I am not sure how this works … but I would like the extension because I am traveling for a week but I am so close to finishing.

We have a 2 week extension on this campaign for this campaign so you will now have more time to get finished up.

Slow progress.

More mottling and painting to be done

Hi Scott, managed to finish my Tornado, thanks for the campaign, had a great time building it. An exellent 2012 to everybody, Happy modelling.

Good looking Tornado! Just how hard was it to decal Gonzalo? Lots of little stars or just large sheets of them? I certainly don't envy you putting them on and trying to get them to conform to all those panel lines!

Thanks for the nice comments Chris, Revell had the nice idea of providing large decal sheets, also large quantities of decal setting solution were used.

Gonzalo, Beautiful work on the tornado well done! remember to post your pics in the gallery.

Well, Happy New Year everyone. Since the campaign got a two-week extension, I figured I'd try to get something built after all. I picked a Trumpeter 1/72 Sherman from the stash. First Trumpeter kit I've built, and I have to say it needs some work. Fit isn't the greatest in places, and the plastic is pretty soft. I'll definitely need to break out the putty for this one. Here are some pictures.

The unopened kit (and yes, that's 1:00 am on the iPod):





Interestingly enough, the kit comes with both finished bogies (top) and bogies to be built (bottom). I haven't decided yet which ones to use. The bogies to be built have some nasty looking sync holes, so I may opt for the prefab ones:



Close-up of the pre-made bogies:



And some initial progress:



More to follow...

Nice to see that things are still chugging along with this campaign. Paul P., your 109 is really coming along nicely and he Tornado looks super, Gonzalo.

Mark V, that Sherman is quite interesting with the two types of suspensions. I've seen this once before with a Trumpeter kit in their JS III. Sadly, from my own experience and from what you write about the Sherman, Trumpeter tracked models seem to be plagued with fit issues. I'm currently doing their M26 for the Korean War campaign and the suspension on that has been a nightmare. Good luck with your build.

I've done a bit more weathering and I still haven't touched up the last few details. I know it's not really part of this campaign but I though this might be of interest to some. My SWMBO got an acrylic texture medium by DecoArt called Fierro. After looking at an experimental application, I couldn't help but be reminded of dried lava. Since my tank is meant to be one from Iwo Jima and Iwo was a volcanic island and had dark sand beaches and areas of dried lava, I thought that it might have some potential. As this is partially an experiment, I didn't want to risk a nice wood base so I took a page from Sabredog's bag of tricks and tried it on a cocktail coaster. Here's the coaster with the stuff applied to represent the potential





With the Chi Ha posed at its current state.







The medium is shown in it's natural state after drying. This is only a start and will still need some amount of work. There could be great potential for modellers and I envision using it for all kinds of surfaces. The base material is rather thick and somewhat sculpt-able but can be thinned with plain water. Other uses will be up to a users imagination.

@Scott- - There seems to still be some serious problems with Kitmaker's gallery. I have tried dozens of times for days now and always am getting the "Server busy, try again shortly." You might have to make some alternate plans for completion pictures if this problem continues.

Cheers,
Jan

Just an outstanding decal job. It looks great.

Joel

Thanks a lot Scott, managed to post the pictures on the gallery.

Jan Etal: excellent work on your Chi Ha, very interesting medium you are using for the base,perfect for the volcanic ground on Iwo Jima, thanks for sharing and thanks for de nice comments, much appreciated.

Joel: Wonderfull job on the Priest, Thank for the nice comments

Tom Moon: loved both of your builds.

@air-aset- Glad you like my little beast. I'm always on the lookout for something that I and others can use.

While learning all these new things about acrylics, mediums and such, I've also been reading about small subject (Macro) photography. There was also a hint or two about photographing models in the Clark book. I normally shoot work in progress pictures using camera settings of ISO 100, Aperture Priority (for larger depth of field), F18-F20 and with a 4X macro filter. As one might guess, this is great for seeing all the flaws that the naked eye or even with magnification devices are not noticeable. Digital cameras are both a blessing and a curse.

Anyway, I've changed a number of settings on the camera and tried some experimental shots on a build that I am doing for another campaign. The main ones were changing the exposure metering from wide area to centre weighted, pre-setting the white balance based on a sheet of white paper and changed the aperture to F11. Below you'll find two images taken of the Chi Ha with the new settings. I have touched up several little detail pieces on the tank and applied some pin washes with the glaze base added to them. The colours used are similar to what many used with artists oils for the same purpose. I think that between these points I can see a subtle but definite difference that hopefully improves the overall effect.





@Scott - Still having no luck with the gallery here.

Cheers,
Jan

Jan, Gary has said there is a soft deadline for campaigns at the moment due to the gallery being the way it is! I was trying to upload the other day and it is just a case of perseverance and you will get your pic's uploaded eventually it is just a PITA at the moment

Thanks for the extension. I had no time to build and to finish a kit for several months, and failed to complete a few campaigns. Now I have an oppurtunity to back with this one.
1/72 is going on with Dragons first zimmerit Tiger-I Late Production.


Unfortunately, I saw an production error in chasis (only one that I saw on a Dragon model) which was shorter than hull. Nevertheless Dragon 1/72 tanks are always my favorites.


I have painted only the turret yet. It will be sPzAbt. 505th or 506th with green camo over dark yellow.
I have experienced some painting problems that the green camo got thicker than I expected. Nevertheless, I will finish it at the weekend.

@Burak: nice to see another braille scaler. Your Tiger's looking good so far! I spent another hour or so finishing construction of my Sherman. The fit on this Trumpeter kit is not very good, and I spent quite some time puttying and sanding. The seam on the transmission cover still needs a little more filling and clean up. I also carved out the back end of the 50 cal, to make the handles look more like, well, handles. The original part was one solid piece of plastic.





Still haven't decided if I'll use the one-piece bogies or the four-piece ones. The one- piece bogies look pretty good and fit well on the hull, but are solid on the inside. The four-piece ones look a little better, but require a lot of clean up, have some nasty sink marks on the return rollers, and are a very loose fit on the lower hull. Here are a couple of comparison pictures:





One-piece on the left, four-piece on the right.

Painting is next...

@Panzerace - Burak, great to see another small scale build in this campaign. You've done a fine job on the Tiger especially since I know that the Dragon Tiger I's have more than a few problems.

@dutchboyinohio - Mark, nice to see your rapid progress on the Sherman. From the looks of the two types of suspension options, they look almost identical. I'd go with the ones that fit better. Great job on creating the .50 cal handles.

As for me, after far too much time on the computer trying to log in to the Gallery area I finally got a couple of pictures up. They're the one's from my previous post and I consider the build 99+% done. I just wanted to make sure that there was something in the Campaign Gallery. I'll take some more pictures later and may substitute some new ones for the first pair **IF** the Kitmaker server settles down.

Cheers,
Jan :

@treadgeek: thanks for the feedback. I'm glad I'm doing this one as an out of the box build, if not, it would turn into a much bigger project. Not sure I'll build another one of these again, as there are better options out there......

Hey Scott ,,got something strange going on here ... this campaign does not show up on my current campaign's ,,now i know its still running or is it .. ? all the other ones i have joined are there but not this one .
Any help here would be good mate

Phill

Mark, Good to see you are going to hopefully fit a build in good luck.

Jan, Well done on getting a pic in to the gallery, I am sure that the problem is being work on with the gallery?

Burak, Looks like you are going to get your build finished in time well done.

Phil, the campaign has a 2 week extension in place so some of the builds can be finished I think it will be of the list becouse some members may try to enlist after the original deadline. The campaign will now finish on the 15th of this month, hope that explains it for you.

Wheels of Misfortune...

I had my doubts about paint adhesion to the Trump vinyl tires. Typically, I would have swapped these for resin dealies, but, OOB rules and all..

Anyhoo, I thinned Tammy paint with laquer, hoping that it would give it more bite. No such luck. For my other vinyl tires, I'll use enamel or automotive plastic adhesion promoter, or just buy resin.


And if the flaky paint wasn't enough, something's going on with the dimensions of the tires. They used to be a decent fit around the rims, but check out the gap that is appearing on many of the wheels:



So, out came the CA to permanently fix tire to rim. I re-sprayed them with Tamiya NATO black and vowed to be careful when handling them. But that meant I had to repaint the hubs NATO green, however, masking tape could not be used as it would lift the black paint off the tire again. Out came the larger P&D set which as luck would have it, had a punch that came within 1mm of the hub dimension. A template was punched out of .010 and teh hubs were resprayed:


I'm going to call this one done. I may come back to it later and weather it up a bit, and get some MV lenses for the missing clear sprue. I have really enjoyed going "OTB" and plan to do more in the future. Looking at all the other campaigners' work, its easy to see that today's kits can be made into great projects right out of the box.

I have paint and decaling completed om my Bf109 G6.

I just need to do a little weathering now.

Pics tonight

Cheers

Paul

Almost there

Just some paint touch ups, a couple of gaps to fill, and a bit of weathering to do.

This build is all about learning to do Luftwaffe Mottled Camo. It is a very basic kit and a good kit to practice techniques on.

Here's where I'm at :





Cheers

Paul

Graeme, well done your build looks the part from OBB, It is a shame about those tyres though! I am sure one of these days manufacturers will learn that we don't like them..

Paul, your bird looks great that is a very nice finish for a first attempt at the mottled effect.

And the great-looking builds just keep on coming!! I'm making steady progress on my Sherman. The base coat is on and the bogies have been attached. Next up is detail painting, decals, and weathering. Just have to attach the turret MG and the tracks. Pictures to follow...

Okay, for the purposes of this campaign I am calling the Chi Ha done! Obviously there won't be a base at this point but I am pretty happy with the way it turned out. I've learned a lot of things from the people in this campaign and also from the Alex Clark Small Scale Modelling book.









My thanks to you Scott for showing me and everyone else that you can build a pretty decent model straight out of the box.

Cheers,
Jan