Hey guys

It's been a while since my last posting. While waiting on kits, parts and stencils to continue my other builds I was experimenting with the Trumpeter KV-II.

I built the kit in one day, there's some lack in my building progress but I wanted to experiment with some painting techniques and gain some experience for my next builds. So please give some critiques about the painting...

First I painted the base coat and tried to give some highlights on the edges to give some artificial volume to the model. The higlights were very white so I put on a thin coat of clear green which had a great effect on unifying the paint. Then I picked out some hatches and details by brush.



Because of the very light base coat I put on around 5 to 7 filters with oil in darkbrown and dark green. After this I began the fading with the oil dots. I found this as one of the most difficult steps! The pin wash was done with oil colors but I'm not satisfied with this step (I have to buy a wash from MIG). As you can see on the turret edges I gave less attention and the oil wash collected too much there.



Now I'm WIP with the scratches and chipping. First with a green color, then with a dark brown chocolate tan color all with small brushes. I had in mind to use different greens for scratches and chips for some variation but it looked weird so I just used on color.





The turred is next with chipping and scratches...



Next will be dusting with the airbrush and the pigments.

Tell me what you think!

Hi very nice so far but there is no evidence of any markings on the turrets of the KV 11 , In nearky 1000 photos I have yet to see a single marking or slogan , hope this helps cheers ian

sandy , have you seen the captured german kv, that has herman goiering divison written on it, not exactly soviet but its an example of kv's with slogans
great pics, and the hermann georing tank is here

Hi A.W., The paint job variation looks very good and I think that the accumulation of the wash/ filter around the turret weld beads looks fine. There would have been an accumulation there anyway since crew members would be climbing in and out of the turret would possibly have muddy boots and when it rained it would have washed towards the sides and accumulated there. The chipping effect is really good but not overdone. I wanted to point out that you may want to take a look at the fenders on the rear; in the photos you can see a gap and the mounting tab is clearly visible in the photo but aside from that it looks great. I myself tend to have a heavy hand with weathering because I like my vehicles to look beat to hell even though most didn't see that much service. Keep up the good work, Jim R.

Hi A.W. welcome back to the forum my friend. Your KV is looking awesome. The color mod and chipping is top notch.

Rob

Great modulation on that KV.

Looking good.

Post more.

Very nice. You didn't go overboard with the chipping too,but just enough for nice effect.

Very nice indeed.

The only thing I'm not too sure about is the green base colour that you've used. It looks a bit too "grassy green" to my eye, a bit too vibrant (if you know what I mean).

But that's a purely personal observation, and takes nothing away from your technique and the finish you've achieved, which are SUPERB.

As others have already said: excellent modulation, and very nice balance on the chipping and weathering: Enough to be really effective, but not overdone. I like it a lot.

Thanks for sharing.

- Steve

Hey guys

first of all thank you for all your nice comments!!!

@ Ian: I've red it about the fake slogans. But I wanted it as 'decal-weathering' exercise, how chipping works over it and how much fading it has to be. By the way i weathered the decal several times with filters, perhaps a drybrush would be nice... My slogan means just 'for' cot out from the standard decal 'for stalin'.

@ Jim: As the KV is an exercise tank, I didn't want to spend much time in construction, so there are several things I missed. But thank you for pointing me out.

@ Rob: Your T-55 gave me much motivation do get at the paint desk


@ Steve: I know what you mean by the green is too vibrant. I think the daylight was a bit hard, it's a bit darker in person. The green was mixed with Tamiya colors and I think it became too bright. I took 7 filters to tone it down a bit...

The turret chipping is overdone... First time I used a sponge on this turret. Should have stopped after only using the brush. And the dusting with pigments is too harsh too. I'll try to wipe them a little bit away or bringing it in the nice corners. I'll try to make some mud for the wheels and tracks. That's next.







Tell me what you think. Good and bad.

The painted hatches look too unrealistic to me, but I know that's how the Mig modulation tells us how to do it. Maybe tone them done closer to a highlight color - just my view on the whole modulation thing. I think everything else is looking like a mean tank. Carry-on!