Special Hobby 1/32 Morane Saulnier N

[rhallinger]

Eric, thanks for that detailed description of how you handle black basing.  Very helpful and informative.  I will have to try it sometime.  Also, the reference to the Golden High Flow acrylics is much appreciated.

The Moraine really looks good at this stage.  The black basing was well-executed and created a realistic finish for this aircraft.  Looking forward to what's next.  Very well done.

Best regards,

Bob

[RAGIII]

Thanks for the tutorial. Your Morane is looking terific!
RAGIII

[RLWP]

I'd say it was rather dark, personally - and it could be the lighting in the image. The linen let's quite a bit of light through so the insides of the wings are not completely black

That's just my opinion, and it's your model to build as you wish

Richard

[Juan]

Enjoying your build, thanks for showing your technique.

[ebergerud]

About the surface being too dark - we'll have to see. There is a lot more weathering to come and that will include fading. However, I really don't have a clue on how to properly emulate the effect of sunlight passing through doped fabric and showing the ribs. Here are 3 pics - two of the same replica and one original:
wingribs by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
MS-g by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
1916-morane-saulnier by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
I don't see how one is going to make an opaque object like a plastic wing look translucent. (Tamiya has done at least two kits - one was their Swordfish I - in clear plastic to show the full interior. I wonder what you could do with that? But I doubt we'll be seeing clear styrene wings anytime soon.) Ultimately you have to evoke the look - but no modeling technique I know will reproduce the effect. (If wiser heads see things I'm missing, please comment.) The third picture above shows an opaque wing with dark ribs. That's only appearance of course - it looks that way because the light is going through the fabric. You can also see from the last photo how prominent the tape or wooden slats on top of the wing are. It's passed my mind that I should have trimmed the chart tape more carefully and left it on the wings. As far as the mottled wing - which causes the irregular light/dark patterns - it's not done to evoke sunlight going through the wing - hopefully it will be step one to creating that patina of castor oil + dust + mud + other fluids + wear from ground crew that I think would have appeared on a well flown service aircraft. We'll see.
Eric

[smperry]

One trick is to note is that the spar does not touch the fabric. so what you paint the spar has to be lighter than what you paint the ribs. Look at it as pre shading narrow lines with hard edges. If you can raise the mask for the spars a few thou and get a slightly softer edge to go with the lighter color, then you are a master masker. I have done it before, white primer darker spars, even darker ribs, then mist on the CDL until you get the translucent, 3d effect you want.

sp

[RLWP]

I'm far from convinced that paint effects widely used on metal skinned aeroplanes transfer to wood and fabric ones. Likewise, dirty aeroplanes don't convince me either

If you read autobiographies from the time, it's noticeable how little flying pilots did due to weather conditions. On top of that, there were a lot of ground crew tasked with maintaining the planes, including cleaning them down immediately after a flight

Oil soaking into canvas is pretty obvious in pictures, and really inevitable due to the constant loss lubrication in some engines. Paint that has got rubbed off by aggressive cleaning is also often found and not unexpected. Paint applied at unit level was unlikely to have been done to a high standard, and put onto a slightly glossy dope. And the inevitable rash from handling is easy to find

But dirty 'planes caked with mud, with oil leaking from every panel - you don't see many pictures like that. For a start, they would be heavy - and weight was precious on low powered aeroplanes. Some SPAD pilots regretted the all over paint schemes they applied due to the penalty it created

We're back to the basics of modelling here - look at lots of contemporary pictures of aeroplanes then decide what you want to do.

Richard

[ebergerud]

Richard - I don't think we see with the same eyes. I teach and write military history for a living (doesn't help modeling skills of course) and I have looked at a boatload of military photographs from several different wars. I do agree that you probably didn't find "mud-caked" planes so weighted down with filth that it hurt performance. (I think you could count on the fact that any plane in service for even a few weeks was not putting out the performance of a new aircraft - I'm sure the engines were rebuilt by ground crew when needed - or when possible.) As far as weather goes, WWII aircraft were grounded if the weather was really bad and they had radios. So of course that would have been true in WWI. However, the last time I was in Europe it rained a lot - often several times a day. That's why the area is home to so many rivers and streams. And I doubt the air war was stopped when the first snow or sleet fell. I think the pilots were regularly up in dicey weather: how many of them simply "vanished?" And all engines were beastly inefficient when compared to, say, a Pratt Whitney 2800 or a Merlin. That's why engineers at the time did well to get 200 hp: - the industrial technique simply didn't allow for a great leap in power. (I bet that the radial would have been very difficult to cool with Great War technology.) And rotaries did burn a gallon of castor oil in an hour. Lastly, if you landed a plane that was coated with a film of castor oil, landed in a dirty or muddy field - how would you have cleaned that off? Perhaps aircraft were far more tidy than I imagine - some of course were. But I think that fluid-dirt-dust patina would have been there. I could produce hundreds of pics like the ones below: two are of a Morane N, (the cockpit is a good close up: how do you account for the tonal variations evident on the wings?) one of an Eindecker and one of Lanoe Hawker's Bristol Scout: I see planes that would have shown a kind of film - unevenly distributed - across the aircraft. On the rare photos that show the underside - the oil stains would have been very large - that's something you can see in modern films.
MSBigcockcockpit by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr 
wholeftr by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
Eindecker by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
Lanoe_Hawker'sBristolScout by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
I have no second sight and certain admit to be possibly in error. Obviously we can't see these planes as they actually existed but I think the photo record certainly allows for some aircraft to fit my image of a vanished reality.
Eric 

[RLWP]

You (or your erks) cleaned castor oil off after every flight with rags soaked in petrol, which also had a habit of removing the markings applied at unit level. You can find examples of this kind of damage in pictures

I would like you to have a go at explaining what you can see in the pictures you linked. I can see spillage marks and the results of handling (two patches on the rear of the fuselage of the Bristol monoplane) . There is quite a bit of paint damage including the results of cleaning on the underside of the Bristol monoplane. On the wings of the Bristol mono I can see the ribs highlighted by the reflective dope finish. The nose of the Morane is quite clean and has quite a bit of distortion on the top emphasised by the shininess of the dope. I'm not sure if the chipping is real as there are white dots on the prop

I'm not going to make judgements of the Bristol biplane, it's a poor reproduction of a picture from a book - notice the stripes in the sky

On the shininess of dope, this is an extreme example as N500 is brand new. Even so, notice the reflections in the side of the fuselage:



As an aside - thank you for engaging in this discussion. I'll admit I have a bit if a bee in my bonnet about aeroplane painting, there does seem to be a trend to paint models to emulate other models and exaggerate 'techniques' producing parodies of reality. On the other hand, I'm not an expert on painting and I'm sure these techniques have a place when properly used. So I'm willing to learn

As to weather - yes the air war stopped when it rained, was foggy, snowed and sleeted. Pilots couldn't do observations so what would be the point flying?

Richard

[RLWP]

I notice I am being rather argumentative in this thread, and I want to apologise. This isn't an excuse, just an explanation - I have anxiety, and on low days it can make me unnecessarily combative

I do have an interest in this subject, I would like to understand more, I'm genuinely not convinced many paint techniques represent real world aeroplanes - and this isn't the time for me to be discussing this

You are clearly a skilled and thoughtful modeller Eric, I'm looking forward to seeing how your Morane comes out

Richard

[RichieW]

I really like the effect you've achieved with your black basing technique. I have tried this on WW2 builds before but never got a very convincing finish like you have here. From your tutorial I realise I applied either too much or too little base colour. Thanks for sharing, it looks superb.

[FAf]

Very interesting approach! It'll be fun to follow your build to the finish and see what really comes out in the end. One "problem" with model building is the fact that so many things change over time with each new layer of paint or just new details or the addition of a top wing... Quite often I end being surprised by the end result... I envy those that know exactly what they are doing!
/F

[ebergerud]

Richard

If I came off too strong, you have to remember that I have a background in academics. Henry Kissinger once said that academic arguments were so fierce because the issues were so small - that's true. It is surely true that in our world how to approach weathering a WWI aircraft has to rate pretty low in importance - although it's interesting. And I'm really kind of at sea on this - I have no idea how this is going to turn out. But I'm finding biplanes great fun - and they look very neat on the shelf - even my wife likes them. So straight ahead and see what happens.
Eric

[ebergerud]

pr-rt-r by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr

The weathering is complete for the Special Hobby Morane Saulnier N. As I tried to explain in the last build note, the use of black basing is intended to create a base coat with a high degree of tonal variation and some of the original effect is still visible. But I've done a lot fiddling since.

Fist I gave the kit a gloss coat for decals. Some modelers think that's unnecessary, but I was concerned that 14 year old decals accompanying a problem child kit could be dicey especially for the tail. As things stood the decals did go on - the two for the tail were much too large but trimmed nicely. The roundels seemed okay, but proved very fragile. Fortunately there was an alternate tricolor marking for the fuselage which I didn't use that supplied materials for patches. (One bit came off under some masking tape after dried 48 hours and covered with a matte coat - that shouldn't happen.) In retrospect I should have not assembled the tail but black based it separately and then airbrushed on national markings across the board. But once the tail was on, there was no turning back.

Next came a matte clear coat. This was needed for the oils. (I find oils much better than enamel products - if nothing else, they don't interact with acrylics.) The first step were two filters. Almost all of my oils are Gamblin "Fast Matte" which are designed to dry very quickly and dry matte. Gamblin also accompanies a proprietary mineral spirit called Gamsol. Gamsol is remarkably benign - it has zero odor and no tide marks: ideal for models. The filters are very heavily thinned - figure 10% paint. Unless put on a matte surface the filters wouldn't work at all. But if done right you can "fine tune" the base coat and give it some depth. I used two filters: one of Yellow Oxide and one of Burnt Sienna. Because Gamblin dries so quickly, a 30 minute pause did fine. After that came a wash of black and burnt umber. Figure maybe 25% paint for a wash. Because I use filters the wash is applied carefully - mostly along the ribs on wing and body. Ideally I don't want excess wash, but a separate brush is ready Gamsol to remove some. With the filters and wash down, I pretty much know what I'm dealing with. Next comes adding tonality - mostly with fading. I do not use dot filters. I think fading is much better done with straight up oils with the brush only moistened with Gamsol. Where I wanted to fade I'd use either simple titanium white - applied literally with a toothpick - and rubbed into still mostly matte surface. In some places I mixed some burnt sienna or even umber with a buff and put down a darker patch. None of these faded areas are bigger than a dime. The idea is to mix things up - add depth - prevent a uniform finish.

Here's what the kit looked like before anything described above was done:
Base by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
Here it is after the decals and oils:
filt-oils by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr

Next I masked the front end and painted the front end black with Golden High Flow Carbon Black - a very good paint with a powerful pigment. There's not much to do to vary tonality with a black as dark as Stalin's soul, but I had noticed that many MS N that carried the big spinner (again, needed to make a bullet and fulfill Red Baron memories) had a proper case of chipping. For a light and irregular chipping I am very partial to the use of salt - in this case simple table salt. First I hand painted the front end with Vallejo Metal Color aluminium. Next I misted distilled water all over the front end (I did the spinner separately) and shook on some salt and pushed it around a little. After drying, I airbrushed on the High Flow which, as usual, goes down perfecto.
I'd like to make a note about the paint - and feel free to disagree. High Flow is satin/gloss when dry. It's also a water based paint and creates a kind of film - which is what I want. As good as acrylic lacquer paints (Tamiya, Gunze, MRP) are I'm not sure that most weapons painted for service use looked as though the paint had changed the color of the surface - like what you'd want in a new car. Rather I think they looked like painted objects. Water based acrylics look like paint has been applied over something else. The difference is subtle after weathering but it's still there, especially if you see a kit in person.

Anyway, after the paint dried, I brushed off the salt and ended with a nicely chipped front end. This is a forgiving technique - I found some of the chips too much, so I used a very fine brush and did some editing. The result is about what I wanted:
chipping by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr

Lastly I wanted to soil the plane without making it goth. (I found a couple of pics of a MSN in Soviet service - it looks a complete mess. Some of the best modelers out there specialize in very severe weathering - knocked out tanks, abandoned aircraft, rusty cars etc - it's a genuine skill. But that wasn't what I wanted.) For inspiration I watched a 60 second video on YT of a MSN being moved out, mounted by the pilot and taking off. The little thing was kicking up dust galore and exhaust poured out of bottom of the engine. (The angle of attack on take off is impressive - the N model MS was originally a race plane.) The pilot also did some acrobatics to get into the cockpit - I'd guess Lewis was right about this plane being made for a pilot about 5'6" - and that would leave some proper scuffing over the weeks. I also kept staring at buckets of photos of linen covered early war planes. The DH2 below is typical of what I was thinking about:
dh2soiled by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
To get where I wanted to be I turned to Iwata Com.Art paints. Com.Art is a very popular brand for professional airbrushes who "paint" on paper. The stuff is marketed by the best airbrush maker on the planet, so it does have a place. But the texture isn't ideal for plastic. I use transparent colors - usually transparent smoke - so the opacity is very low and it has a grainy texture. It feels almost grimy. So I airbrushed the stuff all over the plane in a kind of mist - this is a common enough technique for any acrylic but Com.Art is made for it if you want to emulate a general grime. After that I took a small "streaking" brush and applied an irregular coat mostly along the fuselage and the wings close to the fuselage. Underneath I used Com.Art "old oil" mixed with a little Klear and gave a proper oil streak from the engine and back. I also used some pigments just to soil the underside. And this is what we get:
pr-rt-ft by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
Here's a detail pic:
PR-det by Eric Bergerud, on Flickr
Next up - rigging.
Eric

[FAf]

That looks really good, Eric! I like the effects you've achieved! I did try black basing several years ago, but I never got the results I wanted and nothing close to this. Maybe I just gave up too soon?!
/Fredrik