Fokker DVII Early in 1/33, 247/18 Jasta 28 Pilot Unknown.

[DMPopa]

After finishing the Udet Fokker DVII I am tackling another Fokker DVII repaint.   The graphics for this model are taken from IL-2 Sturmovik, another flight simulator program than the source for the Udet Fokker.   There are an enormous number of Fokker DVII to choose from in both flight simulator games and this particular Fokker, 247/18 interested me as it is a subject not covered in an existing paper model form and is colorful with a well rendered streak camouflage.

Repeating a Fokker build serves for me the purpose of working with a familiar subject as I learn how to work with the Sturmovik graphics, develop the skills to draw my own under-skin structures, and to improve model construction skills. 

The Plane is identified as a Fokker DVII, 247/18 Jasta 28 Pilot Unknown.   The Sturmovik Skins and Template forum included the following pictures of the plane:







Items of interest:

The national insignia is the Balkenkreaz cross overpainted on the earlier Iron Cross insignia..

The engine surround does not contain any ventilation louvers.   Apparently the Fokker DVII has a lot of variability in this regard over its career. 

[NigelR]

You are a glutton for punishment  A very interesting scheme.

[DMPopa]

File types used in IL-2 Sturmovik:   There are two (2) file types used, one is a PSD file, a filetype associated with photoshop, and the second file type is DDS, a file type associated with on-line game graphics.    The PSD files are multi-layered files that serve as templates for an airplane type, example Fokker DVII, that can be opened in GIMP.  These are big file size.   This is the link to these PSD Template Files:

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/35355-official-skin-template-links-updated-81222/

The DDS files are single layer files that may be created from the PSD template or edited from a similar DDS file.   These are small file size.  DDS files can be opened in GIMP but as I will describe in a later post, are of limited use in GIMP when directly opened from a DDS file.  There is a workaround to this.

PSD file discussion:

These PSD files are marvelous.    The airframe color graphics (sometimes there are alternates in the template) are in one layer.   Metal parts color is in another layer.  The panel lines, in the layer called Shadow is in another layer.  The Shadow layer also includes a sub-layer called canvas texture that highlights canvas features and creates a cloth like pattern in the color layer where canvas is used.  Mechanical details like rivets are in another layer.   There is a wireframe layer that provides the actual boundaries of a detail, like the fuselage which I use to work the structure parts and is important as the color renderings will at times go past the actual feature boundaries.  Bottom line it is easy to create a different version of the template version. 



Weathering along with Shadows I have found is what creates issues with color brightness / darkness in the resulting model graphics when printed on card stock.    Where Weathering and Shadows are used, DDS graphics is not for example, dark green that can be lightened using the GIMP or a post-processing application to change individual color levels, but green with a layer of black or some other dark shade on top of it.   It is possible to find DDS files where the author used low levels of weathering and shadows so consider this if you want to do a repaint from DDS files and don't want to deal with color brightness fixes. 

Increasing color brightness using the PSD file in GIMP can be achieved by reducing the Weather and Shadow opacity level or unclicking the visibility for these layers entirely. 

For the subject model repaint I have a DDS file and used the PSD file to change certain parts.  For the metal parts forward of the cockpit in the PSD Template file, I unclicked the Weather and Shadow layer visibility.   It turns out that the metal parts color was good for the model I am doing.   For the fuselage underside, I went to the Color Here layer and changed the color to the light blue in the 247/18 DDS file and reduced the Weather and Shadow visibility.   For the national insignia white parts, I repainted these in a brighter shade of white.   As I will write about in my next post about the DDS files, I lightened the streak camouflage using the Dodge function. 

My best practice is to make changes to the PSD file, and then export as a jpg file.   Then open the resulting jpg file in GIMP and make changes as I describe in the UDET forum posts.   

[DMPopa]

DDS Files:

The majority of IL2 Sturmovik skins are saved as DDS files.   The DDS files can be downloaded from individual links in the il2sturmovik forum however the best solution is the so called Haluter skin downloader which has links as well as sample pictures of the plane in the database.    The downloader requires downloading the sample files into ones computer but once done things work pretty well.   Below is a link to the downloader:

https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/forum/156-haluters-skin-downloader-hsd/

DDS files can be opened in GIMP for viewing.

Click on the DDS file and Open File as GIMP.

You should see something like this:



To see the graphics, go to the color channels and unclick the Alpha channel:



The image should appear, similar to the 4th picture above.

As I wrote above, other than viewing the image, there is not much that I found that I could do with the image opened in this way, as saving to jpeg or doing a copy and paste resulted in the original greyed out screen.

My workaround is to convert the DDS to a jpeg and open the file the jpeg file in GIMP. 

Below is the DDS to JPEG converter application that I use:

https://anyconv.com/dds-to-jpg-converter/#:~:text=AnyConv%20is%20a%20five-star%20%E2%AD%90%20DDS%20to%20JPG

The conversion process is slow so I use the open in gimp just to view the file, convert if I am serious about doing edits.

The DDS files will have embedded into the file all of the weathering and shadows and these and if dark enough need to be reduced if the printed image is to have an acceptable brightness.   The method that worked for me is to use the GIMP Dodge function.   In the UDET post I discuss that using the Edit functions in GIMP damages that file, but apparently Dodge is not an EDIT so it works without damaging the file.   For the subject Fokker, dodging was used to reduce the dark weathering and shadowing on the fuselage streak camouflage.   Not perfect, but the results are acceptable.   

One use of a DDS file is to find graphics that are in turn copied into the PSD file and the weathering and shadowing is dealt with in the PSD file which is in turn exported to a jpeg.

[DMPopa]

The fuselage structure and skin graphics are printed out



The individual pieces are cut out and the skin is matched to the structure with the structure trimmed to correctly match up to the skin

[DMPopa]

Cockpit parts done.    Control stick made from flexible wire of unremembered make and center shaft between control stick and pedals is .040 evergreen polystyrene rod.  Both are spray painted grey primer and the red control stick handles are brush painted brown.  Pedals are paper.

[NigelR]

You are very prolific! A nice start on this one.

[DMPopa]

The main bulkheads are glued the right hand fuselage member, including the cockpit floor shown earlier.   I intend to add the engine later on in the build as the Udet build showed that it was prone to damage during the fuselage prep and skin addition.  Each side is made as a single piece of cardboard that runs from fore to aft.  The engine horizontal bulkhead is placed a little lower to allow for a second horizontal member to be added on top of it.  Blocks of 1/8" basswood sourced from a ship model (Yankee Hero by Bluejacket) are added at the lower wing and landing gear connect points.   The intent is to make a more secure connection point and hence allow thinner wires to be used in the wing and landing gear struts. 



This is the top hand view with both sides added.  The rear cockpit bulkhead is moved downstream vs. the kit used on Udet to match the skin graphics cockpit location.  I retained a horizontal bulkhead from the original kit downstream of the cockpit to set the curvature of each fuselage side.



The bottom view shows additional bulkheads located aft of the cockpit.   These were necessitated due to the sides going out of square from the top bulkhead to the bottom, which I attribute to the amount of bend in the cardboard sides.    This might explain the original kit design which did not have cardboard structure anywhere that the cardboard would have an extreme bend. 



Top view with additional cardboard pieces added.  I use small rubber bands sourced from the cosmetics section of my local dollar store to assist in the gluing operation.



Side View.  It does not show but the bottom is covered with a single piece of cardboard.   

Next step is to add the MH Ready Patch to smooth things out.

[DMPopa]

Bottom view.  The pictures that I posted made it appear that the fuselage is not straight.  I believe that these pictures were taken before the bottom piece was added.   The bottom looks good and it should as the bottom is a single piece of cardboard and I believe that this bottom piece straightened out the fuselage.

[Gene K]

Thanks VERY much for the detailed explanation of your process. Most interesting since I do something similar, but  using skins from an older flight simulator -- Rise of Flight (ROF). ROF is the mother of the program you are using, Flying Circus, which is part of IL2 Great Battles. The Flying Circus skins are higher resolution, but I still prefer ROF for the graphics (NOTE: I'm not addressing flying the sims, but just using the graphics to make paper models ... and  ultimately Radio Control models). A staggering number of free ROF skins are readily available on line.

My basic process is to open a particular skin (DDS format) in my graphics program (Paint Shop Pro), overlaying it on a three view sized to my desired scale, and individually resizing the skin pieces (fuselage, wings, etc) as necessary. This resizing is necessary since not all the pieces of the skin are to the same relative scale!!! . Then it's just a matter of using the 3 view to make the support structures such as formers.

Sounds like a lot, but relatively enjoyable once the work flow is established. Fun!

Thanks again.

Gene K

[DMPopa]

Thanks Gene for the compliments.  The Udet Fokker model build log also on this forum explains how I do the re-sizing and for Udet the skins were taken from another flight simulator.  Incidentally it was on a RC airplane forum that I got turned on to using flight simulator skins for model use.

On to the Fokker:

The fuselage has been glozed with MH Ready Patch and primed.





The engine is constructed using similar techniques from the Phonix and Udet Fokker builds    Cylinder heads are paper, cylinder tip is paper spray painted black.  The springs are Bead Treasures Milyuki 11/0 Delic Matte Metallic Silver Grey beads. 



The camshaft is Evergreen Polystyrene 1/6" rod spray painted silver and the valve lifters are thin strips of paper printed in a light grey color.



The valve covers are single pieces of paper as well as the intake manifold.  One of the Fokker DDS skin files from IL-2 Sturmovik had some detailed engine renderings so I used these to simplify this part of the construction.  The way the engine is situated in the fuselage the intake manifold will not be seen but it is there anyway.

[NigelR]

Another excellent build that is coming along nicely. You are really thorough in your approach and it is paying off.

[DMPopa]

The fuselage structure has green paint added to the locations where seams will occur and the front is spray painted in dark grey primer.   The paper skins have their edges painted green.  At this point the radiator / engine cowl has not been printed up.  The engine is installed in the fuselage structure and on the right hand side, some additional fuselage structure is added, the area where the exhaust pipes are located.



The yellow bands need to line up correctly top and sides so the bands are one continuous band.   The top was test fitted as alignment requires that the cockpit opening be in the correct location on the top skin.  So before any glueing occurs the top skin is positioned in place and pencil marks are made at the band locations.



The fuselage skins have been applied to the prepared structure.  With the structure prep, the skins lie down smooth and the seams do not show any bare paper color.

[NinetythirdLiberator]

Looking really nice!  Another fine addition in the making...Dan

[DaddyO]

Coming along nicely and interesting DVII finish with the streaking, lozenge and wide cross forms.

Looking at how you produce them I'm sure a cleverer person than I could print the 'skins' as decals (a bit like the Aviattic style ones currently available) 

Paul