The Ironclad Diaries

[SimonC]

you can just make it out! 

The flags are just under 5mm , so not much you can do! But yes, handpainted.  The whole model is about 8-9cm

[Leslie BT]

Briallant thread Simon. Great to see the steps in creating the models.

Sounds like it need a thread starting on Air brushes and Air brushing.

[Smoking gun]

Thank you for posting this, a have a few HI ships needing paint but have always been daunted by the small size and intricate detail, your post has certainly helped with this. I'll be interested to see how your technique evolves with the next one.

Thank you and best wishes,
Martin Buck

[SimonC]

No Airbrush on this one!

After a little online research it was inconclusive what these ships really looked like -colourwise. I decided to go for a faded unpainted (or at least bleached) plank work type effect as illustrated in the Osprey



With that in mind I still wanted a bit of spot colour to grab the eye. Using contrast paints to lay down the base



Once dry then I'd set to work on the planking. The casting itself was mixed, when it came to the surface details, so it seemed best to go for a 'suggestive' style. For for that using a small brush with a flexible tip. Using paints with a high and smooth pigment content. I'm using AK and Vallejo, but I'm sure that any good paints will do the job. Then thin the paints down to within the inch of their life!  Then taking quite a saturated brush - but a good dip, flick along the direction of the planking - following the detail if you can. The objective being to create a pool at the end point of the brush stroke. The key is to create a suggestion of wood work (over-scale of course)



Then using a lightened versions flip 180 and go the otherway.



The majority of this vessel is planking, and other than that there were some block colour, on the boathouses etc, but again always using the brushstrokee in the direction of the underlying construction. On the hull I did some water staining just really to contrast the horizontal effect of the wooden planking



This was actually quicker to do that the Ironclad, but does need a steady handy. It has a stylist effect , but is reasonably effective

[Antioch (Bob)]

Simon looks great with the planking effect.

One of the things in the Cairo museum were a number of black & white pictures showing all the supply paddle wheelers that supported everyone. Hard to say about details but all of those ships were used very hard. No ramp at the side of the river...just ram one up against the bank, add a few planks to the shore ....& tie off others on her side..sometimes several.

Bob

[SimonC]

while challenging - I am enjoying painting them ... perhaps because there is only a dozen !  and they all look different

[SimonC]

Prepping the next batch of ships -



Taken a bit of a back seat of late as been extremely busy at work. Given the whole retail sector is going into furlough then it will be storm before the calm 

[Colonel Kilgore]

Nice - the return of the airbrush?

[SimonC]

Going back to a Ironclad. What I was unhappy with on the first was the lack of detail on the model, or more precisely the rough casting. The next model 44.CSS Arkansas in the range couldn't be more different. Really clean, with well defined plating. Going back to my original plan of preshaded with a ghosting of grey and then work up the detail.

One of the problem when working up close is that you forget that their models will be viewed from 2' away. Some may treat this as an excuse for lazy painting, but really for small models at distance you are suspending belief a little. I reality they would appear little more that grey blobs, but reality is not really what we are about. The Palmetto State didn't have enough 'contrast' to the eye when viewed from a distance so for the CSS Arkansas I brightened the highlights and edged the detail in a bright grey.

Here is the finished model -



It does in fact look rougher up close, but here is a comparison shot to the first one -

[SimonC]

This is a very odd looking ship. A log of the online images show her in the post war colours (very dark). Of the few wartime pictures I could find, it showed her 'light' with a dark band round the turrent, with the crew areas in white.



Wiki does say that her deck was covered with plates (unsure of the dimensions) the model has them very large. At 38mm thick I wonder if these would be prohibitively heavy.

Painting was the standard press-shade. Here you can see the pin wash to show the panel lines. Being all metal I gave USS Canonicus a enamel primer and a gloss poly coat before the pin wash.



I did work the deck up with some glazes , just to contrast the plates - which otherwise look very flat



Here is the finished job

[Antioch (Bob)]

Nice Simon....thx for posting these.

Re the iron plate..i had a discussion at the cario museum... they were suggesting it was a two part problem...how much and size a particular mill could turn out...and how heavy they could handle where they were building them.

Also re markings...somewhere i have a diagram of what a particular union ironclad sqn markings were. Will try digging that up for you.

Bob

[Leslie BT]

great thread and discussions Bob and Simon.
Shedding so much information about these ships to us gamers.

[SimonC]

USS Signal



Not too much to say on this one. Standard procedure, this was a but more 'painted'. Again trying to stick to the washed out palette of blue/violet to give the impression of distance. Blowing that all away by zooming in 300% !!

[SimonC]

CSS Selma



Long decks tested the steady hand to paint the decking on this. I added the signal flags, as shown here



just a bit of variety. Given more time I would have added the supports, but you got to know when to stop !

[SimonC]

CSS Governor Moore



My favourite of this bunch, this cotton-clad was fun to paint. The masts were challenging as I had broken my last micro drill bit