to do a first coat of primer today, to at least check seams and joints. I'll be focussing mainly on my Typhoon though, which is now ready for upper surface masking and painting. Should be agood weekend of modelling, I may also pull the lid off my Tamiya 1/32 Spitfire and gaze longingly at it. I think that's up next, but I'll need to finish this T4 and the Typhoon before I allow myself to start. But I've been acquiring resin, brass and decals for it.
  15. Looks absolutely brilliant to me. Top job!
  16. Thanks Jonny. The sword kit makes into a decent model for sure, but being a smaller run model by a smaller company, doesn't have the finess of a Tamiya (for example), so be prepared to work at it. But the overall shape is all there, I'm still hoping for a decent result. The stand is called a Flightpose. Originally designed for displaying Sci Fi models, but have a multitude of uses - they do make great in progress stands. https://flightpose.com/ Don't know if they are available in the UK - but I'm sure you could mail order them from the website.
  17. Air compressor all repaired, with a new pressure cut off switch - so back to it! Finished sanding and rescribing the joint in front of the cockpit, and polished up some other imperfections Then masked up a bit to prevent over spray And then re primed the upper surfaces. My scribing technique needs work, but I'm happy with the joint blending. I used this as primer It is without a doubt the nicest paint I have ever worked with. It is super fine and easy to control. I'll be making more use of this going forward. I love the MRP range, and highly recommend them.
  18. Well, so much for the world cup. South Africa played a brilliant game, and hats off to them. That's the game for you! Graaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadually getting the canopy blended in to the fuselage. A touch more clean up, and I'll move on to painting. Got to look and see if T4's had a windshield vent on the outside. The T5's did on the port side front window. I'll just have to sit down and browse lots of Lightning pictures.
  19. Thanks Fellas! I was genuinely disappointed that Wales didn't take their semi final - England vs Wales would have been a belter of a final. As it is, I predict a very physical game - hoping the ingenuity shown against the All Blacks sets England well for the Boks. Looking forward to that. As for Slaters MekPak - seems like they are still going strong! https://slatersplastikard.com/plastikard/mekpak.php My bottle is about 25 years old, and now I just use it as a decanter for the MEK from the hardware store (can't get Slaters over here) - but the hardware store stuff seems to do the job of gluing models just fine. Good for making sprue goo too!
  20. Stunning - lovely work on that cockpit. Looking forward to seeing this progress.
  21. Well, with England in the world cup final, that has spurred me back in to action. Er, sort of. Next week could be big............ Anyway. Canopy got fitted. Then it got pulled off because glue ran and spoiled a corner of one window. That got polished out, and the canopy is back on - more closely fitted this time. And............a bit more filling and sanding. I've had a devil of a time with this model, but I'm getting it there. I have seen others make these Sword Lightnings, and not seem to have the problems I have had, so I have to believe some of my assembly must have been off. I'll take a slightly different tack next time. But for now, more finish filling and sanding.
  22. Hello again. I'm back. I got back to the modelling bench today, and was all set to mask up ready for top side painting, but when I lifted my Typhoon up, paint had stuch to the silicone tips of my holder, and so I have some repair work to do. I've sanded the offending spots back, and then discovered that a seam on the nose had opened. So I sanded that back as well, and I'm refilling. I was mkaing ready to spray some primer on and get back to paint readiness, only for the pressure switch on my compressor to go for a burton. No pressure switch means no pressure, which means no painting today. Oh well, maybe next week. Good to be back at the bench even for a little bit.
  23. It's been a long time since I was at the bench - summer, stuff to do and what not, so this never made it in to the group build. Oh well. Never mind though, back at it. My scale modelling life at the moment is just a world of filling and sanding. Seems like there is a filler for every occasion. ON the plus side, sprue goo is working well to get the fuselage joint evened out and hidden, and after a bit of re scribing I'll be ready to add wings, tail and nose cone, and move closer to painting.
  24. No, not me. I bought both of mine from model shows in the UK a long time back, so I never had any letters from Frank Brown with mine. I think I bought both of mine in 1996. Shame in a way - I always keep an eye out for the Echelon Lightning I sold. Be that as it may - top job on yours! Really super, looks excellent.
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