SPA Modeler

Yes, we all have to eat, and provide for ourselves and possibly others as well. And give them our time and attention.

I don’t know about the art department filling my needs, but I sure would not mind an archive where I could delve into history... photos and written records to answer questions that go with my projects... the internet has more and more of that with time. But one has to sort thru so much crud to get to the nuggets that are most wanted...

Our drug is in our mind... whichever project becomes all consuming until completion of the vision....

You got that right, Carlos.

I didn’t end up salt fading this guy. The prospect of trying to clean salt and salt residue out of all the various places within the joints and surface detail that it could hide was overwhelming, and the effort/benefit analysis wasn’t looking good.

So instead I very heavy-handedly dot faded this with Raw Sienna and plain old White oil paints. I got a nice dusty, sub-faded effect. Also, I addressed the fans and vents in the rear, spraying them gently with NATO Black and then Hull Red. They’ll get a touch of orange rust pigment later on during pigments time. What else, OH! Weapon systems also got painted. I think they look much better now than when they were plain black. I’m waiting for the oils to cure, and the enamel on the weapons to dry, then she’ll get a clear coat and the washes will commence, and those guns out to look real nice afterward. Lots of details on those to pull out.

What else? The decals faded down nicely with the dot fading. I’m happy about that. And I started working on dirtying the feet as well.

Okay, here she is:

The oils toned the desert sand down a lot. Much better now!

Yes sir! That’s one thing I was banking on. And I’m glad it worked the way I was hoping it would.

Wow, I just finished reading all this. I am also fairly artistic, but I don't know that I ever went to that extent dreaming about something or constantly thinking about it while insomniac. Still, your doing so shows how incredibly important it is for you and how effective it is in helping you get such outstanding and realistic results. I guess it doesn't work for me because I do so many projects at once. LOL!

This is now becoming even more impressive with every post. I myself might have called it done by now since it looks so; but I know that somehow with your mad skills, you're going to improve this even more beyond my expectations.

Thank you Duke, sincerely. It is certainly starting to *feel* done, but there are still a few things left I’d like to do. The back definitely needs a wash, and so does the top of the midsection. The legs, not so much. Those I think would be better off staying as-is. And I’d like to do some dry brushing on some of the cable and hoses. And pigments for the feet. But that’s the kind of stuff that’s small, we can knock out that kind of thing in an afternoon.

It’ll be complete very soon.

Oh, there is one other thing-

Some of the oils enhanced the sides of the decals. Thick carrier film... I need to clean that up, and then determine whether I want to roll the dice with a flat coat and hope that makes the underlying issue- the step from the thick carrier film, disappear or at least be less obvious, OR just remove those and use a set of numbers from my spares. I’m not too worried about that though. As we know from prior decal mishaps, these things only cause temporary frustration, and are solvable.

Ironically, I ended up using crosses off a Tamiya decal sheet because the Peddinghaus ones were out of register. LOL Tamiya crosses. Who’d have thought they’d come through for me after frustrating me so much with my current Emil!

Hell, man, if worse comes to worse I can strip the white off the panels, strip the decals, then cut masks, and paint those on there. I am partial to the red numerals. The red sure looks nice on there.