In honour of my mate

[hrtpaul]

I couldn't remember where to put this so I'll chuck it here. I was greeted with some very sad news just over a week ago. A mate, Will, who frequented the Models and Hobbies 4 U meet and make sessions every Saturday that Brock and I attend passed away. Will was only 48. He was a very talented and avid armour/military modeller that took a liking to German vehicles. He dabbled in aircraft and ships as well. So all other modelling has been suspended and I'm building the 1/35 Tamiya Leopard A4 in his honour.



It'll be in German colours in keeping with Will's interests and OOB except for the main gun. I started this today and got quite a lot more done than I had anticipated. I'm enjoying this partiular, probably for the reasons already mentioned. Anyways here it is so far

Bloody road wheels. I now know why I don't do armour



The turret is almost finished



The upper and lower hull assembly is almost finished as well





I'll be continuing the build tomorrow after work and hopefully it'll be almost ready for paint by COB tomorrow. This is actually the most modelling I have done for a long time so hopefully it'll spur me on to get more shit done in the model room.

[hrtpaul]

More progress on Will's Leopard from Monday night. The roadwheels etc have all been painted in SMS Camo black.



The turret, upper and lower hulls have been primed in Mr Primer Surfacer 1500 black.



As I have just returned from Will's funeral, I'm gonna go out to the model room and continue the Leopard with hopefully a bit of colour being sprayed on. I'll be using Mr Hobby #78 Olive Drab (2) for the green as apparently it's a pretty good match and I also have quite a few bottles of it to use.

[Adam the Akrodude]

Sorry to learn of your loss Paul and what a fitting tribute.

[hrtpaul]

Cheers Adam.

Today was Will's funeral was pretty tough for me, let alone his lovely wife and family. After I got home I needed to GTFO of my head for a while so went out to the model room to continue on Will's Leopard. Once again I got a heaps done and further than I thought I would. First up was get the barrle onto the turret. The barrel is 3D printed and needed a little massaging to get it to fit. It looks way better than the kit one and even has the rifling in the end of it. After that it was time to add some colour to the tank. I painted a couple of spoons to compare some colours and settled on Gunze H78. As it was primed in black I thought I'd give the mottling thing a go as I'd never done it before to break up the big expanse of olive drab. I started by spraying a shit ton of H78 dots and squiggles all over it. I then added a slightly darker green (H80) to the mix and sprayed the dots and squiggles all over it again. So as you can see, it's a proper Leopard now with it's spots. This pic was early on in the mottling exercise as there were a crapload smaller dots etc by the time I'd finished



After the dots etc I sprayed thinned H78 all over attempting not to cover it all up completely. This kinda worked. I can tell the mottling is there but I did go a bit heavy in places. Next time I'll thin the paint even more so I can build it up slower.



I did a heap of detail painting which was time consuming but needed to be done. I'll let the paint dry for a few days before giving it a clear coat in preparation for decals. I also have a special touch in mind but I need to work out how to do it so I'll be keeping that under wraps for the moment. The biggest mission to do now it paint the rubber band tracks. This is going so well I might even finish it by next weekend and therefore my first completed build for the year.

[hrtpaul]

Well it's still not finished surprise surprise. Life and a double hernia operation put the brakes on for a bit. But a few days ago with a bit less pain I was able to get out to the model room with my little man to have another crack. The tracks were painted 3 different colours and come up pretty nicely. I then did a black pin wash over the whole tank and I'm very happy how that turned out. My first proper go with washes and it won't be my last. So here's some pics







So the next day (Let's call it Tuesday) I slapped the decals, all 12 of them, on and sealed them up.







I then gave the whole model a clear coat of Gunze H20 flat clear. I woulda used SMS lacquer flat clear but apparently in the vast expanse that is my paint collection I didn't have any. DOH Anyways it looks pretty good and tied the pin wash and marbled paint effect together fairly well. I did, however, forget to take pics of that stage. Then the last 2 days have been spent adding an antenna, repainting the mudflap thingys, fitting the machine gun, general paint touch ups and adding a special surprise that'll be under wraps till tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, I have a couple of flat clear touch ups to do and I shpould be able to call this tribute done. Hopefully finished pics will be up tomorrow

[RayS]

That is looking great Paul, your paint method worked well.

I have a Finnish Leopard 2A4 on the SOD which you have got me interested in getting finished. I think I will be trying your spot method on it and of course some washing.

[hrtpaul]

Cheers Ray. I strangely enjoyed building the Leopard but that may just because of the reason why I built it. I'll give another tank a crack I reckon. Your's is looking nice as mate. Look forward to seeing it done

[hrtpaul]

Ok I actually finished a model. 5-6 weeks from start to finish. It's amazing what happens when one pulls their finger out and stops f&^king around. Will's Leopard is done and I am very pleased with the results. It looks a lot better in person than the pics. This had a lot of firsts in it for me. My first tank, first time using panel line washes properly, first time using the mottling under the paint thingy and first time using my stencil cutter for letters instead of just circles. Speaking of the letters, I was shitting myself that I'd screw up the painting with my own masks cos I only had one shot at it. As Will was rather fond of German armour, I picked out a German font to use and luckily the words came out really nicely. Phew. The aftermarket resin gun looks way better than the crappy kit 1 ever could have. The gun and the self made antenna are the only things I used not OOB. The kit went together well but it is a Tamiya kit, albeit an old one. As much as I give target modellers as much shit as possible, I can see myself building another in the future. I'm hopefully taking it to Models and Hobbies 4 U tomorrow so it can be displayed with some of Will's other models. Finally, Will mate if you're looking down on us bud, I really hope you like the job I've done for you. RIP mate

[oz rb fan]

thats really nice mate....i'm sure he's proud.

[RayS]

It looks great finished Paul