lazy sunday afternoon..

[jankees]

..and I enjoyed myself repainting the shockwave WWII P-51D Mustang. Both paints are based on original paints scheme from the war, as most of my material was in black & white, am am not 100% sure about the colours and some of the details, but I am quite happy with the results anyway.
44-15052 was flown by Lieutenant James A. Hickey of the 354th Fighter Squadron of the 355th Fighter Group, based in Martlesham Heath, UK, while  44-15255 was flown by Lieutenant-Colonel Gordon Graham of the 360th Fighter Squadron of the 356th Fighter Group.






What do you guys think? Would I make anybody happy with an upload, or does nobody fly this plane?

[SkyNoz]

I think the colors, red, blue, green seem to be a bit bright. I would use the doge tool or a lighting brush, to show some 3d look etc. There nice, but I would touch them up a bit before uploading.

[NigeF-51]

Hi jankees,

Both look very nice and I would definately like 'Down for Double' as it is/was a scheme I was thinking of doing.

The colours look about right, although the anti-glare panel is probably too green & should be olive drab.

One other little point, the aircraft and pilots were assigned the opposite way round. Gordy Graham was 354FS/355FG which operated from Steeple Morden, UK.

BTW I am working on Jane IV of Lt Col Bert Marshall of 354FS/355FG & planning to do one or two from each sqn of the 355th.

Nige

[jankees]

Why, thank you for your kind words!
Nige, of course you're right, I mixed up planes and pilots! Thank you for correcting me.

As for the colours, I work with two handicaps: real WWII photographs are rarely in colour, and if they are, they do not have the brightness that we are used to nowadays, like here:


on the other hand, if you paint your aircraft in bright colours, to make them easier to tell apart, I would not use subdued bright colours, I would make them as bright as possible. This is partly why I like painting American WWII planes, the bright colours. This brings me to my second handicap, I am actually colourblind, so anything that is not bright is a problem for me, like in the green/olive drab anti glare panel...but I try it anyway, is this better?


As you can see, I also took the liberty of applying the name to the other side of the plane, I am not sure that it is original, but I figured that someone who plays down for double wouldn't mind a double name, and it looks better too I think...

Good luck with Jane IV, it seems Lt.Col Marshall used a lot of Janes, I counted 7! Keep me posted on your progress! If you have any paint schemes you want done, just ask and I'll see what I can do, and there are a few more I want to try. There's also a few that I already uploaded here and at avsim, if you have any comments on those, please tell me, they can always use improvements (I probably used the same green...)

[NigeF-51]

Hi jankees

Thanks for the reply.

Jane IV is coming along well, I think I'm about ready to start on the alpha channels. I have to agree with you regarding photos, I've been working from a grainy B+W photo & the cover art of Bert's son Bills book 'Angels, Bulldogs & Dragons' and correspondence with Bill. There were indeed 7 'Janes' & none were lost as a result of aerial combat!
Whilst I do like the polished look to the aircraft, the purist/perfectionist in me wins & Jane IV will be as Bill put it, 'kept clean but time was not wasted polishing her'.

Regarding the anti-glare panel, I use the RGB colours of 85/79/68 based on the Federal Standard colour of FS34087 recorded on the decal instruction sheets from Cam Decals.
Like Jane IV, I think Down for Double only had the name/artwork on the LH side, but this evening I'll check through my 355FG material to see if I can confirm/deny that.

[jankees]

..and here is yet another repaint, but this time with the right colour! (and without the polish this time)

What do think?

[SkyNoz]

What I would do is, if you look at that real photo of the mustang and see how the panel lines appear to be a lighter color then the polish AL. I would lighten the panel lines a color lighter then the base polish almost like a light grey. It looks good without the polish, Just do your best to make the repaint look real.

[jankees]

Thank you for your input, SkyNoz.
Yes, you're right, the lines look lighter on the pic of the real plane, but I can show you lots of pics where the lines are dark, sometimes darker than in my repaints. Here's another plane that's on my wish list:

Now those are dark lines I would say!
There's quite a few repaints out there with very light lines, e.g. look at this excellent skin by John Terell:




It is beautiful, but somehow it has never quite satisfied me. The plane look like it's carved out of a single piece of metal. For me it is too smooth, I like to see how it is actually put together. That's why I made the lines darker. We actually painted the same plane:





I've also experimented with reflective lines, that vary in colour/reflection with the light falling on them, in reaction to your reaction, but in the end decided that simple black is best. Here's an example, see if you can spot the difference:





In the end, what it boils down to is your own taste I'm afraid, but that's OK for me! I hope it is for you as well, but please, don't let it stop you telling me what you think of my repaints. It's amazing how few reactions you get...

[SkyNoz]

Well in my terms I don't budge about taste, I develop something as real as possible. Why would panel lines become more noticeable in some pics then others? Well, first panel lines become more apparent when oil stains dirty up the paint. When a aircraft is clean, panel lines are almost hidden. I'm not trying to be a judge of your work, just trying to provide you with something that we would both agree on.

[NigeF-51]

Hi guys,
Personally, I have done the panel lines & rivets on my versions by cutting back the opacity of the various layers until I feel it looks right. However, in light of previous posts in this topic I'll probably have a go at varying the colour as well. By the way, I assume you are aware that when new there would be very little visible in the way of panel lines/rivets visible on the wings as they were filled & painted to enhance the laminar airflow.
Jan, thanks for uploading Down for Double, I got it from Avsim last night. I've looked through my 355th FG material, but can't find any detail of the right side of the nose, but a decal sheet I've seen only has artwork for the left side.

[jankees]

Whoops, sorry SkyNoz, it did not mean that you had to budge, all I wanted to say was that different people have different tastes, and in the end, nobody (or everybody, depending on your view) is right. I draw them the way I like'em, and the way they feel realistic to me. They are never perfect, and other people do them differently, no worries there. I like them a bit used, and oil stained, so the lines show up. On the other hand, your comments will make me (and Nige apparently) try different things, like in my previous post, so you're helping me there, thanks!
Nige, yes, new, they would look perfect, but new is not my main interest. I like used, or as you say, clean, but not polished. I tried to make KI-B Josephine a bit dirtier and less shiny, but prefer the effect of Down for Double. I hope you like that paint. I know there probably was nothing on the other side, but I just couldn't resist. And hell, you'll see lots of Mustangs with 'creative' paint schemes, like Damn Yankee, the one in my sig. It looks like that at the moment, but as far as I've been able to find, no plane with that registration or  name ever flew with that squadron. Still looks good though, both in real life and in FS.
I think we can all agree that we do our best, and I am very anxious to see Jane....
As a teaser, here's the last one I've been working on, taken from far away, so we cannot see all those horrible lines (and other stuff I still have to figure out, like where are the bars on the front windscreen? (if you know, please tell me!) Why does the nose distort my paintjob, and how can I accomodate for that? Why don't the bloody stripes match up? etc etc)




Thanks for all your reactions, it helps!