AT-3 Tzu-Chiang in ''Fontaine'' Camouflage

[Ed S]

Looks like its a good thing you bought the BIG tube of putty.  You're going to need it for this one.

I am looking forward to seeing this camo when it's finished.

Ed

[cthulhu77]

Sweet mother of pearl !  You are going to ruin your good wrist just sanding !

[sotoolslinger]

JHMouse you've seen my builds, Welcome now to my world If you drink alot while doing PSR not only is it not so boring but you can't see the flaws so easily

[Jeffry Fontaine]

JHMouse you've seen my builds, Welcome now to my world If you drink alot while doing PSR not only is it not so boring but you can't see the flaws so easily

Barry does not drink so all of his work has been accomplished in a sober state or under the influence of paint and glue fumes. 

[John Howling Mouse]

Jeffry's right....makes this sort of thing that much more painful as one has to perform the many stages of PSR stone-cold sober.

I also have to pull out my CF-100 Canuck and check out the comparisons...which means I'll likely start another kit (Jeffry's fault!)

[John Howling Mouse]

PSR's finally done (there should have been some sort of local parade).  Canopy is masked:





On another thread, someone asked about my patented method of quick 'n' dirty wheel well masking.  First I slam some rough-cut regular masking tape into the depressions of the wheel wells then cut to a little closer shape with a scalpel (don't drink and model!).



Then, I simply fill in the wheel wells (over the masking tape which will make subsequent clean-up much easier) with modelling clay (steal your kid's Plasticine: it will work just fine) and quickly shape it to perfectly fit the outlines and contours of the openings.



I used to temporarily attach the gear doors as their own mask but paint always seemed to seep in.  And I tried using various liquid masking products in the wells but found them nearly impossible to remove from recessed details, etc. and carefully taping the opening takes far too long.  If I try to paint the wheel wells after the model's airframe is nicely painted, I invariably mess it up, even when I tape the finish along the wheel well perimeters.

Oh yeah, don't forget to tape down the actual gear DOORS for painting at the same time as the aircraft (but who'd ever forget that?!)   

[AeroplaneDriver]

Good grief man!!

For future reference, when your main goal during a build it trying out a new paint scheme, go with a shake & bake kit, not something where the various parts only seem to have a casual relationship to each other.

[Jeffry Fontaine]

PSR's finally done (there should have been some sort of local parade).

Now that you have sanded away all of the blemishes it looks pretty darn good.  Like a silk purse from the proverbial sows ear.   

I used to temporarily attach the gear doors as their own mask but paint always seemed to seep in.  And I tried using various liquid masking products in the wells but found them nearly impossible to remove from recessed details, etc. and carefully taping the opening takes far too long.  If I try to paint the wheel wells after the model's airframe is nicely painted, I invariably mess it up, even when I tape the finish along the wheel well perimeters.

Barry,

I am surprised to see that you are not using that low tack/low residue blue masking tape.  It does not leave a lot of adhesive behind when you use it for temporary applications.  

You know that thing looks like a two/thirds scale CF-100.  All you need to do is add a couple of wing tip tanks and give it some maple leaf roundels

[John Howling Mouse]

Okay, here's a recap of the past week's worth of work on this baby.

Once the white Krylon primer was sprayed, it was time to draw on some outlines.  This is where I first realized that doing this ingenius concept on an actual 3D model as a wrap-around scheme was not going to be as easy as I had first figured.     The yellow tape is to mask off for home-printed decals (fictional national markings).





I used Testors Acryl "neutral gray" for painting the actual scheme.  Here are the initial outlines handpainted in:





And then we get to the modified pointalism.  Not difficult, you just have to be very light with the brush and extremely patient (my two worst non-attributes):

[John Howling Mouse]

Then it was time to paint in the wrap-around cross-hatching in two different configurations while trying to avoid conflicts in angles, etc.  I was originally going to tape them all off, believe it or not.  Then I remembered this is something that is supposed to be painted on a real aircraft without using some sort of high-tech, computer-driven robotic arm.  Because of this, it's supposed to look "hand-painted" in the field.  So I handpainted it in scale, too.







With the final lines in, the scheme was all done except for my fictional national markings.  At this point, I thought it looked sort of hokey and wondered if this very good idea would have been executed better by someone else.  But, what the heck, it's my model, eh?

[John Howling Mouse]

I pulled the masking off and it was time to apply my home-printed decals.  I recently upgraded to an economical little Samsung CLP-300 laserprinter and tried out the best laser decal paper I could find (I've used six different brands for inkjet printers before, all with mixed results).  This new stuff by Bel Paper is phenomenal!  You can seal it with Krylon "Crystal Clear" (optional) and then apply MicroScale's "Decal Film"-----end result is as good as any other after-market decals I've ever purchased: strong, dependable carrier film with no rips/tears or flip-overs.  I'm hooked!

[John Howling Mouse]

And here is my little trainer wearing Jeffry Fontaine's camo in all its glory.  The fictional country is "Ket" as in "The Isle of Ket" (not "Kent") and it is one of the nations located within my conceptual continent called "Centralia."  I've mentioned Centralia on this Forum before: it's a slim, global-length continent located between North/South America and Western Europe/Africa.  The continent covers the same wide variety of terrain, climate and culture of the continents on either side but is mainly populated by previously unheard of nations and their peoples.  The addition of this interspersed continent naturally has major consequences in my alternative history of the world and opens up a whole series of fictional nations, languages/culture and vehicles, etc.

[John Howling Mouse]

Some more pics.  Don't forget to go back "up there" to see the in-progress pics, too.  I hope I did justice to Jeffry's very innovative idea.

[John Howling Mouse]

Some tarmac shots:











And the "in the hands of the Gronk" shots:

[kitnut617]

Holy Crap    (sorry couldn't think up another 'alternative')  I can't believe what I'm looking at