#53 Academy 1/72 B-24H liberator

[Twokidsnosleep]

REALLY coming to life before our eyes, nice
Loving the tail stripe and your guns look good
Keep at it

[Kevthemodeller]

Coming along very nicely mate

[Johno]

Coming along very nicely mate

REALLY coming to life before our eyes, nice
Loving the tail stripe and your guns look good
Keep at it

thanks guys i'm getting pretty excited finally hitting the home stretch

[Johno]

Alright finally got all the little touch up done on the body and gave her a coat of future
Coated b24 by John Adcox, on Flickr
After a couple coats she's looking smooth might have got it a little extra shiney but wanted to make sure i had a good an smooth surface for my first try at decaling. And after learning that you don't want to touch wet decals with your finger and tearing the first decal a little, i recovered well and was smooth sailing from there. And man i couldn't be happier with how she looks all dressed up and ready to dance!!
Coated b24 by John Adcox, on Flickr
Getting the decals by the gun windows was a little trick because the placement put part of the decal over the window, but wasn't as hard as i thought, once i got the decal set on and smoothed out i just gave a little slice down the edge and just flapped it over the botton sill at first i tried to cut that edge too but it tried to pull and tear the decal so i just left it flapped over till it set and got a bit Dryer and it cut without tearing it then
Coated b24 by John Adcox, on Flickr


Coated b24 by John Adcox, on Flickr.
Now just just gotta throw a coat of future to seal the decal and its on to wash.

[Les0012]

She is looking fantastic, all dressed up ready for action.

Great build

Les

[Twokidsnosleep]

It is always fun when you get to bring the build to life with decals
Great job

[alextheblue]

Love the colour and those decals really bring it to life!

[Twokidsnosleep]

Last month for the sig
viewtopic.php?f=660&t=25285

If you are finished, pop up at least four pics into a "Final Reveal" thread here
viewforum.php?f=662

[gaz45]

Very nice work there mate

[Johno]

Alright so my next move was weathering, i thought about just leaving it as is maybe just some panel line accent, because i have zero experience weathering, but than i figured theres no way to get experience except by doing. Also i thought it would just not look right if a plane that flew 130 missions was too clean. So my first step was the wash. well the first hiccup was realizing the washes that came with the army painter set i got are ink pin washes and not a clay wash like i thought, and in had no mineral spirits or the like to be able to work with it. But the internet told me i could use pastels so i had these chalk pastels so i experimented.

Wash by John Adcox, on Flickr

The first issue i ran into was i ended up putting too thick a coat of the future on it so the wash ended up going in the panel lines well but wasnt adhering to the rest of the plane, so after the wash i highlighted areas by using a wet Qtip to apply the pigment, and also put in an order for some Ultimate dark dirt and modeling oils and thinner so my next build will hopefull be smoother. Also from looking at pictures i saw on some planes there were worn faded chipped areas on the wing from im guessing where oil would spray, also the wing tips also seemed to have alot of wear, so i decided to use the vallejo thinner i have and used a swab to rub areas and wear the paint to the plastic then paint the exposed plastic silver.

24 by John Adcox, on Flickr

24 by John Adcox, on Flickr

B 24 weathering by John Adcox, on Flickr

Next was trying to put chipping ont the wing edges and i couldn't get it to look good then at one point i accidentally got a big streak of silver on the edge and went and put some thinner on a swab and started wiping and after the first wipe i got a really cool effect and went on and repeated it and this is how it came out.

B 24 weathering by John Adcox, on Flickr

Then got the rest of the shading to where i was satisfied.

B 24 weathering by John Adcox, on Flickr

So then after much fiddling and experimenting i finally decided to call it done, and although its far from perfect i called it a quits before i ended up screwing it up completely and started finally putting on the landing gear and other little parts and get this girl finished before i ended up destroying it.

[Johno]

So she's finally done, after many mistakes and broken parts this learning experience is finished, she is far from perfect but all things considered im pretty proud of her. I'd like to thank everybody for the tips and encouradgement along the way, and a special thanks to paul and the ISM crew for the great tutorial videos and this awesome forum without which this project definitely would have crashed and burned before it ever got off the ground.

IMG_6996 by John Adcox, on Flickr

IMG_7094 by John Adcox, on Flickr

IMG_7018 by John Adcox, on Flickr

IMG_7014 by John Adcox, on Flickr

IMG_7082 by John Adcox, on Flickr

IMG_7095 by John Adcox, on Flickr

[digger303]

something to be proud of , it looks great

[Kevthemodeller]

Lovely build mate

[Twokidsnosleep]

The chipping details are very well done

[ElCapitan]

Looks stunning

[Stokesy44]

Beautiful paint job and weathering mate.

I love those late model Liberators with the nose turret, I wonder if the crews felt safer with the new nose after the goldfish bowel earlier models. Brave men indeed.

[Johno]

something to be proud of , it looks great

Lovely build mate

The chipping details are very well done

Looks stunning

Beautiful paint job and weathering mate.

I love those late model Liberators with the nose turret, I wonder if the crews felt safer with the new nose after the goldfish bowel earlier models. Brave men indeed.

Thanks guys really appreciate all the positive feedback, i definiely struggled at times to get her done since most of the process was so new to me but i finally got her in in one piece, minus a couple tiny windows which i thought about trying to fix with some PVA glue, but it seemed every time i went to fix something, i broke something else off so i quit while i was ahead.