The plaster was fully cured today so I could start applying ground cover with the tan house paint followed by the brown w-s "earth" stuff I use. I'm letting this set up until tomorrow and then I'll vacuum the excess and get ready to add the vegetation part.
While this was drying I got back to the Sherman and almost finished it. I got the rest of the photo-etched stuff on.
I airbrushed all the undersides and non-sun facing surfaced straight Tamiya olive drab.
And I shot the upper sun-facing surfaces with lightened o.d. and much lightened o.d. It probably could even be lighter.
I hand painted the road wheel tires a very lightened black and then painted the tracks Tamiya Dark Iron followed by a liberal application of rust pastel powders followed by black of the same variety. This tank hadn't moved in years and the tracks would be completely rusty. Most modelers rust active tank tracks too much. The abrasion of the surface on which they're running abrades rust off as quickly as it forms especially in desert use. Military modelers in general get a little crazy with weathering, especially aircraft. Modern aircraft are kept very clean since you must be able to see leaks very easily.
You'll notice the red arrow in the above pointing out the left headlight guard PE that fell off. PE drives me crazy since you're depending on tiny surface areas and CA to hold it. The CA is brittle and just an errant touch will knock it off. And now I have to glue it back on to a painted surface that complicates things.
All that's left is to apply some basic decals and then overspray them to make them look old and faded. This Sherman is an "Easy " which is one of the last iterations of the breed and is almost identical to the 1:35 Rye Field masterpiece that I finished a couple of months ago. In 1:48, this model had about 250 parts. in 1:35 and a full interior with working tracks, that model had 2,000 parts. Big difference. Should be ready to go on the railroad this week.
Our 2nd Covid shot was rescheduled from today to Friday due to the winter weather in L'ville.
