The plan for today was to get all three planes weathered and ready for final assembly. A plan grew in my mind where I would try three levels of weathering on these planes: heavy, medium, and light. I also wanted to experiment with some new weathering ideas.
I started with the desert Hudson. I thought the lighter color was a little too yellow and bright, so I decided some heavy weathering might fix the problem. The plane with the standard camo would get the medium weathering, and the non-standard green camo would rely only on preshading to give it some character. I really like weathering with artist oils, which I normally apply over a flat-painted surface. There is good and bad news about applying this type of weathering to a flat surface. Good news: the flat surface has tooth that allows the weathering to grab on to. Bad news: the flat surface has tooth that often grabs on to the oils and makes them impossible to blend. :o)
I started with the heavy weathering. I wanted to try to apply some heavily thinned sand color to the entire plane. This would lighten and modulate the camo colors. I planned to use heavily thinned acrylics that I would apply in very thin layers. The problem was that the layers were going on very wet and I didn't notice how much I had applied until the weathering started to dry. Well, I may have applied a touch too much. Then another idea hit the fan. I might be able to wipe off some of the weathering and create some interesting weathering patterns that matched some of the heavily weathered planes I have seen in photos. Plain water didn't do anything to the weathering, so I mixed a little bit (about 10%) of alcohol with the water. This did the trick, and I was getting some really cool looking effects. The problem that emerged was that the weathering was embedded in the flat surface of the paint, and I reached a point where continued work with the water/alcohol started to lift the underlying paint of the camo. So, I did what I could and called it "good". I did get some cool effects and I plan to leave it as it is. I applied a little additional weathering with oils, and moved on to the next plane.
The second plane was done using artist oils. I usually apply light dots of the oil paint where I want it to be, then lightly blend them into the surface using a dry brush, after a few minutes drying, I then complete the blending with odorless Turpenoid. I like Turpenoid because it dries flat.
Plane number three has some cool preshading that shows through the gray/green paint. It is staying just like it is.
I plan to add some exhaust stains and machine gun soot tomorrow, and then add all the last bits, and call these complete. I have some family stuff tomorrow, but I hope to find time to finish all three planes. Cheers everyone.
14 attached images. Click to enlarge.
