Military Model Scene

Lifecolor USMC Paint set and the Italeri 1/72 V-22A

One of my recent builds is for an older kit, the Italeri V-22A Osprey. This is one I wanted to build so I/we volunteers at the Museum of Berkshire Aviation, at Woodley in Berkshire, could use it as a talking point about the question of 'how do you make a helicopter fly faster'.
The kit itself wasn't a difficult build and I wanted to build it closed up, but still couldn't stop myself from painting the interior of the cargo hold, which is included in the kit. The cockpit is the one element that can be seen on the completed build, so that did need to be done. The engines & rotors are designed to be fixed in the upright position which also suited my wish to display the finished model. The one issue in the build, if you want it to sit on its' undercarriage, you need a fair bit of weight in the nose before you close up the fuselage halves. I filled it with Deluxe Materials 'Liquid Gravity', which are tiny metal balls that can be poured into the available spaces. As it turned out, my efforts were right on the borderline of what it needed, but a tiny bit of Blue-Tac under the front wheels is enough just to make sure it sits correctly if the display case gets knocked.
As for the external colours, I went with the camouflage scheme suggested in the kit, which has a Light Ghost Grey/Forest Green disruptive camouflage. For this, I brush painted the Light Ghost Grey, a colour provided in the recent USN & USMC set of paints from Lifecolor (available via the importers, The Airbrush Company), and then the Forest Green from the same set was again brush painted for the disruptive camouflage scheme. Once this was done, the whole airframe was given a blue-grey wash, in this case from the range of AK Interactive washes, and I like the way it softened the colours and tied the two together The rotors were done in a satin black, with the red and white stripe tips also brush painted.
An interesting subject I think the Osprey, and the model is now on display in the Museum of Berkshire Aviation.

Robin