1/48 Hobbycraft F8f Bearcat

Gallery Article by Anton Alerte, MD on Aug 2 2011

 

Hello to all and Happy belated Bastille Day for my French friends out there! 

This is the Hobbycraft F8F "French Bearcat" boxing in 1/48 scale. I spruced it up with a beautifully rendered engine from Quickboost and aside from a minor disaster when my oil "wash" ate through my "paint" this was a pretty straightforward and enjoyable build. 

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The paint is good ole' Model Master Sea Blue and the exhaust stains were added with Tamiya weathering powders. I used the kit decals to represent a French Bearcat serving in Indo-China during the "unpleasantries" (tongue in cheek,CHECK!). I must admit I wasn't too impressed with the kit decals but they settled in nicely with a bit of solvent especially the roundels on the lower wing surfaces that had to snuggle around some detail.

I added some paint chipping and soot along the leading edges and wing roots using a silver marker pen which was toned down with more weathering powder and, as we say, Voila!

Anton Alerte, MD

Photos and text © by Anton Alerte, MD