I finally got this baby assembled and primed with a rust red primer. I agonized over the paint scheme for days and finally decided on a desert theme using the weathering technique I posted
here. The light brown would contrast with the rust red primer to make the weathering stand out. The above pic shows the salt still in place after airbrushing. I know top picture is out of order, but the primer pic doesn't draw attention.
The above pic shows the top of the model after the hairspray and salt were applied to the primer. At this point the bottom of the flyer had been airbrushed with a cream color. I wanted the bottom to be totally different using camouflage of sky when seen from below and camouflage of the desert when seen from above.
Above pic shows the bottom taped off before starting the airbrushing of the camo on top of the flyer. This is the part of the project where you learn some valuable lessons. DO NOT RUSH THE PROJECT. However, I didn't follow this rule because the fall weather was nice and I wanted to get at it. So within a half hour of airbrushing the bottom I removed the salt and taped it up. Do not do this in the same day or maybe even couple days, especially on resin models where even with good cleaning practices the paint doesn't adhere great. This was also in the same day as applying the hairspray which is another no-no. Either way, I went on to airbrush the top, then upon removing the tape, removed most of the bottom paint as well. This really sucked and I had to re-paint the majority of the bottom with a brush. Not cool.
Above pic shows flyer with the airbrushed camo before removal of the salt. This was pretty tough, as I'm extremely new to the airbrushing thing and really wanted it to come out awesome. For the most part, I am very happy with the desert camo except for a couple places that I won't tell you about. Also, in this shot you can see most of the steel gaming stand I made and mentioned in the 2nd part of this series.
Above shows the technique I used to removed the salt and do additional weathering. I used a toothpick dipped in warm water to removed the salt. For the really stubborn ones, I would pool a little water around it and wait a few seconds. This would make it release easily. Be careful though, to much water and the thin airbrushed coat of paint can lift completely from the primer. I then rubbed the hard edges with the same damp toothpick as shown. This would leave a great little worn line along any edge. This took a half hour or so, but gave a great look overall, adding to the weathering from the salt. If you look closely there are a few places where this removed all paint including primer. I touched up these spots with a brush and some paint mixed to closely match the rust red primer.
Another shot of the weathering before blacking out any of the details.
A closeup of even more of the weathering down to the hard edges.
A last shot showing the entire flyer after final weathering, but before any details were worked on. Next up would come the brush work, blacking out everything and adding some metals.
In the next installment of this series I will show the pilot and Epic Falcons painted for the base. I also received my weathering powders in the mail and am itching to get a little time to experiment with those to add some additional weathering and exhaust blackening. Hope you're liking how this project is shaping up, I know I'm wanting to put this large project in the done pile so I can get back on some little guys(time permitting of course).
