Thanks guys!
Indeed, it has been two months already�
Probably I haven�t posted any updates yet because, frankly, everything is looking rather ugly at the moment�
The base-coated model is always my least favourite stage of a model. It lacks all the life, depth and sharpness that subsequent layers of paint will add.
But anyway, it may be better to also show this stage, because it is of course part of the process. Ugly is not necessarily uninteresting�
And anyway, base-coating also has it challenges. And for this project, it is proving to be quite a lot of work too.
The first month, I have been airbrushing. And the last month, I have been correcting and refining the airbrushed colours by brush, and base-coating details by brush. And it will still take me some time to get that finished�
I actually spent most of the airbrushing time by masking. This is Le Redoutable, masked for the black to be airbrushed, which is the 5th of 6 colours (after in that order: the lower deck tan, interior white, ochre sides, and yellow stern and bow. And before a dark brown base for the lower hull copper sheeting):
There is a lot of difficult detail to mask, requiring lots of tiny pieces cut from masking tape, and therefore lots of time:
A lot of detail is too small to mask, so I just mask it of completely and add the black detail by brush later, like here on the quarter gallery:
An illustration of how masking and airbrushing only gets you part way there.
I masked and airbrushed the larger black areas on the stern of Le Redoutable (as a reminder of the scale: the mounting handle at the bottom is a regular size toothpick):
But here you can see that the edges still need a lot of corrections and tidying up. That is much of what I�m doing at the moment.
I also had some trouble with paint lifting with the masking tape:
Worst was on Le Redoutable after spraying the black, because I had left the previous layers of tape on too long (4 or 5 days):
I used the yellow Tamiya tape and reduced the tack of it even further, but now I learned to leave it on the model only for 1 day maximum, not more!
Anyway, every (modelling) problem has a solution!
I hand-painted the �naked� spots:
This mostly served to stabilize the fragile edges of the flaked areas (and was good exercise to match the colours), because of course the edges of the flakes will still show:
Solution: sanding the edges, and overpainting again. And repeating if necessary.
Sanding is done, and I�m now in the process of painting.
I left the stern and quarter galleries of Victory completely in ochre. All black areas and details were added by brush. Simply easier and faster�
Here, the lower counter is hand-painted, and the black behind the balusters, and the black stripes in the mouldings above and below the balusters. Some black paint (actually dark grey) of course already crept in the detail of the balusters, but proper shading (and highlighting) will follow later.
Here, most of the black areas have been painted, following the raised detail of the model. On the lower corners, additional detail still has to be painted on. Also the raised detail will receive shading and highlighting later on, which should add to their sharpness.
And finally an example of how hand-painting detail is not a matter of a superhuman steady hand and precision, but mostly of correcting again and again until you are happy with the result.
Here, you can see plenty of blue smudges on the ochre and black, even though I painted as precisely as I could:
Solution: paint over the smudges with the ochre and black paint. And then overpaint in blue again the ochre and black smudges that were inevitable made on the blue. And so on�
The painting of the blue stripes on the beakhead timbers followed the same process.
Again, all of these details will receive shading later on, which will sharpen them, and the borders between colours.
