Hi Miloslav:
Another nice build, I like the chipped paint and the camo.



Robert

Robert
Many thanks.
Miloslav

A little progress with my VK-4501.
1. airbrushed black.
2. light hairspray.
3. airbrushed red oxide.
4. heavy hairspray.
Next to airbrush panzer grey and see if the hairspray will allow a toothbrush to simulate wear.



Robert

Miloslav - a very nice KT! congrats

Robert - I hope you scrubbed with the toothbrush right after that pic because I think the paint dries quickly. Keep us posted

Hello Greg:
So that is the trick, I did not know that you were to scrub while the paint was semi dri. I guess I will get some scotchbrite and try again. After the scotchbrite I will post photos to see if it accomplished any degree of wear.

Robert

I feel a little out of place - I don't have any tracks in my project

I've been trudging away on the vernerable Tamiya 88mm This is pretty much out of the box.

Lots to do in the details,highlights, pastels, 'stuff'.... Here's an update

Hi Scott:
Your 88 diorama looks really good, its hard to imagine that the gun was able to fit into the turret of the technology they had then.



Robert

I agree -- these things are huge, when you can hang two guys off it and still take up that much space. It shows the true inginuity of the German engineering.

@ Eddy; Thanks for the complements on the base... Reality in Scale thought so too and if you want one, you can get one now from them! Your VK45.02 really looks good! This red beast should stand out at any competition. There's just one liitle bit I wonder about. Shouldn't the primer be a complete matt? It has a bit of a satin gloss over it on the pictures... Personally I think this tank should be put on a grey concrete factorybase, in order to give it more impact, but that's just me.

@ Greg; Boy, you 1/48-builders allways have me fooled! Looking at the pics, I allways think;"hmm, not bad at all", untill I see that the scale is NOT 1/35, but much smaller. I must admit that I start to like this scale, but there's just not enough halftracks available in that scale yet, so I'll stick to the larger versions...
For the model itself, I think the camouflagescheme doesn't do the model justice. The pattern looks cool, but the application looks a bit sloppy.

@ Miloslav; Wonderfull KT! What colours/brands did you use? Up till now I used Tamiya's redbrown and green, but think these colours are too bright... Your colours have the right "feel" to them.

@ Scott; Don't feel bad about no tracks, Scott. After all, your 88 is the mother of all 88-versions!
Can you show us some close ups? I really would like to see more of how you tackled this little ""modelling antiquity". From "up here" it looks very good so far.
The fallen pinetree in the front is very interesting too. How did you do that?

It's about time I started painting again, so I can get the dio completed.......

Miloslav,

What a super job on that late King Tiger tank. Like how you've weathered your big cat. Great set of photos that show off your work and that supurb camo paint scheme. Impressive!!! I have one of these in the stash and I hope that my skills will have improved enough that when I do put mine together it will at least be looking half as good as yours.

Robert,

That red oxide color looks like the exact shade that I achived before the weathering process that toned it down a bit. Nice job so far. I don't know much about the hairspray technique and after reading through Greg's heads-up on that subject I hope that things have turned out well . . .

Scott,

What a really cool diorama. Sure brings back memories of when I built mine over 30 years ago. Mine never looked that good though . . . more photos!!!

-Eddy

Ron,




The German red oxide primer paint was produced in varying shades and finishes. This was due in part because of the many suppliers involved and formulas used during that period of time. A huge discussion over the use of the red oxide primer and its exact shade opened up a lot of information here on the Forums. If your interested in finding out more on this subject here is the link to that posting. After reading through and participating in the posts I just had to build a red oxide primered tank.

I really like your idea of placing that ugly cat of mine on a factory floor setting and I will have to do just that as soon as I finish with some my current in process projects.

-Eddy

Here are some more photos.
The 88 is OOTB as are the figures.
The vertical pine tree is a 'Christmas decoration' from Michaels. I had to cut and bend limbs to make it non-uniform. There was a fake 'snow' on it that I had to teadiously scrape off, then sprayed it a few shades of green. Picked out some bark details. Made a new dowel trunk. I am adding highlights after seeing it in photos (looks very 'blah').

The downed pine is made from a doweling. I added squadron putty to the dowel to make bark. When the putty started to 'set' I used a wire brush to rough it up. I then drilled holes all over the trunk and inserted a small branch (photos to come) of a 'funky' dried plant. I wanted something that could 'hold' pine needles. I sprayed the branches with elmers 'spray' glue, then sprinkled static grass on the glue. I added two and three applications of static grass to try and mimic the tall standing pine. Then I hand painted the trunk and branches and sprayed the needles.

The base is simply wall spackle on MDF board.

These photos are my test shots. They really show how 'not finished' this is. I'm adding pastels to tie it all together, more washes on the ground, more vegitation detail. I'm adding lens color to the range finder, tips to the shells, touching up 'white' showing in the base.....

Scott:
Your dio is really nice and I like your photo booth, how is it constructed? Could you post a photo.

Robert

Scott, Nice Dio!

Thanks guys.

The photo booth is actually a store bought product. It's a wire frame with cloth over it.
Google Foldable Photo box and it pops up.

Photo box

Scott:
That is not a bad price for the photo box, especially with the way it folds up. I made one out of pvc from a plan here on Armorama, which I like very much. Mine cost $21.47 which is the pvc, pvc parts, glue, bed sheet and some time on the front porch cutting, gluing and spilling some glue. Still a nice dio Scott and you say it is not finished yet cant wait for next photos.

Robert

Very nice job on an old kit, Scott. It is nice to see something good can still come form this despite the age of the figures.

Thanks for sharing

Thanks for the additional pictures and how-to's, Scott.
Looks real good, given the age of the models.

Jesper, long time no see!
All's well?

Scott,

Thanks for posting the extra photos and for the camera light box information. Really like the close up photo of the crew in action loading that 88 mm . . . wouldn't want to be on the recieveing end of that deadly weapon with motivated and highly trained crew.

-Eddy

Hi guys,
how much longer is this campaign running? I just broke out the Tamiya Tiger 1. Should be done in a week or two.
TIA

matt the campaign runs to the end of November.

Thanks Scott:

@ Matt: here is the shortcut to the Campaign page.

http://armorama.kitmaker.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=Campaigns&file=index&req=showcontent&id=315

Robert

Hi all!

The builds are looking great... Time to add mine. Its only the second model I have posted so be gentle!

Started the guts...


Guts 90% done


Painted but needed way more work


Done!


Done!

DazzaD - nice job. I like the dark areas of the finish, gives it a lot of interest. Nice job.

Done;
You can see what pastels do for a diorama. It really brings everything together and things look to be 'part' of a diorama not on top of a diorama.