A little bit daunted.

[Guest]

Hello chaps and chapesses!

I have been busy beavering away on my Hasegawa 1:48 Spitfire Mk IXc for a few weeks on and off now. Getting just about ready for the painting to begin and am really nervous.

This is the first time I have painted camo with an airbrush and have been really careful putting this baby together. I just don't want to spoil it with a ham fisted attempt without asking for tips first. Please help!!

Steve

[stona]

Have you got a good photo of your aircraft? If not I would bet that it is still in its factory finish. The scheme for the Spitfire was tightly regulated,I don't want to start a debate about how they were painted but line ten contemporary Spitfires up and the camouflage patterns will be very similar,almost identical. The application will also have followed the strict guidelines that the manufacturers were obliged to follow in order for the finished aircraft to be accepted. In 1/48 this means that the demarcaations between the various colours are effectively "hard". Most modellers like to use some artisitic licence and soften them a little bit.

I'm sure it is do-able,by some airbrush gods but I certainly can't spray a Spitfire camouflage scheme freehand in the way I would some Luftwaffe schemes. This means masking. You may be able to download some patterns for the Spitfire scheme in 1/48 which you can print and cut out to apply to the model. Stick them on with Blu-Tac. Spray at ninety degrees to the masks. The higher you raise the mask the softer the edge. Alternatively you can use the Blu-Tac sausage and tape technique which I use (on my rare forays into things sporting roundels!) but this gives a pretty hard edge.

Cheers

Steve