(#3 done!! pics pg 3) Aliplast Fiat G.55 Centaur Vatican City Defense Force

TheChronicOne · December 06, 2016, 03:38:28 PM

Thank you so much, Lou!

I'm going a little nutty on this one, for sure. I dreamed this mess up in a half awake state so.... heh...

I think I forgot to mention the materials for those vials.. simply clear sprue and actual cork bought from a craft store... Anne's Fabric or whatever... chain store or something. There's one just two blocks from here.

MOVING ON.. let's not pretend like I didn't mess up the " weathering " I did in a couple places. Thankfully, I had a solution for both that I think fixed up the spots I was worried about. With teh addition of an anti glare strip and an anti bust-your-butt strip I not only added a bit of character and more color but covered up the parts where I took off TOO much of the white. It was bugging me so I decided to do this first before moving on.. so.. NOW I can gloss coat it then put the transfers on so I can continue with the weathering. I need to improve upon the areas where the exhaust leaves the manifold and also do the "random" type of weathering over the top of all the decals once they are one. Might do a little bit with used motor oil but I kind of covered that with the weathering I've already done, so we'll see.

I'm hoping this thing pulls a "Bobb Ross" and only looks like a pile of crap right now and once it's done will look killer.

TheChronicOne · December 09, 2016, 01:26:13 PM

Yay! Getting closer now! I can do transfers today and decal this bad boy up.I just spent the last couple of hours finding them and trimming them. Time to eat lunch then I'll be at the vinegar water. I'll have pictures by the end of the day.

EDIT: Never mind. I can't find the most vital transfers..... what the hell?? No idea where they went. No telling when I'll be done now because after 45 minutes of looking I'm not sure how much more patience I have.

EDIT: LOL! This keeps happening. The minute I give up on something it works out. Less than one minute after hitting "save" I found the transfers so now lunch is back on and pictures later I HOPE!

TheChronicOne · December 09, 2016, 08:29:52 PM

This thing took up a big chunk of the day but you know how it is...the closer to being finished, the easier it is to work on some times!

I have to glue on three more of the holy waters then I need to add another gloss coat to seal in these transfers then it's done.

Preview pic, more to come tomorrow if the sun arrives in force:

TheChronicOne · December 10, 2016, 10:58:07 AM

So close can smell the crappy weathering!

Just a quick update... waiting on the sun to come out so I can do some proper pictures. It's TRYING but still a lot of cloud cover. I may have to just roll with what I have though. In other news, it might be delayed a bit due to the fact that I'm having to put almost everything on hold to get together a bunch of my old toys to try to sell to a local dealer. I can't wait to get him over at the house so I can ask, "DUDE, does your new toy store have model kits?!?! "

I'm making pretty good progress on getting the toys together so I should be able to break and get this little plane its glamour shotz. Going to stop long enough to glue the remaining vials on then let it sit as I get back to rumaging.

Side note... this could be just the ticket I need (selling these toys) to allow me to buy the paint for the F/U-2. The idea of brushing the paint lost its luster again after I slept on it.

TheChronicOne · December 10, 2016, 01:52:04 PM

All done! I'll try to take more pics tomorrow when the wind isn't 8 billion miles and hour and when the sun is in the right place. I waited too long today.

That said, I managed to snag some decent pictures. (well.... decent enough.. I should mess around with different backgrounds and lighting.. I'll try tomorrow.. )

TheChronicOne · December 10, 2016, 02:44:30 PM

Thanks Brad! It has some character to it, for sure.. Still don't know about the weathering but... ehhh! I think it's passable.

She's going to be a happy lil airplane addition to the line up sitting on my TV stand waiting to be obliterated by some clumsy oaf.

Question is... what next?! I guess I'll have to blab about it in my blog.. first time in months now, I think, that I haven't had some project going. There's the Spyplane but still waitin on paint so it's time to get something new cracking.

zenrat · December 10, 2016, 04:13:09 PM

It's better than my first attempts at weathering.

TheChronicOne · December 10, 2016, 05:30:13 PM

Quote from: zenrat on December 10, 2016, 04:13:09 PM

It's better than my first attempts at weathering.

Thanks, Fred! I'm pretty sure I actually learned a thing or two about it this time around and won't be as apprehensive about trying more in the future. Not that I will be abandoning glorious factory fresh beauty schemes though.

Dizzyfugu · December 11, 2016, 12:46:34 AM

Weird. But cool, could come from a Hellboy comic.

TheChronicOne · December 11, 2016, 10:05:44 AM

Oh it's weird alright! I can't decide which is more "oddball" this one, or the Vampire Vampire. Cool, yeah I think so, too.. Thanks!!

TheChronicOne · December 11, 2016, 01:48:11 PM

Weather will not cooperate! No sun, 30-40 MPH winds... So, I decided to bite the bullet and dive right on in to photo editing software. A facebook buddy directed my to ipiccy which is really neat! Easy to learn and I think I actually got the picture of the airplane back closer to how it's supposed to be instead of relying on the camera to try to figure it all out. The originals were too dark and too color shifted (I think that's the right word?).. too "blue" so I did what I can to lessen the blue, clear away the haziness and get the colors corrected back to how the thing actually looks with Mk1 Eyeball. Added a border as well.

Before

After

Like with anything I'm sure I'll figure new tricks along the way and manage even better fixes.

TheChronicOne · December 11, 2016, 02:05:54 PM

Wow, I spent like 2 hours on that last one because I was playing with all the settings. This time I just clicked the "auto color" button then added the frame. Total time editing was less than 30 seconds and I think it's better than the original:

Before

After

Hooray for free online photo editors! Didnt even have to download it.

EDIT: One more.

strobez · December 14, 2016, 03:22:59 PM

I loved the Vampire... but I REALLY love this one. It's creative, it's cool, it's well built and has a neat story attached... what more could you ask for?

TheChronicOne · December 14, 2016, 04:29:24 PM

Thanks, Greg!! I was all "Bob Ross" about it for awhile... you know... how he does his paintings and they look like a mess then all of a sudden towards the end it takes shape. It could have went either way. Not too sure I like my painted inside edges of control surfaces.. tried it twice now and neither time has really turned out all too great but over all I'm pretty damn happy with it. One thing I think I DID manage to improve on was my control wire (aerial? whatever it's called) . The last one I did I think was more in scale with them thick cables tight ropers walk on.

Have a Holy Water on me.

strobez · December 14, 2016, 08:53:46 PM

What did you use for the wire? I need to string one for my C.714 and I'm thinking of using stretched sprue... but I'm open to stealing good ideas elsewhere.