1/48 MiG.-21UM/bis – Croatian Air Force
These are my first two kits I built 3 years ago. Nothing special really, rookie work, no aftermarket parts, no preshading, no postashading, bad weathering and decal silvering, but both planes are in nice and unusual color scheme so I thought I could give it a propper photoshoot and post it here.
Both kits have inaccuracies experienced rivet counters will find
Nr. 165 is UM version by Trumpeter, painted in display red/white squares color scheme.
Nr. 131 is bis version by Eduard (weekend edition) painted in standard CAf two tone grey scheme (after modernization in 2013). Old buckets are still in service (more or less) and waiting to be replaced with something younger.
Two unique and superbly finished builds, Boris...great work!
Sorry to disagree, looking from this end they don’t look like rookie stuff at all. Both kits have very appealing markings, and look the part
They look good on pics, but there are quite few things I'd do differently today. I did these with enamel paints which I hate, could not do preshading with cheap $30 airbrush, did not know I'm supposed to apply gloss coat prior applying decals, so I got silvering on nr. 131, did not know how to apply wash, placed roundels in wrong position...
Wow. What a beautiful pair of MiGs. Really, you are more talented than you believe, Boris.
Excellent.
‘Liked’
Bit of advice, Boris...please don’t be so hard on yourself. You know what real war is like. Model for fun, you have a lot of talent, and many years ahead to use it.
čuvaj se, prijatelju!
Don't worry David, I get all the fun I can from modeling. I'm not hard on myself, it's just natural process of learning and evolving with time. I guess every modeller sees mistakes when looking at his past builds. Meanwhile, all my models are equaly valuable parts of my collection.
1 attached image. Click to enlarge.
Good to hear, Boris. Good man.
Fine work, Boris. I like them both, but the red & white one is so very striking. You did a GREAT job masking everything on it.
Bravo!
Great work Boris. Two wonderful colorschemes, specialy the red/white one. You don't see that version build so much.
Looking forward to your next project.
Always liked the MiG-21 (who doesn't?) and I find the Croatian paint scheme "well suited" for it. The red/white checkerboard UM is really unique and remembers me a space rocket from a 1950 sci-fi illustration! Hope they will keep it operative as long as possible!
Keep on getting fun from modeling and thanks for sharing that fun with us through these pictures.
Very nice brace of -21's, Boris! My early builds look like toys, but you gotta start somewhere! I still have almost all my early builds in my display cabinets - mileposts along the modeling journey.
I wish my first two kits looked as good as these do. 🙂
Really nice work, Boris.
Hey Boris, nice work! where did you get the decals from for 165? it is not part of the Trumpeter kit right?
I was lucky to get one of the last of Model Maker decals few years ago. I don't think they're available any more.
1 attached image. Click to enlarge.