A first go at airbrushing

I've been meaning for some time to add airbrushing to my arsenal of modelling techniques. It seems particularly necessary as I go further into building model aircraft.

My mate Mark P has had a cheap airbrush and compressor set for some time and we've discussed having a session to play with it but we've never managed to get it scheduled. Recently he dropped it off at Stately Counterpane Manor and urged me to have a go myself.

I had a fourth Airfix Folland Gnat kit in the stash (having already built Red Arrows, Yellowjacks, and RAF Valley trainer versions) and was casting around for a suitable colour scheme for it. The scheme used on the aircraft in the film Hot Shots Part Deux was an option but I wanted something that would use one of the airbrush-specific paints I already own so an overall aluminium scheme was the best bet.

In the end I recycled to decals from an Airfix Vampire T.11 kit to produce a fictional Royal New Zealand Air Force aircraft.

The model was rather rushed as I just wanted something I could apply paint to quickly. It was originally going to be modelled gear-down but unplanned violent contact with the workshop floor changed that!

For a first attempt I'm reasonably pleased with it. I haven't yet got the hang of mixing non-airbrush paint to the right consistency but I'm getting reasonable results with ready-mixed.

The compressor is a small, battery-powered job with only three pressure settings. I'm hoping to receive an airbrush of my own for Xmas at which point I may have a go with the one the Baroness uses to power her staple gun. It has a reservoir; usability will just come down to whether the pressure is sufficiently adjustable.

More terrain for Calais

I recently rediscovered some old maps that had emerged from the garage of my in-laws' house when it was being sold. It turned out that they were 1/100,000 scale British War Department maps dating back to 1915.  

The one covering the Calais area gives a pretty good idea of the terrain fought over by 10th Panzer Division and 3RTR on 23rd May 1940, which happens to be the subject of my game for Joy of Six next year.

Using a suitably sized paper mask to mark out the table area I came up with this.

I'll probably simplify the terrain somewhat but I did want to have a shot at modelling the area (top right) of fields divided by drainage ditches.

I started off with a suitably sized offcut of PVC board. I chamfered the edges and then painted on the field shapes in Modpodge before scattering on sand. When this was dried I sealed the sand in place with another layer of Modpodge.

When this had dried I painted the ditches black (and varnished them) and did
the fields in a couple of shades of brown.

The fields then got another coat of Modpodge onto which I scattered fine flock, a couple of shades of green on most of the fields but a coarser yellow material on one of them. The whole was then sealed in place by dripping on watered down Modpodge and allowing capillary action to carry it through the flock.

Finally the fields received a fifth and final coat of Modpodge (slightly watered down this time) onto which static grass was added using an applicator. I worked one field at a time so the glue was still wet when the static grass was applied.

And I used two shades of static grass for a bit of variety.

The two brighter green fields are the same static grass on different shades of underlying flock. There's actually a very subtle difference in colour at the end of the process but it's not obvious in the photo.

I have some stand-alone ditches made from strips of Poundland floor tile but I think this integrated module gives a better look.