As promised elsewhere in the forums, here's my newly-finished Tamiya Rufe. This kit first came in 1973! My boxing is from around '89 if I remember correctly. This model started out as part of series of 1/48 builds to practice my cockpit painting and detailing on - an area where I have felt I've been a bit weak. I feel I've improved to my own satisfaction in that area now, so during the course of the build the main goal shifted to practicing my weathering - another area I'm not particularly strong in. Inspired by Matt McDougall's experiments with 'black basing', I decided to go for that grungy, patchy look. I've usually found it hard to achieve anything more than a badly painted look, but something clicked with this one, and it's turned out almost exactly as I saw it in my mind's eye. So on that score alone I'm very pleased with it.
These WW2 Japanese aircraft certainly make great subjects to practice weathering on! If anything, I was probably aiming for something a little more extreme than I ended up with, as I feel I need to overcome a certain amount of timidity when it comes to weathering. Maybe next time!
Kev
