A return (of sorts)... P-51B 374th FS, 361FG - Bald Eagle

[Knite]

Hello all,

I've made a couple of skins in the past (3 P-38s, 2 B-24s), and really enjoyed doing it, but then dissapeared off the face of the earth while working on a P-51D named "Bald Eagle".
Well.... Bald Eagle has returned, with some changes/fixes due to help from people (such as Guppy) way back when, and the ole P-51D is now the correct P-51B in correct colors... So this is a return, of sorts, of me to skinning. I already have a 2nd in the pipeline (a P-38 of course!)

As you will see, there is a lot of work to be done (note the gun scarring for the extra pair of .50s... haha), but here she is so far. Please tell me what you think good or bad, as well as any corrections I need to make, as I'll be using this thread as something of a "Work in Progress" for any who are interested. Thanks all =)

Without further ado... P-51B Bald Eagle, with a reference to start, and my rather large images to follow :

[1pLUs44]

 

[oboe]

Very nice, Knite - good to see you back.   Combination of OD + bare metal always tough to pull off but this looks good.

[RTHolmes]

wow thats quite a complex skin, a good'un though a few things I spotted:

* nose cone colour should extend further back, level with the front of the exhausts.
* stripes over exhausts: too many blue stripes and not thick enough, should be same width as the yellow
* stripes on rudder: should be a bit wider - 1/3 width of the rudder
* stripes on wingtip: need tweaking
* wing painted section: should start further outboard of the wing root, and finish further outboard (closer to end of flaps)
* aft fuselage painted section: much bigger cutaway for the tailplane
* fwd fuselage painted section: maybe should extend a bit further down the fuselage (its level with bottom of canopy frame, not glass), smaller cutaway for crew names
* canopy: fwd and aft painted sections should be taken back a little so the bare metal canopy frame shows more clearly

nice skin though, might tempt me into the B for a tour

[Knite]

Hey all, thanks for the kind words.

Except you Holmes you p@#$.     j/k. That's exactly the type of stuff I like to have checked actually.
Honestly, I appreciate the input.  The color of the blue/yellow swatches are actually different in my 3 or 4 different profiles I have, but in further examination based on your feedback, I think I'm going to redo-them again slightly. I've struggled some with lining up the paint as the panel lines in the profiles don't line up with the panel lines quite 100% with AH's panel lines and the panel line referneces I've used. However, I've tried to approximate as close as I can but there is still a lot of "cleanup". As I said this is based off of a previous skin I scrapped, so some things don't line up quite the same. That'll be fixed.

Thanks a ton! As I said, I'm going to use this as my WIP thread so expect to see an update coming in the next few days. =)

[Knite]

Hey all =)

As promised, I would make an update, and here it is. Please, PLEASE give me any comments, either positive or negative. As much as I was a wise guy to RTHolmes, I really did listen and just about everything he pointed out has been fixed or changed.
In fact, I spent waaaaaaay more time on this aircraft before this update than expected. I was kinda thinking of not being done for another week or so, but I got a lot farther along than I orignally though. There are 3 panels on the undercarriage I need to "sweeten up", but other than that, I think she's pretty close.



- Here we are, early in the morning just after coffee about to do a low level flight around the area. (really, this is just an excuse to show off my new propeller  )


- The crew takes a picture right after wheels up. I was flying light so didn't need to use the whole runway...


- Just a view from above, showing the panel lines, rivets, and what not...


- And here she is from the side, hopefully showing off the new metal method I attempted, as well as the bigger contrast between paint/metal, and new engine tarnishing.

[lyric1]

 

[RTHolmes]

nice, canopy works great

[Fencer51]

Whoa.. those insignia are too bright of blue.  (I need shades  )

edit: And.. check the actual insignia.. there is an indent where the white bars meet the blue circle.

edit#2: And.. check the under nose area where the yellow does not wrap.

edit#3: And.. check the invasion stripes missing under the wings.

edit#4: And.. check your invasion stripes not wrapping under the fusalage.

edit#5: And.. there are 8 kills on the profile..

edit#6: And.. check the tail ID markings not wrapping around the underside of the Elevs.. They would have been black as well.

edit#7: And.. Stenciling is missing below the kill markings.

Good Grief.. I should have just looked harder..

edit#8: And.. the green on the upper wings does NOT match the profile posted.  It is too close to the fusalge and not straight.  They were painting over the invasion stripes.  Also you are missing the red "Don't Step Here" L shape.

[Knite]

Thanks Lyric and RTHolmes. RTH, I worked on them for a while trying to fix what you were mentioning earlier. Even going back to the stock skin didn't give me the effect I wanted, so I winged it and got lucky. haha

Whoa.. those insignia are too bright of blue.  (I need shades  )
edit: And.. check the actual insignia.. there is an indent where the white bars meet the blue circle.
edit#2: And.. check the under nose area where the yellow does not wrap.
edit#3: And.. check the invasion stripes missing under the wings.
edit#4: And.. check your invasion stripes not wrapping under the fusalage.
edit#5: And.. there are 8 kills on the profile..
edit#6: And.. check the tail ID markings not wrapping around the underside of the Elevs.. They would have been black as well.
edit#7: And.. Stenciling is missing below the kill markings.
Good Grief.. I should have just looked harder..
edit#8: And.. the green on the upper wings does NOT match the profile posted.  It is too close to the fusalge and not straight.  They were painting over the invasion stripes.  Also you are missing the red "Don't Step Here" L shape.

Thanks Fencer!

Woah : I used the same color blue for the insignia as I did for the trim on the plane. I was trying to keep the # of colors down to so the shading on the metal and green wouldn't get too "mucked up" when breaking down to 256 colors. I'll try a darker blue and hopefully it won't mess things up too bad elsewhere.  

edit - You know, it took me a good 10 minutes looking through my pictures and profiles to know WTF you were talking about. The white internal bars actually cut INTO the blue circle, correct? Is that what you meant? Also, does that apply to the stars and bars on the wings as well, or just on the sides of the fuselage?

Edit 2,  4 - Yeah, those are some of the panels missing right now =(

Edit 3 - Holy cow! I completely did not catch that. Thanks a TON! On looking at what I've got, the invasion stripes should be lined up basically with the OD and go white, black, white, black, white... correct? Unfortunately, I only have 1 B&W photo of Bald Eagle, and it doesn't show the underside of the wing.

Edit 5 - Actually, that one is one that I've gone back and forth on. Let me explain... The profile, and a bunch of pictures I've found show 8 kills. Yet when checking American WWII aces, I couldn't find Robert Eckfeldt... so obviously I was a bit confused. I've tried multiple times to figure this one out. It appears he destroyed 4 190s, and heavily damaged 2 more while on the ground. Then later got 3 air kills. Really tricky to figure out how many to put... do I put 4 for the original 4? Do I put 7 for "kills"? Do I put 6 for the first 6 (4 ground kills + 2 heavy damaged), or do I put all 9? As you can see none of the numbers are the same as the 8 in the profile. However, I intended to put 6 and apparently forgot to put the 6th one on. hahaha. I'm not sure how many to put here as not only is there that historical information that has me thrown off, but I've got profiles showing 3, 8 and one showing 0. Any suggestions?

Edit 6 (whew) - Easy fix. Wasn't sure if they did or not. Thanks for confirming.  

Edit 7 - I'm thinking you're referring to the writing I see below where the kill marks are? I only have 1 period photo and couldn't see them. In profiles, some have it, some do not. I wasn't sure so I omitted. Easy enough fixed.

Edit 8 - The painted over the invasion stripes part, I had no idea. I was trying to follow the contour of a panel line. Thank you. The don't step here red is an oopsie. I have it in the to do list but forgot it so far.

Thanks a TON for the help so far all.

[B4Buster]

Should the panel lines stand out better than they do?

Nice looking skin though

[Knite]

Should the panel lines stand out better than they do?

Nice looking skin though

Thanks B4.
I can change the "depth" of the panel lines at any time. The way I do my skins, any place I paint, panel lines do not show up as "deeply" as places that are pure metal (such as the front of the plane or undercarriage)
Did I cover the panel lines TOO much with the paint?

[Fencer51]

Knite, the panel lines on the wings are not visable as they were filled and painted over.  The gun bays are the exception.

Check out http://www.cebudanderson.com/p51bdetailpage.htm for the invasion stripes.

Also check your PMs.. you got a couple presents. 

Also check out



and



and



for the text I was talking about.

[Knite]

Thanks a ton Fencer. That's really helpful. I originally thought the "stencil" was the pilot/crew notification that in BE's case was on a panel plate in front of the cockpit. Boy was I wrong.
I'm also increasing the "heavyness" of the paint. Will bring out more color so I may have to do some desaturation to counter-balance, but that's not a problem. It'll help hide the panel lines even farther in the painted areas.

[Fender16]

This skin is shaping up to be really pretty.
Keep up the good work!