Puttying, filing and priming

Canyon filling

First things first, I applied a hefty amount of Tamiya's putty to fill all these insane megagaps of the plane. This is one of the main reasons I've always found plane models slightly annoying: if something goes a bit off while combining subassemblies even if the subassemblies themselves align properly, everything's ruined. That's something I really don't appreciate.

After the grey goo had cured for almost 24 hours, that being the next early evening when I had some time to fool around, I sanded most of the excess garbage off. Still, I didn' take too strict an approach. The best result would've been achieved, I assume, if I had sanded most of the greyness away, but then I'd also lost at least 90% of the still remaining surface details. I decided that a decent surface for painting was most important in this model.

I had to fake the remaining parts of the landing gear bay doors with putty because the kit pieces didn't cover enough

The sad greyness of the air farces

I wrapped up my part in the painting of this plane by priming it. Just in case I also sprayed some Vallejo Grey Surface Primer inside the plane, just in case the artist herself wanted to give her personal touch to the cockpit, too. The next phase, in any case, was not going to be in my hands.