Jagdpanzering 16

Sixteenth session

Like I said the last time, I was figuratively at a crossroads. Instead of dashing into something I did spent some time checking different German camo patterns. There was a specific, quite dramatic-looking, pattern that I had been itching at implementing myself for a good long while, but I didn't want to use it on this specific unit. In the end I decided to implement a pretty traditional freehand three-tone camo, but for the first time I'd also do the little dots often seen in the ambush camo.

Hinterhalt-Tarnung

Green

I started the painting by thinning down my green paint (VMA 71019 Grün RAL6007) somewhat so that it wouldn't clog my airbrush after sitting in its bottle for over a year. The first green splotches that defined the rest of the pattern I sprayed over the left side wall of the casemate, and let the rest just flow. In these first two photos the frontal green areas were maybe the weakest-looking of all.

The sides of the Panzerwanne were left in basecoat because it was all behind the running gear, shadowed and also covered by dirt, making the camo pattern there pretty pointless. And as far as I could tell that's what ze Germans also did back in the day. I just chose a couple of randomish road wheels to be painted green, and applied some green shapes to the idler wheel and the drive sprocket.

Yeah, I based some of my choices on my memory. That was the "danger" breakpoint n+1 in this (or any) project.

My gently thinned paint dried wonderfully quickly, it was so nice to paint as I could just spin the model in my hands without too much worrying.

Red-brown

While the greens were drying I cleaned up my airbrush and thinned some red-brown (VMA 71031 Rotbraun RAL8017) in the same manner as before, but in a smaller quantity. I went around the model and searched for parts where the brown areas could come to break up the shapes even more. Again, in hindsight, I could've used less brown and left more space for the green.

Finally I did the same semirandomizing with the road wheels and added a touch of brown to the idler wheel and the drive sprocket. Just like with the green layer earlier.

Some of the dunkelgelb bits had gotten a bit too constricted for my liking, so I touched them up before packing my tools away for the evening.

That ended up looking like a pretty typical Project Mumblings camo. While painting I was thinking if I had indeed formed some kind of a set of stereotypical shape-breaking tricks that I have repeated way too often. Especially looking at the mudflaps in the rear that feeling got pretty strong.