Housesparrow's Millennium Falcon, Fine Molds, 1:144, w. some photo etch

[Housesparrow]

Note: The Ready for Inspection thread can be found here.

I think this one should be fairly quick to complete. The finish should end up looking great, now that I can use an airbrush.

The fine molds kit comes with paint masks, something I have never used before. It didn't work well when I made my Tie fighter model, painting it with a brush over the masks, but now, I have an airbrush and I suspect that the result will be perfect. I think I only have to make sure there is enough adhesive on the masks, so that paint isn't blown in underneath the masks.

Fyi, the paint masks is simply a single sticker sheet called "masking sticker". These are not individual and pre-cut masks, so I have to cut out each mask by the looks of it.

So this kit is a box I had lying around for years. I even bought some photo etch for it, nothing much, a little PE and some resin parts in one pack. The PE was a bit hard to come by as I recall, and some other PE was iirc sold out.

I don't think the PE is entirely accurate. Presumably it is somewhat abstracted, otherwise the detailing might have been too small for production I am guessing.

The main color to be used, is the USAF Light Gray, being a warm gray, as opposed to cold or neutral gray.

I had to excavate six holes for the resin parts, simple enough. The six PE parts fits nicely btw.

I had already begun working on this kit, when I re-opened the box the other day.

The insides of the two main hull pieces are painted black, as I thought it might perhaps prevent translucency to some degree (unsure if effective with only black enamel paint). Ideally, one would have to use both black and maybe silver paint on top of that to block any light passing through the plastic.

Edited March 20, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Thom216]

Well, ain't that just a cute lil' Falcon!!

The use of those resin and PE look pretty good. Will do something similar with my MPC and the Bandai 1/144 - some day...

For its size, the detail looks great on that and will probably really pop under paint.

Can't wait to see more!

[Housesparrow]

I think this looks like an amazing model just by looking at the kit parts.

Will have to try improve on my use of the Tamiya Panel Line Accent Color. I have bottles of brown, black and gray, I think I should mix black and gray and find some mixture that gives a nice color to the panel lines and the crevices. Hm, maybe even two layers of that stuff would be an idea as well. I want to avoid having solid black panel lines, because it will probably make the model look cartoony or toy'ish I think.

I am not sure how to go about painting the parts, fearing I couldn't get to all the crevices after assembly, so I went ahead and airbrushed some parts.

There is a particular area in the front that has to be painted before assembling the model. A coat of Humbrol Clear and a wash and will also have to be applied before assembly.

I don't see how I can apply my Tamiya enamel wash, without applying at least one layer of Humbrol Clear, but I will try to keep the amount of layers to a minimum and I might as well be ready with some paper tips, to try soak up any excessive amounts of Humbrol Clear that probably will pool in pits and corners on the model.

I can tell that my own photo here is a little dark, because my white sheet of paper is not that white and bright here. I color correct all my photos in a post-processing application, but I usually use only one stored setting so here the end result wasn't the best.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

I poured some Tamiya gray panel line accent color into an empty Tamiya paint bottle and mixed it with enough black to make it dark gray. Just like with the Tamiya panel line accent color bottles, the stuff settles on the bottom, so one has to dig into the solution to try apply some darker shade to the model.

The panel line accent color seem to maybe be a little light in the image below, I guess I can try make it darker some later again.

[Housesparrow]

Even though the 'Tamiya Panel Line Accent Color' seem best for precisely panel lines, it does ok for dirtying up a model, but perhaps only if refined with a brush damp with white spirit on a second run (a cleanup).

I think I have found out that by having a first layer of this stuff applied, I can, in addition to cleaning it up from panel surfaces that ought to be clean, also try remoist and liquify the now dried panel line accent color, and let the new liquid create a lighter darkening effect. Seems too easy to end up having this stuff creating super dark stains, something I don't think looks all that great on a model.

Looking at things, I realize that I made a mistake, and I have rectified that by removed some of the parts that I had previously glued on. Those parts were already painted, and dirtied up, making it less easy to airbrush the ship later. So I will simply airbrush the two big ship halves, put on Humbrol Clear, and then dirty it up with accent panel color, and then glue all the parts together. This approach is also what is described in the assembly instructions.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Thom216]

Those details do pop out!

[Housesparrow]

I think I should try add some extra color to these pieces. The way they are now, they are simply colored light gray.

Will have to look at photos of the real models and see if anything is colored metallic or maybe red/blue/green/black, or maybe having some other smoke texture to it.

Btw, I think I'll glue on the canopy part to the main top piece, so that I can airbrush that whole thing. Hopefully, that entire canopy part will fit nicely when jammed shut down onto the other major bottom piece of this model.

Ehehe, like with the Turbo Porter airplane, I've also modeled the Millennium Falcon in 3D. Long time ago though, probably don't have the project files anymore. Lost a couple of harddrive over time, and some project files probably died with them unfortunately. I only have two or three images from it I think.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

For your amusement, and shameless self promotion (not many ppl get to see this) here's an image of the 3D model I made, a loooong time ago. It is a combination of nurbs surfaces and polygon meshes.

Edited February 9, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

I haven't been swearing this much since a long time ago. I panicked a little when the pieces didn't end up with the correct angle right away, and I was fiddling too much to correct it. The awkward part here was ofc using the cyanoacrylate. Wouldn't want to imagine how I could even try pry these PE parts off again after the glue had dried. I think in retrospect, I should have tried being more careful and used the tweezer properly, to try slowly place down the PE, instead of rushing it.

The end result of applying these PE parts turned out to be better than I had anticipated.

Btw, what most people perhaps don't know, is that the design/scratchbuild for the original Millenium Falcon involved using various parts from existing plastic model kits (cars, tanks ect).

Edited February 9, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Despy]

I'd like to warn you that Bandai plastic does not like Tamiya panel line accent color. I used the same thing in mt AT-ST build and the plastic cracked in more than one location.

[Housesparrow]

Oh. Hm, I think I should be ok. I will use two layers of Humbrol clear, so that should guard the plastic I think.

Thank you for mentioning this! I will try to be careful.

[jaitea]

I'd like to warn you that Bandai plastic does not like Tamiya panel line accent color. I used the same thing in mt AT-ST build and the plastic cracked in more than one location.

....but this model isn't Bandai,....it's FineMolds

J

[FG2Si]

Nice progress on your build. I just finished the same kit with the same MMI detail set at the end of last year.

The Fine Molds plastic isn't affected by the panel washes like the Bandai is so you should be fine as Jaitea mentioned. I used Mig wash on my build.

Carl

[Despy]

....but this model isn't Bandai,....it's FineMolds

J

Oops sorry, my mistake.

[Zarichta]

Fantastic job.

The paint work is subtle and nice.

Best.

[Housesparrow]

Things are going a little slow I'm afraid. Some things that had me go "hmm". Did not expect the primer and black paint to come that easily off the PE parts I painted, managed to damage them twice now. Makes me doubt a little if it is a good idea to even mask the paint, fearing the paint might get ripped off at some point. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever masked painted PE parts before.

Now, I saw something marvelous on youtube recently. Someone was airbrushing with Vallejo's new metallic colors and I saw something unexpected. The man had a mirror like black surface to start with, and so he filled his airbrush with thinner, and then added drops of metallic color, something I wouldn't expect to work, so I'll try that out with the stand. Instead of relying on a smooth finish with the black surface primer for metallic paints, I'll add Humrol Clear and hopefully it will look equally nice in the end. I have the metallic Vallejo "gunmetal" color that I can use, didn't want to use the "chrome" for the stand.

Next up, priming the two main parts with funky green, and then USAF light gray, then try add Humbrol Clear carefully so that I can add a wash to it all.

BTW, there is this Vallejo black surface primer for the metallic paints, but I have no idea how to get it mirror like and smooth, if anyone know how, please let me know.

Have been delaying the canopy masking/painting work, heh.

Edited February 13, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

I have now put five layers of Humbrol Clear on that thing seen in my last post, though in retrospect, I should have been more careful, I let the thing dry with the largest surfaces being vertical, somehow I doubt that is the best given how the stuff should probably level out horizontally and not vertically.

I finally added the masks to the canopy, have to mask the turret clear parts as well. Did not look forward to masking the canopy, but having started, it was fairly trivial.

The way I apply the mask, is to use Tamiya masking tape, that I cut clean with a sharp blade, making thin strips to place next to the straight shapes all around on the canopy part. Then I simply patch the holes with more masking tape.

Using a tweezer to move the cut masking tape over to the model doesn't seem to work as well as using the tip of the scalpell blade, making sure the cut masking tape isn't fully stuck to the blade.

At the very start of this masking job, I opened a pack of some non-Tamiya brand masking tape, but the adhesive seemed too weak for my taste, so I didn't use it.

Btw, it looks to me that there is a minor molding flaw on this big clear part, on each side, bottom front related to the shapes, luckily nothing major.

This time around, I will avoid airbrushing Humbrol Clear onto the masked canopy, because it seems to become a little messy after a few layers of this glossy clear coat and I want to avoid that.

Edited February 14, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

I airbrushed the funky green primer on the two largest pieces, leaving the turrets for later, as I haven't masked the two clear parts for the turrets.

I don't know, I have difficulty covering the surface properly. It seems as if maybe the flow on my airbrush weakens after some seconds, but I can't explain why. The ratio of paint to thinner was 50/50. I think I used too much thinner. Even though I can see I have paint flow in my spray, the model doesn't seem to darken as I expected. I mixed the paint in the airbrush cup, maybe I didn't mix it well enough? *shrugs*

[Housesparrow]

I think I did a better job at covering the model with paint this time, though I have to go over it a second time, some areas are still a little darker than they should.

Because of how I filled up my paint cup, I used the lid, but unfortunately I didn't notice the cup going dry at the end, so some goo got on the model, nothing bad, but it could have been avoided.

Does airbrushing look like fun or what?

Edited February 14, 2016 by Housesparrow

[jaitea]

Looking Epic

J

[Air-to-Air]

One problem I had with my airbrush was water in the line. Now I know most compressors come with a water trap on the compressor but I discovered my Iwata blowing water even though it had a water trap on the compressor. Easiest way to test your airbrush for this problem is to just use it as an air hose on some unpainted plastic. If you see little water droplets forming around the point at which you are spraying, you have got water in the line. Water in the line does not go well with either acrylics or enamels!

The solution is to get an "in-line" water trap that fits on to the line, just before the airbrush itself. This fixes the problem and makes your airbrushing much less frustrating and more consistently good. Give it a try if you haven't already got one.

[Thom216]

When my water trap went bad it spat on my 1/48 Corsair. Had to redo it. Make sure you always have spare water trap handy!

Edited February 16, 2016 by Thom216

[Housesparrow]

I had some difficulty with painting the PE parts. There is supposedly to be a gray colored ring around the vents, something not represented with the PE, and so I had to paint the big xis pieces of PE there, both black and gray.

Because of how some of the paint got ripped off by the masking tape (I tried to lessen the adhesiveness before applying them), I had to to some touch up work with gray and black.

There are two layers of Humbrol Clear on the model atm. It is difficult not becoming impatient, apparently there is no way around it, and four layers is required to make the surface smooth.

Next up: applying dark gray panel line accent color to the two big parts.

Edited February 16, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

Adding the dark gray panel line color was great fun!

Hm, I wonder if perhaps my post processing color correction have turned the color of my model a little green here.

Edited February 16, 2016 by Housesparrow

[Housesparrow]

At some point I realized that I should perhaps have added the decals first, before applying the panel line color. I will simply clean the areas where the decals go, and reapply the panel line color if necessary.

I airbrushed on just two layers of Humbrol Clear, before adding the Tamiya panel line accent color, but two layers seems to be enough, giving the surface a somewhat smooth surface finish.

Edited February 17, 2016 by Housesparrow