E-75 What-if

E-75  What-if ......Berlin 1946


Although I am not a big fan of what-if and paper panzer models, I just couldn't resist when My good friend and fellow club member, Steve Reid, asked if I would be interested in painting the one he is working on.

Steve's love for scratch building and what-if models shows when you see the models he builds, awesome and talented. Steve has done a full build blog on this model, and can be seen here.

With the building part of this project done, the model was handed over to me at our last club meeting, and the model is now at my rust factory waiting to be painted.









 




Next update will be with the primer hopefully on.


After giving the model a quick once over to check for anything that needs fixing, it was time to slap some paint on this monster.


I started by giving the entire model two light coats of primer grey. When dry I painted the lower hull a dark rust color using Lifecolor paints. The reason for this is that there will be lots of chipping and rust showing on the lower hull.



The turret received some rust paint that was left in the air brush, no need to waste paint. When all was dry I started painting the gun barrel first, using various shades of grey and black.





Next came a primer red color from Poly scale on the mantlet.



The lower hull received the same primer red, and this was applied using the  Color modulation technique.





I then set the lower hull aside to dry and worked on the turret. The main camo color applied is the Panzer Gelb using Tamiya paints and again the CM technique.



I let the PG dry an hour or so, then started masking for the first camo color. I used an old method for this, blue tack. The stuff works really good and usually does not pull the paint off. One of the advantages of using blue tack is that you can form it around corners and curves.



I decided to go with a dark green for the first camo color, again using Tamiya paints and thinned with their Lacquer Thinner.



Once the dark green was dry it was time for the second color, a greyish green.



When all was dry it was time to see how it turned out. Other than some touch up work it came out the way I had hoped. Once the washes and filters are applied, the colors will be toned down some.










In the next three photos the turret has been set on the hull to get an idea of how the tank will look.







The turret and hull will be set aside to dry completely for at least 48 hours before starting any other painting or weathering.


11-02-10

After letting the paint cure over night, I then went and removed the paint in the rear section of the lower hull. This is the area that burned so there will be lots of effects to replicate the burn and rusted metal. The chipping is the beginning of the process, more will follow once all the filters, washes and streaking is applied.

To add some life to the model and break up all the Red Oxide Primer I decided to add some factory chalk marks, and some bare metal areas such as the plate that holds the Driver and RO hatches.

I started to add some silver to the weld beads, in this case an aluminum colored pencil was used instead of paint. The chalk marks were done with a white grease pencil.











Still much more to do on the hull.


11-04-10

The lower hull was set aside to dry before I could work on it again, so I moved onto the turret.

I applied the standard wash and filter treatment to the turret, nothing new just the normal oil paint and thinner mix. I used a hair dryer to help speed up the drying time , or at least enough so I could continue with some weathering.

With the filter/wash dry it was time to add some chipping to the turret. Since the turret has a three tone camo scheme I went with scratches and chips using Vallejo acrylic paints. The important thing to remember is not to get carried away with the chipping, in other words don't over do it. Also keep them small, it looks much more realistic than blobs of paint made to look like chips.




The acrylic paints dry quickly and so without wasting time I moved onto the fading of the paint. I don't use this technique very often because in my opinion it does not look very real. A filter with oil paints, or dry brushing can give a much better effect. But since I wanted to use as many techniques as possible for the fun of it,  and to show what you CAN do with these techniques.

So I broke out the trusty 502 Abteilung oil paints from MIG productions, and spotted the hull with various colors.



With a brush dampened with mineral spirits I removed the oil spot in a vertical motion, up and down. The trick is to try not to blend each of the colors, but to form vertical streaks with each of the shades of oils. If you blend the colors you end up with basically a filter, same concept as the filter. Try to keep the darker colored oils in the shadow areas, and the lighter colors on the raised areas. By doing this you create sort of a color modulation, also similar to the filter effect.
Another important thing to remember is not to apply any blue to the lighter colored paint, here the panzer yellow. By doing so you get a green tint to the yellow.



In the above and below images you can make out the various streaks and fading on the turret.




The next thing to do is apply the chipping using a dark color, in this case I used Vallejo Camo brown. This was applied onto the lighter colored chips I added earlier. I also added some here and there on the flat areas, and these will then get rust streaks later on in the weathering process.




Same procedure as last time, set the turret aside and let the oil fading dry, and start with the hull again.

I decided at this point to paint the added on armor plates bolted to the Glacis, or bow of the tank. These bolted on plates were originally the rear plates of T-34's, with the center filler piece from the side of a T-34. With this in mind a shade of green was chosen, along with a shade a bit lighter.

Before the paint was applied I masked of the surrounding area with blue painters tape with some extra masking tape helping out. With the area masked I then applied two good coats of HS (hairspray) , enough to build a layer but not to flood the details. A hairdryer helps dry the hairspray, then we mix some green paint.



The armor plates have received a coat of green paint using the various Tamiya paints shown in the photo below. This will be set aside to dry a bit before removing the paint, forming chips.




Once the paint was dry, I used some stiff brushes and tap water to remove some of the paint around the edges of the plates, along with the original tanks exhaust outlets.

I very light filter was the applied followed by a wash. Both of these were done using MIG oil paints. I then added some silvering to the welds just to make them stand out.





A few images of the turret mounted on the hull to get a picture of what the model will looks like.

These will be set aside to dry overnight before applying a coat of clear acrylic to seal things for the next stage in the weathering.






11-05-10

Weathering with AK Interactive and MIG Production products.

The AK products are still very new, at least to me, and I have been dying to try them out ever since I received some samples from AK Interactive USA. I will be trying all the weathering products out and doing a revieve here on my review page soon.

I started with the Streaking grime. The paints are of thin consistency, between a wash and regular paint and are enamels. It seems that it is a mix between oils and regular enamel paints, which allows for more working time. This is evident in the fact that you can let it dry 30 minutes and go back and do the streaking with a damp brush,awesome.

I started by applying some heavy streaks at the top of the turret sides and let it dry a half hour. This is where I got a bit nervous, would it stay like this or maybe leave tide marks !!!!!!!






After letting it sit and dry for the half hour I used a wide thinner dampened brush to streak the grime in a vertical motion. This was then dried with a hair dryer and I then went to work on the lower part of the turret.
Here I mixed AK015 Dust effects and AK014 Winter Streaking Grime to get a grayish green color. Again I let this dry for 30 minutes before doing the streaking with the damp brush.



I repeated the process with both until I was happy with the results. An important thing to remember, as with most weathering techniques, is not to over do it. It's always best to to do a little at a time in order to get the best results.






Now that the experimenting with the turret was done, it was time to do the hull. I had planned early on in the painting that the Red Oxide primer hull would get some serious weathering in order to break up the all red color. The streaking was to play a big role in the weathering as would the dust and dirt.

As with the turret, I started with the AK 012 Streaking Grime on the upper edge of the hull.



After a 30 minute drying period, I started the streaking with a dampened brush. So here is how the grime streaks look on red primer.


 
Next came the same mix as used on the lower section of the turret, AK014 and AK015.



Here are the results of the first layers of grime. Once dry I will then add more if it needs it in areas.



The following two images show the turret and hull together, with grime streaks. Onto the weathering with MIG products.



To dust up the model I used MIG pigments in earth and dust tones. Sorry I forgot to add them in the pics.Since this is to be a knocked out tank  I used MIG black pigments to replicate the soot around the hatch openings.




The next update will be on the rear section of the tank where the the tank burned.

Don't forget, this blog is also on my forum, feel free to follow along and post your comments there.

http://myforum.scratchmod.com/user/categories.aspx


11-09-10  

After working on the model for a couple of days I have made some headway. I first started by doing the burnt area of the rear hull.

I started by giving the burnt out area a light misting of clear smoke from Tamiya to start the sooting process.



Next up came a couple of like coats of hairspray sprayed from the airbrush.



To replicate the burnt ashy paint often seen in pics as a white chalk color, I decided to try some thing different from what I usually do. I mixed some Tamiya flat white and deck tan to an off white color. I wanted to stay away from a pure white as this is too bright in color. Using a stretched out scouring pad I sprayed the off white paint with low air pressure. The reason for the pad is to not get an even finish as you would when applying a coat of paint.



Once the white was dry enough, I started removing the white using a stiff brush and warm tap water.

Below are the results of the ash chipping of the burnt area. That kind of sounds like something else eh,hmm.











The next thing to do was add some more black soot using MIG Productions Grimy Black. This was applied in the burnt area using a large soft brush.




Work on the E75 continues on the next page. You can follow this link or go back to he beginning of the current project page.