Operation Thunderbolt - Build Log Part Four

Hiiiiiighway through the DANGER-ZONE....

Yep, today it's the turn of the bold pilots to get coloured in. These two are currently called - in my head - by their high gothic callsigns of Mavericus and Anser. These seemed like a nice self contained episode of the build log so a post it is.

With cockpits and the like start from the bottom and work up. In this case, the light grey interior was first, then the seats, finally the pilots uniforms, their faces and then helmets. This way you are always layering the next section over a potentially messy previous one. There's not much to say about the cockpits. I did a suggestion of instrumentation - as frankly there won't be a lot seen - and decided on a light grey interior to help people see the interior details existence through the canopy.

I figured that they needed brown uniforms in order to stand out from the predominantly grey airframe. Note that the outside of the cockpit hasn't been highlighted. That'll come with the rest of the fuselage. The jumpsuits are Val US Field Drab; the straps are Val German Camo Beige; the leather Val Leather Brown. These have been given a wash of Agrax Earthshade and then highlighted first with the original colour and then with a little Deck Tan added.

This shot is very work in progress but I knew that the gloss varnish on the helmet glass would erase the work I'd done making the patterns and colours of the helmets show through the tinted glass effect. Stoopid cameras. You can see it in the flesh but the camera picks up too much of the reflected light. This was achieved by a first applying a basecoat of Val Dark Sea Blue, washed with black. This gives that armoured tinted glass feel. Then to show the colour beneath you thin the paint down and apply glazes of colour to the glass. This allows the helmet colour beneath to "show through" the tint. Worked quite nicely.

Couldn't resist dropping Mavericus into the plane - still a lot more work needed obviously - just to see what he looked like. Badass is my verdict. Then got curious, what would he look like with canopy in place?

Ah, damn near invisible. Never mind, I know it looks cool in there. Now all you do too. :)

That's it for another day.

TTFN