just for fun I am building the old Sherman from Monogram, I first built this kit in 1976 and wanted to do it again for old times sake. I will do some improvements to the kit but do not plan on going too crazy.

here it is so far
I tried to put some cast texture on the hull by applying liquid glue and stippling with a stiff brush.

i have added some simple detail with strip plastic.

Nice to see this old girl being buyilt again. The First Large scale Sherman I made when I was 12. The only real hassle wit htheis one is the tracks
Al

Hey Al
Yea the tracks are pretty silly but I plan on just setting it in a lot of mud to cover that up. I love the figures in the kit and that is what I remember most of all and all the fun I had with them, now that I am a lot older and a little better at painting figures I want to do them a little better and hopefully they will turn out OK.
Doug

detail for the 50 cal

one of the figures

first i paint the eyes and dark areas


the next step is to paint the darker skin tones under the cheeks and neck

face is finished

I look forward to this! Great walk down memory lane and I look forward to the improvements.

Those figures - Monogram did a great job with weight and sag in the uniforms.

the driver and standing figure done, I think that Monograms sculptor way back when did a great job on these figures and they were fun to paint.



I will place his left hand in the sleeve when I position him next to the tank

Beautiful paint job Doug. This 'dark area' technique is something new to me, always thought I should go from light to dark for faces. Very nice work!

Always loved this old kit. Such an improvement over the contemporary Sherman kits. I still have one waiting to be built and I did two of the M4 last year.

Those figures really paint up nice. The same sculptor also worked on the old Merite line of 54mm.

Yeah, the Monogram Merite series - I thought they looked familiar! I have a couple of them, the D-Day paratrooper and a Japanese infantryman. Thanks Stephen for the memory jog.

Yes, I really like these Monogram kits. A shame that 1/32 lost out to 1/35. I wonder if Monogram ha plans to expand the series had not Tamiya trumped them? Anyone know?

The only one that I am sure of was a Firefly. Not sure what version but it was rumored. You look at the Sherman sprues and you realize how easy it would have been to do inserts to switch the bogie units to the heavy duty type.

...says one of the best figure builder/painter in the known universe.
Excellent stuff Doug, will be following this blog!
Cheers,
Israel

thanks guys

the next guy is my favorite from the kit, the dude with the M1 Carbine, I am placing him in the turret hatch, and have replaced his neck with a new one so I can have him looking down on the other guys.

started the painting on the tank, chose to paint the stars on instead of the decals

i wanted to have one infantry man in the scene with the tankers and so needed a 1/32nd scale one so went with the classic Airfix multi pose US set. I think that Roger Saunders sculpted these and they are still pretty cool in my mind even if they are almost as old as I am

yes I always go from dark to light as the light highlights are the top values and so to me should be the last on the figure, i basically just keep adding highlights as I move up the folds to the brightest spots that are touched the most directly from the light above.

Beautiful work. The paint on those figures is beyond words. Outstanding!!! I love when people built those old kits. I hope someone will do the same with the Monogram panzer line

Yep-- those Merite figures are where I first learned how to paint miniatures back in 1968 or 69-- I had the Falschirmjager and the Berdan's Sharpshooter-- they came with a very thourough and fully illustrated painting guide with photos, including how to do faces and uniforms step by step. Why can't figure manufactures do that today? I went on to to the Soldier Shop in NY and Imrie-Risley 54mm figures, then on to Bugle and Guidon and Series 77-- but Merites were where figure painting started for me. As I recall, Monogram only released the 1/32 (54mm) Sherman, a Grant, a Mark IV, and the Whirlbelwind in this series, where there any more? Shep Paine was the builder for many of the later "white box" boxings, but I think there was an earlier blue box version too. Someone mentioned that Tamiya may have kept Monogram from doing more, but remember that Monogram was first with several 1/32 releases-- the M-16 half track, Weasel, Eager Beaver truck, Jeep and 37 mm gun (I still have mine, with the box), and the M48... and frankly they were better than the equivalent Tamiya stuff at the time-- It's just that Tamiya had more German WWII stuff out-- even though it was crap (anyone remember those rubber band tracks?). Anyway-- I'm following along with the rest of you on this "nostalgia build"-- it looks pretty good to me. Keep it up-- maybe there should be a campaign on the old stuff.
VR, Russ

The Monogram jeep, Halftrack and truck were from an earlier release program going back into the 1950s. I have the most recent SSP re-issues of the Halftrack and eager Beaver truck and the molds are from 1956. They are also actually closer to 1/34 scale not 1/32. Seems the US Army used to do recognition models in that scale. I had the jeep and compared it to a 1/32 snap together jeep Monogram around 1978 and it was noticeably smaller.

The Monogram 1/32 kits were from a few years later and started with a Panzer IV H and Sturmgeschutz IV both of which were recently re-released. A Whirbelwind followed. A few years later brought a Brumbar and Panzer Jaeger IV with molded Zimmerit. Lastly came the Ostwind which had a nice turret crew included. The Lee and Grant came around the same time as the Brumbar, the Shermans a few years later in the early to mid 1970s.

This was also around the time Airfix did their sdkfz 250 halftrack and Crusader. Airfix Lee and Grant are from 1976 or so. The last Monogram 1/32 kits were the Sdkfz 232 armored car and M8 and M20 armored car. The 232 was re-issued a few years ago and I bought and built one. The Shermans are in release now and i built two M4 and just have an M4A1 to go.

The Airfix Crusader and Rommel Halftrack are available now and a re-release of the 17 pounder was announced last year. Now if we just get Airfix to re-release the Lee and Grant. Still the best large scale kit of them after all these years. !

How did it come out? On the pictures looks good. I've always wanted to try this method out...

it worked very well, not sure if it shows in the pictures or not but I was pleased

progress on painting the infantryman on the ground

mud starting on the track area


just white glue and some dirt