Haven't posted in a long time. I have been experimenting with the type of finish I'm going to use on this model. I've decided I'm going to make this thing pretty worn out. Evidently, Russia has spent 600 million dollars on refurbishing their MiG-31s. This one is going to represent one that is about to go into the MiG spa for a facelift. The pictures you see here are not of the 31, but of a test Su-27 that I purchased a while back.I used the salt technique to blister/wear/chip the paint. I used Mr Paint gray primer and Alclad black under areas that would show metal. I let that dry for a few minutes, then pre-shaded using Mr Paint Black. I sprayed a few different metallics from AK and Alclad randomly. After those cured, I misted the model with water and sprinkled slat on it from a grinder in order to get varying sizes of granules. Once that was dry, I sprayed a Mr Paint Lemon Gray and yellow primer at random while trying to get good coverage. I rinsed the salt off after that coat dried and repeated the salt procedure on the yellow. I then sprayed Mr Paint Traffic Gray and rinsed the salt off again. I used a 3600 grit sanding pad to carefully remove some bumps and salt residue and to thin down the Traffic gray so that the yellow would show through. I applied a spare Red Star and applied some Mr Softer so that it would adhere well to the paint. After the decal dried, I sanded it down with a medium grit sanding stick. Panel line washes, stains and other stuff were then applied. I coat of Alclad matte was then sprayed to seal things up. My impression of this test is that the Mr Paint Traffic gray is too light and doesn't offer enough contrast with the yellow and metal. The shades are all too subtle and a little boring. I think that in the end, I will either darken the Traffic Gray or used a more neutral darker gray that I'll lighten. I like the effect created by the salt, but it did leave some residue that I didn't see making the surface a bit too rough in spots. There is no need to use Alclad black primer in this case.
2 attached images. Click to enlarge.