Here's a couple of pics of my latest effort, it's the Trumpeter BTR-70 late version. The base coat is now on over a little pre shade, I'm planning to add grey/black and green camo. It's a nice model with lots of detail and quite a lot of photo etch for the various external fittings. The hatches are tacked closed with a little white glue till I get the camo done and then I'll pose it with most of the hatches open as there is a fairly good interior to show. Think I'll put this one on a base as somewhere during the building up of the axles/suspension something got misaligned resulting in a wheel floating a little.

so nice!

That looks great. Keep going, don't stop now. Looking forward to seeing what you do next.

Got the masking on for the shape of the green camo, this is the first time I've used this method normally I use the AB freehand but I am looking for a harder edge. I tried the rolled up fillets of whitetack but found it wasn't working for me they kept falling off and I could feel the blood pressure rising! Time for a "change of tack" ha ha. Have put down a colour swatch next to the model (Tamiya XF-73) but think it will be too dark so am going to lighten it up a bit with a mix. Back at work now after Xmas so progress will have to slow a bit.
Thanks for looking.

Camo done, now for the fun part, pin washes, filters, streaks, pigments, mud, dust and all that good stuff. lots to do. Pity most of the axles bits will be hidden by the wheels, did see someone else's that that had been posed with a flat tyre and a jack under the hub, thought that was a good idea to show some of what's there. Will take better pics later on with the new handmade light tent.

Some more progress;







This has been great fun with hardly any troubles, the fit of parts is almost faultless, the only small hassle was the fit at the sharp join at the front/bow between upper and lower hulls which needed a tiny bit of filler. Still weathering, and detail touch ups to be done. As mentioned above this one is going onto a base and I'd like to include a couple of figures for scale, can anyone recommend some modern Soviet infantry? Thinking Afghanistan.

Hey Paul-

Beautiful job! I really like your solution to masking the camo. Will have to try it myself sometime as I also have been unhappy with the Silly Putty/FunTack method. I have the same kit and will be doing it as a East German vehicle.

For the Soviet infantry figures, you might want to check out ANT Miniatures. They have some really nice modern and Afghanistan-era Soviet figures that would fit perfectly with this gem of your.

Best,
-Bill

Fantastic work you are doing here Paul- a really great build and an excellent paint job. I admire the way you tackled the camouflage masking- nice going!

Paul,
very, very nice ! I'm looking forward to what people will be doing with this new batch of Trumpeter kits.

Sean

AWESOME! Nice to see another Scot doing Soviet armour!
Thanks
Euan

Really, really nice and a very cool camo.

Thank you for sharing.

Ole

Thankyou comrades, back to the daily grind tomorrow so again progress will slow a little. Fraternal greetings from red Clydeside !

Nice Model, good to see its not weathered to death. Masterclub do a whole range of figures specifically for the BTR-70 in Afganistan.

Have completed the base for it and am now waiting on the figure from masterclub to finnish the scene will post pics as soon as he's done.
Cheers Paul

Lovely !
Real good job !

Cheers
Christopher

Masterclub figure arrived just after I made the last post, so it's now all complete and here are some pics sorry if there are too many but I usually take loads and whittle it down to the best ones so it could be worse. The Masterclub figure is really nice and seems to have a passing resemblance to a certain prominent Russian politician? I used a picture I found of traffic on the Kabul to Jalalabad road as a basis for the scene, I was aiming for a really dull miserable wet day though the finished scene could really be anywhere and is not related to any particular time frame.


















Thanks for looking and comments.
Paul

Paul,
That is a superb diorama. I really like the mountain and the water. Also the snow leopard is a good addition. I also like the Cyrillic "Sapang Pass" Instead of a passive cute puppy , if you had a soviet army dog growling at the crouching snow leopard it would have added more tension to the situation. But I like this setup too.
Regards
V

Looks great. I think it would look awesome if you replaced the big cat with a squatting mujahideen.

Good work Paul...

I think this works really well as a scene- its nicely balanced. The figure and animals are really well painted as is the BTR. The water effects on the terrain are brilliant- really looks like water running down the rocks. Only thing I would say needs a second look is the wet areas on the BTR- judging by how wet the terrain is I would say the BTR should probably be more wet than it currently is but thats a minor niggle. Still a great scene.

Thanks for the reply's, This was an easy fun build, the only slightly tricky part was getting the BTR to look part of the scene it might have looked better had I gone for standard overall green, also making it look damp but not too shiny was awkward. Anyway it's done and I'm now trying to decide on the next project, kind of like these big soviet trucks Maz,Ural etc.
Cheers Paul

Paul Great work on the btr looks spot on. Could you tell me where you managed to get that masterclub figute from?

Paul

Paul, got the fig from masterclub's ebay site, try this;
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Masterclub-UK

Left me speechless. Well done, sir!

Cheers Matt, what can I say (haha)