[Finished] Airfix 1-72 Supermarine Spitfire MKIA

[aussiejuggalo]

Thought I'd do a little build log thingy on this Spitfire I'm doing , this is the first model I've done in about 5 years and also the first time I've heavily used my airbrush for modelling (so its not going to be the greatest).

I did start building before I decided to do this build log so... oops .

Tools

First up the tools, pretty much all my old supplies of paint, glues etc were set rock solid so I decided to buy all new stuff, still using a crappy Chinese airbrush and cheap paintbrushes atm so the paint jobs aren't the greatest, I also had some problems with tip dry while spraying the primer so it hasn't gone down as nice as it probably should of.

As you can see I'm using AK paints, Badger Stynylrez primer, as many Ultimate products as I could get my hands on (suck up much? ) and some essential tools I was missing.

The Model

Airfix 1-72 Supermarine Spitfire MKIA, was nice and cheap so I thought what the hell.

The Build

My awesome setup .



The pilot, he's so tiny I'm amazed I was even able to paint him.



All painted before his black wash.

I didn't have the navy blue for the uniform so I made my own with the RAF Azure Blue and some black, didn't turn out to bad I suppose, the other colours I used was matte black, RAF middle stone yellow, brown leather, white & light flesh.





The black wash, came out pretty good considering I made it using black paint and thinning it down heaps (was in between the consistency of milk and water), I'll buy a proper wash after this model I think.





Inside the fuselage, not 100% sure how detailed I want to go with this just yet, I may paint the handles and stuff on the walls I may not, I will be painting the tanks tho.

Used the Aircraft grey green for this and the cockpit (I'm guessing it's right).



The cockpit on the other hand I will be painting as detailed as I possible can with the paints I have.





That's all I've got so far, I'll be painting the cockpit and inner fuselage today once the green dries, then I spend some time gluing, filling and re-scribing the fuselage.

I think the hardest part of this model for me will be the camo, still haven't worked out how I'm going to do it but I think that white tack I bought will probably be the way I go.

[aussiejuggalo]

Got some more work done.

Inner fuselage is done, I didn't end up painting the other parts inside. The missing paint is from trying to fit the cockpit, stupid things being a pain and not going in.



Cockpits also done, I'm pretty happy with how the leather turned out, it's kind of hard to see but I did it 3 colours to give it some depth, dark brown, brown and light brown and with the satin clear it looks pretty good.



Decal went on a bit screwy but I can live with it.



Was a bit hard to get the wash out from the floor which I'm not to happy about but it'll be hard to see once its in anyway.





I had a little disaster with the pilot, he got stuck in a hole in the painting stand and I kinda ruined the paint on his head and face, gonna have to repaint him .

Probably also buy a proper wash in the next few weeks to seeing how my thinned down black paint is drying far to quick.

[Homerlovesbeer]

Looks great for a first attempt! I just finished this kit and found it very enjoyable

[aussiejuggalo]

Thanks, using this as a test for a bunch of stuff like the wash, pre-shading etc.

Yeah it's a good little kit, bought a few more Airfix 1/72 kits to which I may or may not to build logs of.

[aussiejuggalo]

Got some more done the last couple of days.

Took a good hour fighting with the cockpit to get the fuselage halves together and they still didn't go together fantastic, same with the fuselage and the wings.



Decided to put the wheels on to and paint it all in one go.



Had some pretty big gaps in the canopy so hopefully the Vallejo putty hasn't ruined the cockpit.



Gonna wait another day to get all the putty and glue dry before I prime it, I'm hoping to have it finished in a few days .

[Homerlovesbeer]

I built one of these today with the nephew in 1.5 hours start to finish unpainted. Again I found the fit really good, I just made sure all the spru tree connections were cut off properly.

The nephew will paint it separately and loves it

[aussiejuggalo]

Yeah I found most of the parts fit it was just the fuselage and the canopy, they didn't sit right (can see the canopy gap in the side pic), also the cockpit but that could of been me when I glued it all.

Apart from that is a really nice kit, didn't have much flash or crap to clean up.

[aussiejuggalo]

Thought I'd try my hand at some pre-shading today, it went well I think.



I promptly gave up after seeing the colossal mess I made .

I'll just er... cover that... with some paint... a lot... of paint .

Moral of the story, bad eyes and shaky hands are bad for pre-shading.

[Homerlovesbeer]

Lol. Pre shading is not one of my most favorite parts of the build.

[aussiejuggalo]

Yeah, that was my first attempt and it really didn't go well, I'll start practising with my new airbrushes before I try it again.

On another note I covered that disaster up and going to be working on the camo soon.

Edit, I still don't know what washes I want to buy to finish this thing, thinking maybe the Ultimate set or something.

[aussiejuggalo]

Right, covered up that pre-shading disaster and got the brown on.



Tried to just do the areas that were brown but that didn't go so well (old airbrush was being stupid so I tossed it and used my new iwata to cover the whole thing in brown).



Finally started working on the camo but I'm not 100% with how its laid out.



Using white-tak but I cant get a lot of the squiggles in which is really bugging me, was thinking of getting some 0.04mm line tape and using that, what do you guys think?

[AAC]

I built one of these a while ago and made some masks from the instructions on the box viewtopic.php?f=34&t=10695&start=10, you can just download the image and print it if you like

[Homerlovesbeer]

This is what I did. I used these templates and cut them out. I then used blutak to stick down on top of the Spitfire and painted away. Tedious cutting out the template but well worth it!

http://www.yolo.net/~jeaton/mymodels/sp ... tTemp.html






End result

[aussiejuggalo]

Cool thanks guys, I'll try this in a few days.

I didn't even think of doing a mask, I'm so out of practice .

[Goose]

Nice jobs.

Love it

Goose

[aussiejuggalo]

Finally got to paint the camo, had to wait till I bought a new printer.

Used white tack and tape to mask it.





Big green mess . I forgot to mask underneath so I need to repaint the bottom , also some of the paint & primer pealed off where I did have it masked so I need to fix that to.



Didn't come out perfect but I think its close enough, may try doing it all with tape or be more careful with the white tack next time.

(Don't mind the Curtiss Hawk 81-A-2 in the back ground)







Next will be the clear coat for the top, respray and clear the bottom then probably the biggest pain in the ass... the decals.

[Twokidsnosleep]

Really liking that camo combo
Nice work

[aussiejuggalo]

Thanks .

Right well today I thought I'd do the gloss so I could fix the bottom and get started on the decals, it didn't go to plan...

I used the AK glossy varnish with a couple drops of AK retarder and well it went full matte and rough like 1000 grit sandpaper .

Also like an idiot I unmasked the canopy when I removed the camo mask .



How ever the exact same lot of varnish worked fine in my Curtis Hawk fuselage.



I think for the spitfire I may of been spraying from to far away or maybe to high a PSI (around 25), may try and lightly sand it back and spray again tomorrow.

[TommyKillander]

The cammo is looking good !

I actually built this as one of my first l kits after getting back to the hobby. Nice details for a 1/72 but therr are some issues with the fit if I remember correctly.

Keep up the good work

Cheers

Tommy

[aussiejuggalo]

Yeah this one does have some fit problems, easyish to fix at least.

Finally got around to paint the wheels, propeller & got the whole plane clear coated today, gonna do the decals over the next week or so.

Also ordering the full set of Ultimate washes today so should have this fully done in a couple of weeks .

[Homerlovesbeer]

Careful using a wash on this kit as the panel lines are pretty big and the wash will only make them even more emphasised. I avoided it myself.

[aussiejuggalo]

Yeah I noiticed, I bought the Ultimate Weathering Wash - The MEGA Set so I might make up a really light wash for it.

[Lee1979]

My first time pre shading was bad but keep trying it does get better mate and makes a big diffrence to yr model.also i was using a cheap airbrush until i bought a harder steenbeck infinity now i enjoy pre shading lol

[RayB24]

Neat build, clear coats have done that to me in the past. Its because I think the coat was to thin and you need to build it up. Light mist then wetter coats.

I use Future or I think in the UK its called Kleer. Cheaper by far and has a lot of uses, even as decal set. Also rescues clear parts.

[aussiejuggalo]

I'm gonna try preshading on a bigger model I think, hands are to unsteady to do it on a small one like the 1/72 planes I've got.

I think the clear went screwy because when I sprayed it, it was a pretty hot day with high humidity and I was a little bit to far so it was drying before it even hit the model, think I'll be investing in a spraybooth to, clears gotten everywhere .

I'm probably also going pick up some Alclad Aqua Gloss when / if it comes back in stock in Aus, already gone through most of that AK clear and I've been thinning it and adding retarder.

[aussiejuggalo]

Started getting more work done on this over the last 2 days, put about half of the decals on but god some of them are fiddly, there also probably not on perfect and some may be on the wrong way but oh well least there on.

Bottom ones are completely done, pretty happy with how they came out.



Bad pic but still doing the top ones, was going to do more today but my rooms to hot.



I also stopped because I spilt half the bottle of Micro-sol...



Got all my washes a few days ago to and the Dark Dirt will be far to much for this, may use Light Dirt or Earth (I got the full Ultimate set).

[aussiejuggalo]

Well I finally got around to finishing this thing, I decided to give it a neglected look seeing well it's not the best job in the world and it does look pretty neglected.

The weathering was much heavier but when I did the matte clear coat it kinda killed it, I know for next time though.













Setup I used for the pics . A little over the top for such a small plane .

[Twokidsnosleep]

Turned out fine!!!
I like the photo set up as well

[aussiejuggalo]

Thanks .

Yeah that setups pretty good but a bit big for most models, the photos turned out much better than I expected though .