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***Finished*** My Interpretation Of "Lou IV" (44-13410) as of 26th July, 1944


mark.au

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Some great photos Mark personally and I am not an expert in anything could the wing have faded inboard of the darker patch at the end or a had an extra coating at the end ??? Either way would make an interesting tonal variation/detail on a model.

What ever you do it will be a cracker.

Chris

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5 hours ago, CheshireGap said:

Mark, be wary of that dark triangle just aft of the "LOU IV" (3 in your picture) being a painted colour - on Mustangs the panel surrounding and to the rear of the exhausts is in a darker metal, that triangle is likely to be just the only corner of that panel that is unpainted


Yes!  Of course you are correct, I completely forgot about the steel surround to the exhausts.  I think my original assumption that the area around the gun barrels was left unpainted may be closer to the mark then.

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1 hour ago, bigbadbadge said:

Some great photos Mark personally and I am not an expert in anything could the wing have faded inboard of the darker patch at the end or a had an extra coating at the end ??? Either way would make an interesting tonal variation/detail on a model.

What ever you do it will be a cracker.

Chris


I think probably so for the wing tip.  I can’t think of anything else it could be.

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17 minutes ago, mark.au said:


Yes!  Of course you are correct, I completely forgot about the steel surround to the exhausts.  I think my original assumption that the area around the gun barrels was left unpainted may be closer to the mark then.


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And... I ve already changed my mind back to light blue.  The “light blue” triangle of colour extends lower than the steel panel, which ends at the panel line visible through the name.  If it were simply the unpainted steel panel the “light blue” colour would end at that panel line because below it is aluminium.

 

it also interesting how in black and white the yellow line around “Lou IV” and the “light blue” triangle are the same shade but in colour are clearly different colours.  

Edited by mark.au
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16 hours ago, mark.au said:


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And... I ve already changed my mind back to light blue.  The “light blue” triangle of colour extends lower than the steel panel, which ends at the panel line visible through the name.  If it were simply the unpainted steel panel the “light blue” colour would end at that panel line because below it is aluminium.

 

it also interesting how in black and white the yellow line around “Lou IV” and the “light blue” triangle are the same shade but in colour are clearly different colours.  

I am going to stick to my interpretation when I do my Revell 1/32 in this scheme! In the BW& it sure looks like the dark area extends below the panel line but the colour photo reveals it is really just the yellow, which the relative colour sensitivity of the B&W film is rendering tonally as dark as the unpainted panel. There does appear to be a bit of touching up/smudging at the point of intersection which adds to the illusion. Plus I cannot think of any earthly reason why it it would have been painted a light blue!

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11 hours ago, CheshireGap said:

Plus I cannot think of any earthly reason why it it would have been painted a light blue!


The more I look at this the more I ponder this point.  In many of the discussions this comes up time again; why would they have done that?

 

I’m coming around to the view that it’s the same reason I put go-faster stripes on my Yamaha RD250LC when I was their age. These were young men who had at their disposal state-of-the-art, unbelievably cool aeroplanes which they painted up in bright colours and personalised artwork.  It’s no stretch to imagine that some or even most of the colours and designs were simply because they thought it looked cool.  Young men are young men whatever century or decade they happen to inhabit, and there is no reason to think they wouldn’t mark up their machines the same way I did my motorcycle, and as many of us might have done when their age.

 

They obviously had the time to do this, because of all the other art work on the aircraft.  They clearly didn’t care too much about the anti-camo effect; the front of their aircraft were variously painted bright yellow, bright red, bright green, etc. as well as the other bright markings they carried elsewhere.  All of the foregoing speaks to only one motive for most of this being what I’ll call the “go-faster” effect.

 

Of course, the work they were actually involved in was terribly dangerous and very serious.  But it’s my [limited, admittedly] experience that the greater the seriousness and more arbitrary the consequences, the more young men will make light.  The morale boosting benefit of the artwork is well documented, it’s no stretch to imagine that extended - within reason of course - to things like painting the gun covers a different shade of blue (though my experiments in that aren’t panning out, but more on that in a different post).


I’ve come to the conclusion therefore that in many cases the reason for some of the anomalies we see, particularly on US aircraft due to their command’s generally more relaxed attitude to individualisation on the aircraft, is that it looked cool to the young men flying and servicing these machines.

 

.

 

Edited by mark.au
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6 hours ago, mark.au said:

These were young men who had at their disposal state-of-the-art, unbelievably cool aeroplanes which they painted up in bright colours and personalised artwork.  It’s no stretch to imagine that some or even most of the colours and designs were simply because they thought it looked cool.  Young men are young men whatever century or decade they happen to inhabit, and there is no reason to think they wouldn’t mark up their machines the same way I did my motorcycle, and as many of us might have done when their age.

 

I used to have an aluminium-frame mountain bike that was left unpainted since shiney North American Aviation-esque natural aluminium is awesome.  I made a bomb-shaped stencil and painted an olive drab "bomb" on the top tube every time I bashed into something hard enough to draw blood (my own, mostly).  It did look cool.  Also a record of bold deeds, no matter their trivial nature.  Standing on the shoulders of many giants with regard to my aesthetic, but art imitates life imitating art and so on.

 

War is serious and awful business, fortunately for the modeller the young men tasked with delivering it often have access to alcohol, masking tape, and paint-spraying apparatus.

 

 

 

 

 

Looking over at my 1/72 Lou IV, I note that I painted that gun panel yellow, for no good reason other than the profile that came with the decals depicted it that way.  I'm sorry, Troy-- I trusted a profile!  😖

 

Very interested to see where you go with the gun panel colouration, Mark.

 

 

 

 

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A productive couple of days and I have arrived at this (sorry for the poor quality of the images, I'll take better ones later)...  

 

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Starting from top right and going clockwise you can see the evolution of the blue.  After each coat I took a picture, desaturated it and compared to the B/W images of Lou IV.  While I know this isn't an exact science and actually only measures a comparative tone, not even the right colour, I want to at least get the relative balance of the colours correct.  Not shown here was a similar evolution of the gun coaming colour; I started with light blue and that was far too light.  I tried natural metal but that also didn't work in B/W as its tone and reflectivity was far too bright.  The only thing that worked was a lighter shade of the main blue so that's where I left it.

 

So here's the result...

 

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While the quality of the pics is pretty crappy I think you get the gist...  If the blue if correct, and it does seem to match the tone and hue of the blue [that I see] in the photo, then the relative shade in the B/W image matches the pic of Lou IV pretty well.  You may also notice that I haven't done any pre or post shading on the wings; this was a relatively new aeroplane when the July 26th pics were taken and the paint was even newer.  While most modellers tend to weather Lou IV quite significant'y I believe it would have looked quite pristine and the photos tend to bear that out.  I will add some weathering later, the usual operational stains etc., which will give it some depth and texture but I think the paint itself would have looked quite new in July 1944.  Since these pics were taken I've applied a clear coat and will apply some decals tomorrow.

 

But that's not all...  I've also made a start on the fuselage by applying most of the Bare Metal Foil required.

 

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It's going to be a bit tricky masking on the BMF but I think I have a solution for that in almost every location I'll need masking.  I've been careful to cut the foil right in the panel line and have burnished them down well so that there won't be any perceptible difference in surface level between the plastic and foil once the paint is applied.

 

Cheers;

Mark.

Edited by mark.au
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1 hour ago, Jackson Duvalier said:

 

I used to have an aluminium-frame mountain bike that was left unpainted since shiney North American Aviation-esque natural aluminium is awesome.  I made a bomb-shaped stencil and painted an olive drab "bomb" on the top tube every time I bashed into something hard enough to draw blood (my own, mostly).  It did look cool.  Also a record of bold deeds, no matter their trivial nature.  Standing on the shoulders of many giants with regard to my aesthetic, but art imitates life imitating art and so on.

 

War is serious and awful business, fortunately for the modeller the young men tasked with delivering it often have access to alcohol, masking tape, and paint-spraying apparatus.

 

Looking over at my 1/72 Lou IV, I note that I painted that gun panel yellow, for no good reason other than the profile that came with the decals depicted it that way.  I'm sorry, Troy-- I trusted a profile!  😖

 

Very interested to see where you go with the gun panel colouration, Mark.

 

 

 

 

 

I bet that bike looked awesome!

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Hi Mark

What a great point you made about the paint, young men do like to paint their cars, bikes etc to make them stand out, I did it to some of my cars in the day and think you could be onto something there. 

Great paint investigation and experiments and I do love  a bit of foil action too great work fella am loving this build.

Chris

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On 12/5/2020 at 8:06 PM, bigbadbadge said:

Hi Mark

What a great point you made about the paint, young men do like to paint their cars, bikes etc to make them stand out, I did it to some of my cars in the day and think you could be onto something there. 

Great paint investigation and experiments and I do love  a bit of foil action too great work fella am loving this build.

Chris

 

Thanks Chris.

 

State of play; I'm ready to paint the fuselage after completing the BMF.  In looking at these pics I still have a little texturing to do on the port side; I like to rough up the finish a little with very fine emery cloth but the swirling we can see here is a little too much.  Easy to fix.  Everywhere you see plastic will be covered with paint, as well was some of the BMF as well.

 

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The wings are also decalled, though there wasn't much to it as I surmised that most of the stencilling would have been painted over.  There's one or two still to apply to the underside, that's about it.  As mentioned earlier, I'll weather the wings a little with the rest of the airframe.

 

I've been very much looking forward to getting to this stage, wish me luck!

Edited by mark.au
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23 hours ago, bigbadbadge said:

Looks great Mark,  did you use the normal Bare metal foil with the proper glue or an alternative,  such as the self adhesive tape?

Chris

 

Thanks Chris.  I used the self adhesive Bare Metal Foil product.  I've never been good enough with a brush to use foil that required brush-on glue.  The self adhesive product is very good and it holds quite well, but it is a little more fragile and masking over it requires care when removing the mask.

 

Speaking of which, some more progress...

 

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Again, some cheap and cheerful photos but you get the idea.  I painted the D-Day stripes first and then added the blue and green using blutack as the masking medium.  This was extremely tricky, more so than I anticipated and I had to be very careful with the masking, the foil, the overspray and the paint finish.  Until it is properly dry and I can seal it with a covering coat it has to be treated with kid gloves to avoid damaging the finish.  That being said, I'm pretty happy with how it's turned out so far; I wouldn't say it's an exact copy of the real thing but I think I got quite close.  I went for a hard edge because the photos show that the green and the blue were painted with a brush everywhere except on the rudder - there's no overspray evident at all on the fuselage. The canopy, by the way is one of the spares I'm using simply to mask the cockpit.

 

Tomorrow I'll continue working forward with the black at the wing roots and front of windshield, and then the yellow nose.  

 

Cheers;

Mark.

 

.

Edited by mark.au
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1 hour ago, mark.au said:

Thanks Chris.  I used the self adhesive Bare Metal Foil product.  I've never been good enough with a brush to use foil that required brush-on glue.  The self adhesive product is very good and it holds quite well, but it is a little more fragile and masking over it requires care when removing the mask.

Thanks Mark for the information on the BMF.  I have some but have never been brave enough to glue it on I will have to look at the self adhesive stuff, masking won't be a problem for me as I brush paint anyway.   Thanks again fella and that looks great, with the paint and foil  combination. Cracking build fella.

Chris 

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Well Mark, when I commented earlier in the thread. You suggested we might be on the same page. Indeed it seems we are. It was clear to me that the upper invasion stripes were overpainted with a different colour to the original green. But what colour? A strong blue was wrong but not quite  green 

 

I have to say I think you've pretty much nailed it. 

Very impressive. I can't wait to see the finished article. Yours might be the definitive Lou IV. 

As it happens I'm working on another well known well documented but frequently miss represented scheme. Only this time it should be blue. If I can ever finish it. 

 

 

 

 

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8 hours ago, noelh said:

I have to say I think you've pretty much nailed it. 

Very impressive. I can't wait to see the finished article. Yours might be the definitive Lou IV. 

As it happens I'm working on another well known well documented but frequently miss represented scheme. Only this time it should be blue. If I can ever finish it. 

 

Kind words indeed, thank you.  I am intrigued as to what your project is...??  I'm guessing something to do with Malta, based on the blue comment.

 

@Biggles87 and @bigbadbadge, once again, thank you for your kind words.

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...and the main paint work is complete.  Here's how it unfolded; after the D-Day stripes were on, I worked my way backwards from the tail, sealing with a light coat of Future to enable further handling and masking.  The trickiest parts were where I had to mask on the foil.  In a couple of places it lifted a little but I was able to burnish it back down again.  I used Vallejo Duraluminium for the rudder which looks a little dark in these pics but looks ok in natural light.  I turned out that I had correctly assessed where to put foil and where it wasn't needed almost everywhere.  The exceptions were on the port wing root ahead of the D-Day stripes where I needed to paint the aluminium, and the horizontal panel below the exhausts - on the port side it's almost entirely painted and on the starboard half of it is.

 

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On the port side I had to measure and mask specifically for the nose art which is painted on a very light blue lozenge shape with a darker triangle on its top right corner.  After careful measurement and equally careful masking I applied those and I'm quite confident it'll accomodate the decal as planned.

 

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So here it is, painted and gloss coated.  Tomorrow I may apply some decals...

 

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I've also been working on the peripherals such as the stabilisers and flaps, etc.  It's not long until the major assembly begins.

 

Thanks for following along.  Cheers;

Mark.

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