Dirty kits...

[keefr22]

What I find amusing is the Hurricane shown in Hurry's sig. Look carefully at the state of it - & it's not even a BoB example! Look at the condition of the dark earth patch above & behind the exhausts, and the dark green patch around the cockpit, especially where the pilot enters & exits & where the groundcrew will be standing to help him strap in. Look at the exhaust stain - almost all the way back to the rear of the wing root - which itself is scuffed & dirty everywhere it meets the fuselage. Notice the 'dirty' patch on the dk. earth just forward of the roundel (or is that fresh paint?) - there's a similar patch below & forward of the L in the serial. Both the dk. earth & dk. green paint on the wings near the fuselage show up distinctly darker in tone than the paint further out on the wing, suggesting they're pretty grubby, & there's what looks like a fair bit of mud spatter behind the tailwheel, & the port main undercarriage door looks stinking! And the back of the prop. is none too clean either....

I don't know whether this is a late pre-war, or 'phoney war'/Battle of France photo., but whatever, that aircraft looks pretty grubby to me....!!

Keef

Edited December 28, 2011 by keefr22

[Dr Evil]

For all those who enjoy weathering, some cracking inspiration on here...

http://forums.airshows.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=39516

[Mike Mcellaney]

North Africa:

Europe:

Pacific:

I rest my case... clean and maintained even in the field. lol

Regards,

Hurry

Well Hurry

Would seam these blow your case being rested out of the window

[Albeback52]

Well, all I can say is that I worked on Phantom FGR 2's at Bruggen in the early 70's and our birds used to get pretty filthy and oily , especially underneath. We did wash them fairly regularly, but they still got pretty grubby.

Some sections, especially the tops of the intakes were re-painted with a fairly rough, matt paint where the original had worn away. The only time they looked REALLY clean was when they were re-painted after a major servicing in Aldergrove.

Still. as everyone says, I guess it's just a matter of personal taste, but I like my models to have that slightly "Lived in" appearance.

I remember talking to an engineering officer at Leuchars & he told me it was a bit of an engineering joke that if a Phantom didn't leak, it was empty!

[Jon Kunac-Tabinor]

while my personal tastes veer towards weathered, I do thing there is a case for being careful with BW period photos. We all know how misleading they can be when trying to derive colour schemes from them, and I think this may also be the case when looking at levels of weathering. Contrast, film speed and grain, post processing work ( never mind modern day sharpening and auto contrast and curve adjustment etc) are going to play havoc with percieved tonal levels, so what might look like a heavily worn airfroame in a pic, might not have been so obvious in reality. Thats not to say its not there, just that the "reality" of a photo may be different from what was actually there in the flesh.

There's also modelling fashion: We've had panel line emphasis, pre-shading, post shading and now modulation - whihc have all gone through popularity phases and then settled back into the palette of finishing techniques, plus theres also "theatre fashion" too: WW2 Winter distempers are pretty much always expected to be shown as grubby and patchy, even though, logically, they would have started out fresh and clean ( even if only for a day!). Western desert schemes are invarably sun-faded, even though this would take some time to happen, and your late war Japanese aircraft MUST show signs of bad paint adhesion to look "proper".

Of course there's truth in all these finishes, but I think we modellers like to set certain styles as the "norm" possibly because they are more fun to do, and look more interesting.

Build it clean, build it dirty, build it in between. Theres no right or wrong way. Just enjoy yourself.

Cheers

Jonners

[edited for my pre-coffee spelling!]

Edited December 29, 2011 by Jon Kunac-Tabinor

[AnonymousDFB1]

Build it clean, build it dirty, build it inbetween. Theres no right or wrong way. Just enjoy yourself.

Well said Jonners

Edited December 29, 2011 by Mish

[lufbramatt]

Sure, there will be back burn off the exhaust... but it won't stretch half way down the side of an aircraft

Edited December 29, 2011 by lufbramatt

[Paul Wagner]

Speaking personally, I like my aircraft clean. I do a little weathering or rust, maybe, around the exhausts and guns, but by and large leave them looking pretty and new. It's an aesthetic choice, I guess, or maybe I'm a little tired of seeing everything weathered to the Nth degree... but I also do mine wheels up and with pilots, so I'm very un-trendy

I think the weathering thing is popular because it's a an extra Thing To Do, and in some cases it's perfectly appropriate. But in a lot of cases I personally think it gets overdone as a way of showing off technical skill. So if you don't want to - don't!

Paul

[Skii]

My aim is to make a model look real and un-toylike without resorting to covering the airframe in dust, grime and exhaust soot. That isn't to say that extensive weathering doesn't have its place in modelling but I do feel it tends to be often an abused technique that can often achieve exactly the opposite result of what the builder intended.

If you don't want your model to look like a toy pay attention to the things that betray its scale - overly thick trailing edges, undercarriage/ bomb bay doors, cannon muzzles, all of the things that make a plastic model look like a plastic model.

Just my 2pence...

[thx6667]

When I build my models.. I use actual photos of the conditions and the manner in which the aircraft were maintained... it adds to the realism and it doesn't look... overdone... in the realm of vintage aircraft... I think less is more...

Excellent, you told us what's wrong with other people's finishing techniques and models, looking forward to seeing some of your own in 2012.

Edited December 31, 2011 by Jonathan Mock