1/144 RAAF P51 (Minicraft)

This is my first 1/144 model.i normaly build 1/72 1/48 and 1/35 kits of all kinds.i got this kit off ebay for free.they sent me a $5 gift card and i purchased this kit with it.

I replaced the decals with aftermarker decals from ebay.i decided on Royal Australian Airforce decals as i am Australian and they were close buy in Melbourne and were delivered in 5 days.As Covid is rampant at the moment i am having trouble importing things from the US so i chose to buy the decals from Australia this time.

The kit went together very well and quick.i have a very unique way of painting my models.i only use a brush.no air brush.i paint everything flat black with Humbrol enamel.i then use a dry brushing technique to slowly build up the main colours.i use this technique so panel lines and other details can clearly be seen.i then normaly mix white with the main color and lightly dry brush the raised details giving a weathered finish.i then use Tamiya Acrilics for washes.mainly Flat Black and Flat Red Brown for panel lines.

With this kit i didn't have to do any dry brushing or washes as the panel lines were very visible and this model was so small weathering was pointles.

The thing i want to make clear was how terrible the canopy was.after making a beutiful model i went to grab the kit canopy and found it was very bad.it was missing all frame detail.i was very unhappy so i came up with a solution that worked well.i used Tamiya masking tape painted silver and made the frames myself.the results were aceptable.i was realy disappointed that i had produced a lovely model only to have it ruined by a realy bad canopy so i pondered for a while and came up with the solution.

Also to note is on the wings the machine gun barrels are missing.wich is very disappointing.but i produced a nice model in the end.

4 additional images. Click to enlarge.