Hi everybody,

I gained the courage needed to post one of my ongoing WIP's -- Dragon's old StuG III C/D revamped into one of them elusive DAK short-barelled StuG's from z.V.B. 288.

Besides the actual model itself, I used also Eduard's photo etch package, a metal barrel from RB, an antenna from RB, quite a bit of resin from Black Dog (primarily their StuG kurz package, a bit from their Pz.Kpfw. III stuff), and quite a bit of scratchbuilding. On the scratchbuilding side, I made out of thin metal and other assorted pieces the sand filters, the wiring of the headlights and their protection, and the points for attachment the extra roadwheels. Finally, I took one of the MiniArt DAK figures and an MG34 from another Dragon kit.

The project is in a pretty advanced stage, a few finishing things here and there (i.e. the neck of the figure, the luggage at the rear deck needs some more treatment, painting the stop lights, stuff like this). I'll also post a few earlier images, just to keep the story going.

So here's an early one, still assembling:



First painting pass and post-shading. I used Tamiya acrylics:



First test of the chipping -- all hand-painted:





First weathering pass. At this point I was considering two figures, but as I am not particularly happy with my figure painting skills, I dropped one of them. For the weathering I used primarily AK/Mig filters and washes:






Second weathering pass, with the tracks on. This one was mainly AK/Mig pigments:





And finally, the current state of the project, with a small base for the model as well. The tools are also on:









Thank you very much for your time and attention -- any and all comments would be most welcome! I still consider myself young and inexperienced in the hobby (alas, just in the hobby ) so all opinions and recommendations will be really appreciated.

Ivan/D4

This is awesome! Love how you painted it & the AK/Mig stuff really is great. And I wouldn't bash your figure painting skills hahaha. Looks great

-Conor

Very nice!

The figure looks fine. I was afraid of painting figures too. I just kept at it. Now they don't scare me as much as they used to.

Very nice Ivan, the figs look fine to me.
Pete

Thanks a lot for the kind words guys, it's really appreciated! Given the fantastic quality of the models posted on this great site, it's encouraging

Criticism and recommendations, however, would be just as welcome!

oh very nice.. i have the Cyber Hobby Stug E next on the workbench.. they just look so "right" loaded up like this

Looking good, Ivan!

Are the BlackDog accessories a big lump of detailed resin, or in different pieces of extra stowage?

Thanks guys!

Pytagoras, a bit of a mix between the two, but in general they tend to lump together quite a bit -- which sometimes makes painting a bit of a pain.

E.g. all the stowage on the rear deck (ALL of it) is one piece

No criticism, here. Great job! The built up sand is very nice.

Hi Ivan

That Stug is looking just great and you have done a good job by placeing it as a small vignette and to include a figure.

Thank you for sharing.
Br
Ole

Thank you very much guys! I am trying whenever I can to put a small vignette together for the respective vehicle, for me personally it really makes a difference to at least hint of the "natural habitat" of the machine. Puts a mood and a perspective to the model which is tougher to achieve by keeping the model stand-alone, out of an environment. Sometimes you can even tell a small story with a very compact vignette and the proper mood of the vehicle itself.

Just looked over four of your posts.... excellent work!
Looking forward to further work!

Hi Ivan - pretty nicely done StuG you got there. Since you're asking, I'd like to make a couple comments.

First, on your sandbag placement, I think the one on the upper superstructure bothers me the most. I just don't see it staying there very long once the tank started moving, and especially if the main gun was fired. On the same note, I have to wonder about the one by the driver's vision port. It's already sagging in that direction, how much vibration would it take to completely fall over partially blocking the port?

The other comment has to do with the paint. What did you use to do it with? The reason I ask is that, though the colors look great, the finish is really rough.

Gary, thank you very much, I'll do my best not to disappoint with the future updates!

Bob, your comments are really appreciated, please keep them coming if you see something which is worth discussing! The sandbag placement was done primarily following photo references and adjusting the resin sandbags I had available as much as possible. Here's one of the ref photos, unfortunately I can't share the rest as they're in books:



Obviously there's a difference in the placement for some of the bags, but I had to do with what I had

And on the paint, you're touching a raw nerve I airbrushed the model last fall outdoors with Tamiya Acrylic paint. However, I didn't take into consideration the fact that it was pretty hot and sunny. As I use spirit (98%) to thin Tamiya paints, due to the hot weather, some of the paint droplets actually dried up in mid-air, before impacting on the model. Lesson learned for the next model In a pitiful attempt at defending this StuG, I'd have to say that due to the light direction and the simple phone camera I use the roughness is exaggerated, in reality on the model itself is nowhere that bad.

Thanks again,

Ivan

Ivan the figure looks good, the more figures you do the better you get. The chipping is perfect and doesn't look over done like you see on some German stuff. Keep up the excellent work.

Cheers

Todd

I know how you feel about the paint. The reason I asked is that I used to have the same problem back when I was painting with cans (thankfully, those days are long behind me).