Luftwaffe desert scheme masking

[yak face]

Ive been doing the Tamiya 1/72 BF109 e-7 trop in the background of other builds and its now got to the stage of painting . The scheme is the blue undersides and fuselage sides and desert sand top of fuselage and wings / tailplanes with the high demarcation. On top of this is the field applied green blotches . See pics below of the actual aircraft im doing
Now theres not a chance I can get the blotches that neat freehand with the airbrush , there would just be too much overspray ( it was ok on the fw 190 I did a bit back as that did have very fuzzy blotches )
I got an etched brass template ( Airwaves , now branded as Hannants) but the scale of the blotches was too small so I decided to make my own . Two hours later and heres what I have
I’m hoping that a few strategically placed tiny blobs of blue tack will hold it off the surface enough to avoid getting too hard an edge . And if it all goes wrong I’ll still have got a nice jigsaw to do !

 

[Andy T]

Cracking idea Tony. Look forward to seeing the end result.

 

[Allen Dewire]

You crazy Tony!!! I hope it works out for you though, Buddy...Optivisor 10x lens installed to see the result....................

Prost
Allen

 

[The Smythe Meister]

Ive been doing the Tamiya 1/72 BF109 e-7 trop in the background of other builds and its now got to the stage of painting . The scheme is the blue undersides and fuselage sides and desert sand top of fuselage and wings / tailplanes with the high demarcation. On top of this is the field applied green blotches . See pics below of the actual aircraft im doing View attachment 502421View attachment 502422
Now theres not a chance I can get the blotches that neat freehand with the airbrush , there would just be too much overspray ( it was ok on the fw 190 I did a bit back as that did have very fuzzy blotches )
I got an etched brass template ( Airwaves , now branded as Hannants) but the scale of the blotches was too small so I decided to make my own . Two hours later and heres what I have View attachment 502423View attachment 502424View attachment 502425
I’m hoping that a few strategically placed tiny blobs of blue tack will hold it off the surface enough to avoid getting too hard an edge . And if it all goes wrong I’ll still have got a nice jigsaw to do !

Yep,"Madman" for sure!! ...
Looking forward to seeing how it goes mind .

 

[Jim R]

Hope it works Tony. Certainly looks as if it should.

 

[rtfoe]

It'll work Tony as I had done that for my UHU in 1/72 scale. The difference is I used a burr chucked onto a motor drill for cutting the pattern.

Cheers,
Wabble

 

[Tim Marlow]

Interested to see how this pans out. Not the easiest of schemes I think…..

 

[Jakko]

Good solution. If I were you, I would test it first by holding the masks in front of a bit of cardboard and spraying through them — that way you can work out the best distance to have between them and the model without having to repaint the model right away if you get it badly wrong

 

[yak face]

Good solution. If I were you, I would test it first by holding the masks in front of a bit of cardboard and spraying through them — that way you can work out the best distance to have between them and the model without having to repaint the model right away if you get it badly wrong

Yes , definitely going to have a practice jakko , a ballpark guess is 2 or 3 mm off the surface should be about right . Cheers tony

 

[Flip]

View attachment 502423View attachment 502425

Excellent idea.
I've never had the courage to tackle that sort of camo scheme and was wondering how it's done.
Now I know

 

[rickoshea52]

When me and my (then 6 year old) daughter did something like that, she used a cotton bud dipped in paint, excess removed then dabbed on with the end of the bud perpendicular to the surface.

 

[Del640]

I've just done a BF with a dapple/Mottled effect..

I've used airbrushing before but just recently I've used a small piece of foam(the type you get in the kitchen to wash up with the scrubber on one side)

Cut it triangular and keep dabbing the sponge onto card until you get the look you want.

Or..

I have cut brush bristles down and squared of and again dab until required mottle got.

Del

 

[yak face]

Made a start with this today , using tiny blobs of blu tack to hold the templates off the surface by a couple of mm. Quite pleased with how it looks , just needed a bit of a smudge with a cotton bud in places where the blu tack had left a clean patch . The next bit might be trickier though , the fuselage is far from flat so I might have to do it in stages .

 

[minitnkr]

.....by George I think he's got it.....

 

[Easyrider5258]

That worked well, ,going to pinch your idea for some future Luftwaffe camo schemes

 

[Steve-the-Duck]

That looks pretty good, without too much scatter. Certainly looks like the photo effect

 

[spanner570]

.....by George I think he's got it.....

...yes, by George I think he has!

 

[SteveT]

What a great idea and it works brilliantly too! I need to file this in my brain for later use.

 

[Andy T]

That looks to have worked out very well!

 

[The Smythe Meister]

Made a start with this today , using tiny blobs of blu tack to hold the templates off the surface by a couple of mm. Quite pleased with how it looks , just needed a bit of a smudge with a cotton bud in places where the blu tack had left a clean patch . The next bit might be trickier though , the fuselage is far from flat so I might have to do it in stages . View attachment 504050View attachment 504051View attachment 504052View attachment 504053View attachment 504054View attachment 504055

That's just showing off that is!!