Mick
SOH-CM-2025
Well, I've been wanting to do this for almost five years, and I finally painted some skins for SWingman's Grumman J2F Duck.
When the model was first released I put it aside because was on a hiatus from the hobby for a couple years and wasn't doing anything in FS except downloading stuff and stashing it for future use. It was one of the first things I looked at when I got back into FS, but thetask intimidated me.
All of SWingman's stock skins depict contemporary Duck warbirds or museum examples. Two of them are painted gray as their base color. The other two are silver, but the skins have them as gray. Since all pre-WW2, pre-camouflage Ducks were silver, I had to change the base color to silver. Specifically it should be aluminized silver lacquer, a finish that's always frustrated me. I could never produce a finish that looked like silver paint rather than bare metal. Others have done it with excellent results, but even when I'd copy sections of their finishes and try to put them on other models, the result was awful.
Finally I just decided to use reflective textures to make the base color silver, and not worry about whether it looked more like paint or bare metal. I soothe my compulsive instincts by reminding myself that the Navy used aluminized silver lacquer because it looks so much like bare metal, so much so that in some photos it's hard to tell the difference. So they're a little shinier than I'd like - at least they're silver and not gray. Close enough for a computer model.
As usual, once I got started I quickly became obsessed.
I started with a set of planes from Navy Utility squadrons. They include reworks of the two stock skins that were erroneously painted gray, and three new ones. Here's one of them:
Then I made a set of Marine Ducks, the three section leaders of VMS-3 and one from a Marine utility squadron. VMS-3 flew Neutrality Patrol missions from Haiti and is one of only two combat squadrons to use the Duck as a mission aircraft. (The other was VJ-4, which was a maritime patrol squadron despite its utility designation.)
The third set is Reserve units.
Then planes from ship flights, and then base flight Ducks completed the pre-war series.
Finally I painted a series of wartime Ducks showing the evolution of camouflage schemes and insignia through the war years. Alas, I'm no good at weathering, so they look factory fresh, not war weary.
I have a series of post-war Ducks in the planing stage. They'll probably be finished is a week or two.
When the model was first released I put it aside because was on a hiatus from the hobby for a couple years and wasn't doing anything in FS except downloading stuff and stashing it for future use. It was one of the first things I looked at when I got back into FS, but thetask intimidated me.
All of SWingman's stock skins depict contemporary Duck warbirds or museum examples. Two of them are painted gray as their base color. The other two are silver, but the skins have them as gray. Since all pre-WW2, pre-camouflage Ducks were silver, I had to change the base color to silver. Specifically it should be aluminized silver lacquer, a finish that's always frustrated me. I could never produce a finish that looked like silver paint rather than bare metal. Others have done it with excellent results, but even when I'd copy sections of their finishes and try to put them on other models, the result was awful.
Finally I just decided to use reflective textures to make the base color silver, and not worry about whether it looked more like paint or bare metal. I soothe my compulsive instincts by reminding myself that the Navy used aluminized silver lacquer because it looks so much like bare metal, so much so that in some photos it's hard to tell the difference. So they're a little shinier than I'd like - at least they're silver and not gray. Close enough for a computer model.
As usual, once I got started I quickly became obsessed.
I started with a set of planes from Navy Utility squadrons. They include reworks of the two stock skins that were erroneously painted gray, and three new ones. Here's one of them:
Then I made a set of Marine Ducks, the three section leaders of VMS-3 and one from a Marine utility squadron. VMS-3 flew Neutrality Patrol missions from Haiti and is one of only two combat squadrons to use the Duck as a mission aircraft. (The other was VJ-4, which was a maritime patrol squadron despite its utility designation.)
The third set is Reserve units.
Then planes from ship flights, and then base flight Ducks completed the pre-war series.
Finally I painted a series of wartime Ducks showing the evolution of camouflage schemes and insignia through the war years. Alas, I'm no good at weathering, so they look factory fresh, not war weary.
I have a series of post-war Ducks in the planing stage. They'll probably be finished is a week or two.
