flight deck color

[Vlad]

Steve, excellent work, I took the time to re-read your thread and I am impressed with the flight deck technique. Having said that, I'm building in 1/700 so masking the tie-down strips may be impractical and/or sanity-destroying.

The ship on my bench at the moment looks very similar to yours, except the pennant numbers is 38. This actually helps since Shangri-la only wore that camouflage during shakedown and transit to the Pacific so a pristine deck would be accurate for the time period I'm modelling. I did try to get some weathering down by rubbing the deck with beige and tan pencils. It actually looked pretty good right up until I coated the deck in gloss in preparation for adding the decals. The pencil didn't smudge so much as completely dissolve and disappear! A few areas of the deck do look like they have a tan "shadow" but there is no visible plank effect.

Anyway the decals are on now so it's too late to go back and change it, but as I said I'm happy with a pristine ship in this particular instance. I went for a blue somewhere between 5-O and 5-S with the excuse that the shipyard might still be using the old, lighter Stain 21 and that it would fade in the sun.

I do want to try a modified version of your technique on two future projects, a Yorktown CV-5 and Tamiya's new Saratoga. I'll go with the blue-wood-blue painting, then sand without masking, then try to pick out the tie-down strips with a blue wash (assuming the engravings on the deck are deep enough for this to work).

[ModelMonkey]

Vlad, your Shangri La sounds fantastic. Glad you have enjoyed the build. It is a shame that your penciling technique disappeared but "pristine during shakedown" would look great, too.

[canx2k]

Wow steve, amazing. Really, wow.

How did you plank it? Individual wood, or a plywood with clever painting or...? I am looking for a how to for my 1:144 HMS Puncher but to no avail. I'd really rather not end up photo printing it and epoxy over top because that would be...cheating in my view haha!

[profalexandre]

I also used Tamiya "German Grey" and I think it came out perfect.


I sprayed German Grey, did my oil wash, then pastels, then a few coats of Future clear with Tamiya flat base.
I think it's as close as I could get.

Hi!
How did you make those little marks all over the flight deck, where they fix the planes?

[MrTsquare]

The "official" colors are direct matches to the following Model Master paints (enamels and acrylics):

Haze Gray = Neutral Gray FS36270
Deck Gray = Gunship Gray FS36118
Flight Deck Gray = Engine Gray FS35076

The only difference being that at least for Haze Gray, the USN uses a semi-gloss paint instead of flat but you could always fix that with a clear coat if you want total accuracy.

Hope that helps.

Currently doing the 1/700 STENNIS. Glad to get the "official" colors for the flight deck. My question is about the appropriate colors for the catapults and the ramp. The photos on the calling all fans carrier part of this site show either darker or lighter catapults/covers. Realize that the lighting and and angle of the photos are a big part of the appearance, but just wonder what the should be. Fs26270 haze gray? Fs36118 dec gray? BTW, believe the flight deck gray should be Fs36076 vice what is shown above. Also, should the ramp and the barrier post covers be the 36118 deck gray or ??

Tom