I started the Maggie last night and have been working on her on and off for a couple of hours. I’ll update as I go along as I’ll be trying some new (to me) techniques borrowed from military armour modelling (thanks Uncle Nightshift amongst others). So far I have cleaned her up drilled and pinned and sorted into sub assemblies. The base has been detailed and I’m waiting on my beloved crackle paste to dry and do it’s thing. Sub assemblies. Dry fitted. Held together by pins and gravity. I haven’t decided if I’m going to pin the ‘arm’ baffle plates yet. I’m on holiday with the family tomorrow so I won’t get much done for a week or so now.
Crackle paste, the morning after. Love this stuff! Apply a thick layer, about double what you think you’re going to need, and wait for the magic. The thicker it goes on, the bigger the cracks.
In my experience, something that helps a lot with crackle paste is undercoating the surface to be covered with it, in PVA, varnish, Mod Podge or something like that, the flakes adhere much harder, and it tends to crackle better sometimes. Also, you can mix the paste with some ink (not paint) to give it color so that it isn't white if it breaks or chips afterwards.
Back from a week away and making slow progress. Still priming the mini, but the base is done. Washes, various drybrush applications, some tufts, and a mix of pastel pigments.
Priming is just about done. A couple of experiments going on here. The first being the christening of my H&S CR+ Infinity airbrush. Getting used to a double action trigger again after using my single action Badger for a while has been interesting. It’s a bit like driving a new car for the first time and getting used to the biting point of the clutch. This lead to a couple of spidering issues, but that’s not a problem because... My other experiments is marbling or black base priming (or one of several other names) as used in the scale model building hobby. Unlike zenithal priming, or black and white priming/preshading (prime white and then black line the panels lines) the model is primed black and then is selectivity oversprayed with white in a cloudy mottled pattern, not solid white. The idea being, when you start putting on top coats they look discoloured, uneven, faded, and sun bleached. We shall see if I pull it off... Here are the main body components, imagine the limbs look similar but are on the end of sticks
My wonderful wife took pity on me and upgraded my phone! Hopefully that will reflected in my photos I have started laying down the first base coat and I'm liking the effect so far. I have also discovered, even at very low pressure, there is such a thing as thinning airbrush paint too far...
I haven’t given up, I have just been short of play time About 75% of the masking has been done, I’ll be back when I can with a proper update with pictures etc.
After what has felt like an eternity, the masking is done. Many lessons learned, far too much tape used. Now to get some more paint on it...
Metallics laid down. Gunmetal grey base, highlighted up through from gunmetal to steel. Shadows enhanced with black ink. Satin varnished as a 'save point'. Started peeling away the masking. When that's done the rest will get satin varnish too.
All peeled and dry fitted. Just pins and gravity holding it together for now. A bit of a clutz with tweezers removing the tape, but not a big issue as the scratches will disappear under chipping and weathering in the end...
Some markings added in white to break up the monotones, 'canopy' painted black for similar reasons. I'm getting better at masking... Oil washes applied which will be left to dry overnight before beginning the chipping. Still not glued together
And so it begins... This light chipping, representing paint damage which hadn't gone through to the underlying metal. This also conveniently edge highlights the piece. The whole mini is going to take several hours, then the heavy chipping follows.
Just a quick pic to give you a general idea of the before and after with the light chipping. Left side of the picture has been chipped, the right still to do.
