Hi All,

I've just finished painting my Tiger I, freehand, with the dunklegelb/green/red-brown camo scheme. To say that it turned out, well, not real well, would be understatement. This being only my second model, I should have given consideration to masking, and not getting 'cute' and trying freehand with my airbrush. I'm not good enough, yet, to get away with that.

So....that being said, and there are so many quite specific looking shapes and sizes of the different colors, I am wondering how to go about either buying, or creating, masks to create a specific camo pattern. There is, of course, the issue of feathered versus sharp edges, which would require (I think) different masking. I don't think I've ever seen a specific tutorial or other lesson on how to do a specific pattern. I'm sure most of you are experienced enough to do, freehand, any pattern appropriate, but I think it's going to be a long while until I'm that proficient (if ever). In particular, the patterns that appear to be the hardest to do freehand would be the very narrow, pointy/whispy ended 'stripes'. I can sort of picture masks for, say, the side fenders on a Tiger I, but I'm having a hard time picturing how one would either create or mount a mask over the bumpy and irregular equipment on the top of the hull, or all the curves of a turret. Since my next Tiger is probably going to be the Cyber-Hobby Otto Carius tank, and will need to have a camo pattern that is specific to a particular tank, I need to know how to create an exact pattern, given my beginner level airbrush skills. PLEASE HELP ME!

Curt,
The best way to do this is with poster putty. Get the stuff from the dollar store. This is very easy to do to follow a specific camo pattern and mask over any surface. We use what is called subtractive masking. So, you shoot your entire Tiger dark green. Then you roll and stretch the poster putty out flat and cover all the areas that should remain green. Then you shoot the whole tank red brown. Now you cover the areas to remain red brown with the poster putty. Then you shoot everything dunkelgelb, pull off all the putty, and presto! Perfect paint job. You can protect small details under the putty with little tents of aluminum foil or medicine cups, whatever. If you want hard edge camo, shoot into the edge of the putty. If you want a softer edge, shoot from over the putty at an oblique. This is a very easy and very effective way to get professional looking results.
Get a few empty gallon milk jugs and practice on them for a few hours until you are getting the airbrush to do exactly what you want it to. The only way to master the airbrush is practice and experience, but don't experiment on a model you just put your heart into building.