trickyrich Posted December 26, 2015 Share Posted December 26, 2015 They are nice paints to use, the same goes for Tamiya, though they are much easier to use I find. Lifecolor are awesome when you remember to thin them with water and not alcohol!!! That colour is not the easiest to see in the photos. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirageiv Posted December 27, 2015 Share Posted December 27, 2015 looking good Giorgio, I look forward to all the colours on. I think I'm going to give Gunze a go after hearing so many compliments about it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted December 27, 2015 Author Share Posted December 27, 2015 (edited) Gunze paints are indeed very good, try them and you'll not be disappointed. I've used often in the past but in the last 3-4 years I've moved more and more to water thinned acrylics like Vallejo and Lifecolor. Local availability has been one reason, the other is that the latter work very well with a hairy stick while Gunzes are not ideal for this. On this model I'll use a combination of both: gunze for the lighter blue, vallejo for the medium blue and the SEA tan, lifecolor for the 2 SEA greens and the grey. I've yet to decide what to use for the darker blue. Speaking of these paints, the way Gunze paint cures is different and while the paint may look dry to touch it's still curing underneath. For this reason I suggest to always leave at least a day before overpainting with any water thinned acrylic, future/Klear included ! These paints dry faster and may react adversely with the underlying Gunze coat if this is not fully set, with the result of cracks in the finish. Enough of the painting advices, I noticed how the colour shows very little in pictures, one reason may be that I took the pictures in artificial light and I've not really arranged the lighting properly. In the same way the following picture does not show the green tinge of the colour.. the F-5 has now received its final coat of 35622 and looks quite unusual in this light toilet blue-green overall scheme... Next step will be adding the camo scheme. The F-5 is a small aircraft and 1/72 models are accordingly very small. I don't know yet how I'll mask the various areas, I'm thinking of giving Vallejo's masking fluid a try. I've never achieved a nice smooth demarcation using Humbrol masking fluid but this Vallejo one looks more promising. I may cut masks from paper but I'm not sure if it would be easy for such small areas. Speaking of the camo scheme, I have a few pictures of my subject so no problem for the sides. The rest of the scheme will come from the official USAF drawing for the "New Blue" scheme that can be found in the Camouflage & Markings book on the USAF Aggressor Squadrons. Edited December 27, 2015 by Giorgio N 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
59North Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 unusual in this light toilet blue-green overall scheme... This light-hearted description of the base camo color made me chuckle. It does look silky smooth, though. Well done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickyrich Posted December 28, 2015 Share Posted December 28, 2015 You can see that colour now, looks good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted December 29, 2015 Author Share Posted December 29, 2015 With Gunze paints it's relatively easy to achieve a smooth finish as they dry to a semi-gloss finish. My technique to achieve an even smoother finish is to first spray a good coat, then finish this with very fine abrasive cloth and finally add another very light thinned coat. Now the model will have to wait for a few days as I've managed to find time to take some vacation and will be away with a few friends. In the meantime however I've made an annoying discovery: the kit supplies some details that are not present on my subject ! The one most annoying is the bulge on the tail that I've highlighted in this picture: now, what should I do ? Remove this detail, that will mean having to prime and respray the tail ? Or leave everything as it is ? Decisions, decisions... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
modelling minion Posted December 29, 2015 Share Posted December 29, 2015 Personally I would remove it Giorgio, unless you can find reference somewhere to the Turks modifying their aircraft at some point to include the (sensor?) lump. It shouldn't take too long to remove and tidy up especially if it is in an area of the tail which is a different colour to the one you have already sprayed. Craig. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickyrich Posted December 29, 2015 Share Posted December 29, 2015 I'd remove it to. Is there a panel there on the Turkish one's? If there is then this will be a very easy task to cover up. If you carefully remove it then it should be really easy to disguise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 8, 2016 Author Share Posted January 8, 2016 (edited) After some well deserved holidays, I've managed to restart working on the little Northrop 2-seater. First of all I followed the forum advice and removed the offending bumps from the tail. I've yet to check what they were for, guess for some other variant included in the box. Removing them was easy enough, sorting the surface after this involved some work and the right dose of strong language... With the tail now in the correct configuration it was time to start thinking of the camo scheme. I thought a lot about different approaches and in the end I decided to resort to the good old hairy stick ! I tried cutting some masks but there were too many small curves for my clumsy fingers. I tried masking fluid but the demarcation always ended hsving too many sharp corners. So it was that I drew the scheme using a pencil and then followed these lines with a small brush. The areas were then filled with the relevant paints. This is the result after a first coat: Well, can't say it looks that good, but should improve with another couple of light coats. Paints used : the areas in blue FS 35109 were painted using Lifecolor's UA126 Israeli Blue. This is matched to the lighter FS 35177 however the paint straight from the pot was very similar to the colour seen in pictures of the real aircraft, pictures that show a very weathered bird. The areas in FS 35189 were painted using a mix of Vallejo Model Colour paints, 900 Mirage Blue and 907 Pale Grey Blue. The Mirage Blue is actually a good match to a new FS 35189, however this was much lighter in pictures and adding the other colour ( a light blue grey) allowed me to achieve a result closer to what I saw in several pictures. One last comment on the camo scheme: I had pictures for both left and right sides, although I'm not too sure the two matched very well... in any case I followed these pictures and used the official "New Blue" drawing coming from the Camouflage & Markings book on the USAF aggressor squadrons. This drawing is actually based on an F-5E but worked well enough for my F-5B Edited January 8, 2016 by Giorgio N 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gingerbob Posted January 8, 2016 Share Posted January 8, 2016 I'm rather frightened of brush-painting the outside - mostly because I'm lazy, and hate the thought of having to do it all several times. However, your first pass is intriguing- I like the notion of being able to "map out" the pattern, and then tweak the colours in context. bob p.s. In a strange way I kind of like the "coloring book" look from the first coat! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickyrich Posted January 8, 2016 Share Posted January 8, 2016 It's nice to see some brush painting instead of the usual airbrushing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nimrod54 Posted January 8, 2016 Share Posted January 8, 2016 Looking good Giorgio and after re-checking the Turkish Stars reference photos I have removed the rogue lumps from my kit too. I'm still not too sure about the two round ones to the top of the tail, I can't tell if this is a through hole or if it is the sky reflecting in a flat lens. I will have to do some further checks before the primer goes on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 11, 2016 Author Share Posted January 11, 2016 The round bumps on top of the tail should be lamps, they actually don't protrude as Esci represented them but are flush with the tail surface. On my next F-5 I'll sand them, drill a hole through and insert bits of clear sprue with the inner side painted silver. On this model I'll not bother and just (incorrectly) paint the bump silver. Small update: at some point during the weekend I wondered what about using the airbrush to fill the marked camo lines ? This did not come out too bad, pictures coming soon.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 14, 2016 Author Share Posted January 14, 2016 And this with the stick up its rear end is how the model look now, waiting for the blue paint to dry... I hope that the masking did its job but I already know that some areas will need repainting in the lightest blue... I'll know better after dinner 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 17, 2016 Author Share Posted January 17, 2016 (edited) Well, could have been better but could have been worse... The various masking fluids left a somewhat jagged edge that I smoothed using a small brush. There's also overspray on the lighter blue, I'll have to either respray these areas or find wais to remove the paint While removing the masking, the starboard slat separated... again ! I think I've glued this on at least 4 times, every time cleaning the area from paint, must be a cursed model.. Of course I also broke the pitot tube Edited January 17, 2016 by Giorgio N 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickyrich Posted January 17, 2016 Share Posted January 17, 2016 for being a difficult paint job to mask in 1/72 it looks really good. You'll always have those sorts of masking issues, they should be fairly straight forward to fix. I find it easier sometimes to re-mask the a small area that needs to cleaned up/fixed and repaint it. It still is a nice job though well done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gingerbob Posted January 18, 2016 Share Posted January 18, 2016 Pretty! bob Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nimrod54 Posted January 18, 2016 Share Posted January 18, 2016 That's a fabulous job on the paint, it looks really nice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted January 25, 2016 Author Share Posted January 25, 2016 Thanks for the nice comments, I have to say that this camo scheme is driving me mad, you have no idea of how many small and bigger errors I had to correct... This took quite a while and today the model looks like this: Most errors should be sorted now and I've started painting the tanks. Undersides were sprayed in Lifecolor's FS 36622, the upper surfaces are brush painted as the demarcation is very wavy and I have no intention of masking anything else ! 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skids Posted January 27, 2016 Share Posted January 27, 2016 I like that alot, there have been some great and unusual schemes in the GB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fritag Posted February 1, 2016 Share Posted February 1, 2016 I like that a lot too Beautiful aeroplane. Handsome camouflage scheme. Impressive brush painting (brush painting!) Great combination Giorgio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 2, 2016 Author Share Posted February 2, 2016 (edited) Thanks a lot for the kind comments, glad you guys like this ! I have to admit though that it's not been painted totally with a brush, some airbrushing was used too. This update comes after several days because for some reasons I had a lot of problems with the fuel tanks and had to strip and repaint them twice ! In the end I used the airbrush, the camo scheme may not be 100% accurate but really I was starting to have enough of painting the tanks. Not that it's finished, as the underwing tanks suffered from paint lifting when the masking tape was removed. Fortunately the tip tanks did not have problems. With the tanks painted it was time to paint the rear fuselage section in silver, using Vallejo model air metallics (very nice paints these ones). I then noticed one thing while looking at pictures of the real aircraft: the underwing pylons are not in the lighter blue but seem to be in grey FS 36622. They also have their leading edges in green FS 34079. Guess that the pylons came from another aircraft in SEA camouflage. The pylons were therefore repainted. Another thing I realised is that there's a small black antiglare panel that I hadn't noticed before. Here's the model almost completely painted with the antiglare panel masked and with a first coat of black paint The left stabilator is missing as it broke during the painting process. I've now drilled a hole in the fuselage and the stabilators and will drive a needle trough to make the assembly more robust. Of course the right slat is still missing, no point in gluing this before having completed the model... It was then time to start applying the decals, finally ! I started as my usual from the bottom wing, this because in case the decals are not good at least the first ones are in an area that is less visible... and I'm glad I did this ! Here's the roundel under the wing: See that dark circle at the roundel edge? This is what happens when the underlying white circle is not the same size of the red parts, typical of decals printed with poor registration. Simply put, the decals are not the best. What to do now ? I may just use the roundels as they are, in the end the rest of the model isn't really great and the decals would look from 4-5 ft. Alternatively I may try to sort the problem by adding a white circle of the right size under the next roundels. It would work but how can I cut a circle of exactly the right size ? Not easy. I may also touch up the roundels with a small brush and red paint but I'm not sure I want to go through this. Another alternative would be making my own roundels cutting red and white circles, something that I know I can do as I tried in the past. I'll probably sleep over this and decide in the morning. Some home printing will also be required as this aircraft has some rescue markings in black. These are not present in the Carpena sheet and the ones in the kit sheet are of different shape Edited February 2, 2016 by Giorgio N 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trickyrich Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 She's looking really good, it's a pity you are having dramas with the decals......seems to be a common issue with a lots of builds at the the moment, here and on other GB's!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirageiv Posted February 3, 2016 Share Posted February 3, 2016 (edited) Looking very good Giorgio, I do like that scheme a lot. What size are the roundels? I have 4 spare roundels and Tail flags from an Syhart F-16 sheet if they would be ok size wize? Edited February 3, 2016 by mirageiv Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Giorgio N Posted February 4, 2016 Author Share Posted February 4, 2016 Have to say that the Carpena decal sheet is continuously losing points... the large black/white numbers on the front fuselage are supplied as separate black and white parts (good) however the balck part does not fit over the white one correctly (not good at all). In the end I had to cut each black character individually and even so the register on some wasn't good. In addition I noticed that the tail number is in a weird light blue. It should be in FS 35189 but clearly isn't. The funny thing is that the instruction sheet mentions how this has been printed as a weathered FS 35189 (ok, the aircraft is quite weathered), approximating FS 36231. Sure, problem is that 36231 looks nothing like the blue used for the decal... guess that the only option is to try and paint over the decal with a very small brush and plenty of patience. These issues are very disappointing, more so as I have both part 1 and part 2 of the F-5 sheets from this company with a lot of very interesting schemes. If the quality of the decals is this bad I'm in deep trouble for my future F-5 builds Looking very good Giorgio, I do like that scheme a lot. What size are the roundels? I have 4 spare roundels and Tail flags from an Syhart F-16 sheet if they would be ok size wize? Thanks a lot for the offer ! After reading your post I realised that I have a Revell F-16C "Solo Turk" in the stash and checked the decals, their roundels seem to be quite right (diameter approx 5.2 mm). Problem is that the Revell sheet only has 2 roundels, if the ones on the Syhart sheet are the same size I could use them... PM inbound ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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