Ken Fortier (kencelot) shares his trial and error experience winter-washing his M4 Sherman.

White Out: Winterizing an M4 Sherman

As usual if you have comments or feedback about this article please leave it here.

Thanks Ken! And congrats on being our 100th article!

Cheers,
Jim

Ken,
Great article. Informative and fun to read. And the model is outstanding! I may just give your snow method a try. Very nice work.

Thank you Charles.
...and a HUGE thanks to Jim for the wonderful job of beautifying my attempt at writing one. Great job putting it all together Jim. :-)

Great article....dont ya just hate when the model hits the floor , Tank looks awsome!

You got it right there! Your groundwork reminds me of times we've been off on the high desert in late fall deer hunting. The ground's not frozen yet and there's a fresh fall of wet snow over the top of a slimey, gooey, thick layer of mud. It leaves the bottom and sides of anything trying to move through it looking like they've driven between 2 elephants facing away from each other with a simultaneous case of the Titanian Two-step! :-)

Jim---you are a cruel person. Torturing those of us who can not even glue two pieces of plastic together with this artistry. Hats off to Ken what a marvelous example of talent. Good job!
DJ

BRAVO!
Ken you deserve the title for the best article of Armorama, untill now!
Great job, but I 'think your model look so wonderfull because you did 3 diferents winter schemes, it brought it to live.
Congratulations

Great article Ken. You answered all my questions, particularly on the base, since I am going to be doing something similar soon.
Thanks,

Nic

Thanks for the kind comments all! It was a very fun/frustrating build. I have another "winter work" in the works.

Have you seen the way-to-cool addition our staff has added to the pics? Thanks Jim.

Great job Ken. I really liked the snow fall So this guy has seen it's share of combat by itself . A great Winner (:-)

Ken,
Great Work.
I too have discovered the marvels of Woodland Scenics "Snow". Let me share some of my observations.
First, I mix the snow with Modge Podge (a white glue like substance used in decopage) and make a paste like mixture. This can be troweled onto the tank, between bogies, on fenders or any area with little foot traffic.
Second, take the same mixture and add acrylic burnt umber, some ground cover (fine ground sawdust) and you ger "mud". The mud can easily be applied to tracks lower hull surfaces and will dry to a shiney/muddy look.
One thing about using the paste is you can create drifts, and with some practice icecicles.

A question on the Woodland Scenics Snow. I assume it is permanantly attached to the model or base . How easy/hard is it to work with? I am planning on doing a Chosin Resevour dio with new Tamiya M26.

Gino, it's very easy to work with. The only thing I had to play with was finding suitable method for making it "fall" like snow. Out of the shaker bottle is not too realistic of an effect. I got one of my wife's old make-up brushes to load up with it and lightly tapped on it over the model to make it "fall" with a realistic look.
Also I mixed the Woodland Scenics Snow 50/50 with corn starch to add a more of a fluff.
...and yes, it's permanantly attached via hair spray.

Ken,
How do you apply the hair spray, before the snow as a fixative, or after as a sealant? Doesn't the hairspray leave an overall glossy finish?

After, as a sealant. No shine after. Use a "pump" type spray, as an aerosol type will blow the snow away!

great job! I am winterizing a sherman right now and your article has helped alot!Thank you!

Very good article, very nice job and great visual efect. Congratulations.

Excellent model, gave me an idea for a piece of my own.

Thanks Ken, that will certainly come in handy!

~Chip :-)

Heck! Must be the winter of whited out Sherms... Yup, I'm working on one also, and has been an ongoing thing for about 2 months on and off. Kinda funny discovering ideas I have found out thru trial and error have been mimicked by far more experienced modellers and made into an article! Have been using some other articles, and it's interesting to find the different (if only slight) takes on the same theme... I'm all talk at the moment, but promise to have some darn pics up and running soonish... Great job though Kencelot!~