1/72 KAI KF-21 Kanakull

[UhuFin]

In 2026 the Estonian Air Force is looking for a low-cost solution multirole combat aircraft and is requesting offers from manufacturers. At this point, the Paraman Foundation steps in and makes a low-cost offer that cannot be refused. The foundation manages to convince the Estonian government to acquire five stealth fighters that would be owned by Para-Kanakull Holduus OÜ, a joint venture between the Paraman Foundation and the Estonian state, to which the Air Force would pay rent for the use of the aircraft.



The Paraman Foundation acquires five KAI KF-21 Boramae fighters from South Korea. They will undergo avionics modifications in Poland to increase NATO compatibility. The armament will be purchased from Swedish stocks as needed (including Meteor missiles). In Estonian service, the fighter was given a new name Kanakull, or Goshawk.





The model is from Academy's kit. The digital camo is a generic FOX MODELS decals that were very difficult to work with. Painted with Vallejo's acrylics and finish is matt varnish.

[comrade harps]

I it!

[DogfighterZen]

Can't say i find that aircraft's design very attractive but that is a clean, good looking build. 

[NARSES2]

Terrific build and finish   

Mind you that digital camouflage does do my brains/eyesight in, but I suppose that's what it's supposed to do ? 

[Gondor]

Very nice build

[Dizzyfugu]

Nice! Estonia will probably never have enough budget for even a single one, but it looks very good! 

[Glenn Gilbertson]

That looks wonderful - even if it made me go cross-eyed!

I do wonder about the fashion for digital camouflage when the natural world is not ...

[Old Wombat]

That looks wonderful - even if it made me go cross-eyed!

I do wonder about the fashion for digital camouflage when the natural world is not ...

Because in the right environment (for the camo colour scheme) it can be extremely effective;






I can't find it anywhere, now, but there used to be a photo of (I think) an F-15 in a highly fractal experimental digital scheme in greys & blue-greys, in a slight banking turn taken from another aircraft a couple of hundred metres away, at most, & you could barely see that there was an aircraft there.

Highly fractal digital schemes use a grid of very small squares & blur out in human vision, creating a soft edge between colours & making it very difficult for the human brain to distinguish edges (with which it can give meaning to shapes). The problem is the high cost of applying them, so most schemes in use are "cheap" knock-offs that don't use as small a grid as should be used to get the proper effect.

Note: The black & tan in the digi-cam on the F-16 (obviously added digitally to the photo of the grey F-16) are the wrong colours to use in this environment, as they don't exist there, & actually reduce the effectiveness of the camo, better choices would have been a lighter green (black) & desert pink (tan).

[Dizzyfugu]

These advertising images are just photoshop imulations.  , ANY cammo that you use with colors extracted from the background will look impressive... There's a famous Bf 109E pic over Africa that's frequently posted/quoted for effective cammo, but the picture has such a reduced color depth and high contrast tht it merely consist of three tones or so. That's photoshop, but not the real world.
The selling point of fractal pattern is, though, that they are pretty good at disrupting object outlines, even though the effectiveness of a afst moving aircraft over landscape must be doubted. It's better e.g. for ground vehicles.

[Old Wombat]

In all honesty, Dizzy, most aircraft camo's are more about making them more difficult to see on the ground than they are about hiding them in the air.


PS: Actually, at least 3 of the images used are research images (non-military, as far as I can tell) to investigate the potential effectiveness of digi-cams. The F-15 I mentioned was a real aircraft from quite a lot of years ago, now.

[su27rules]

   Nice!!