Hi Robin, a very novel solution with the glasses but not the first time I have seen it... My brother in law wears 2 pairs like this simply for reading.... never in public though, something to do with spoiling his image....

Regards

Alan

Thanks there Bernd and Alan! Hey Alan, something tells me your brother in law might be in need of stronger reading glasses!

This update is really for those members who were asking about drybrushing although it does include one extra addition to the deck, the main mast belaying rack.

First of all, what is drybrushing? (all you experienced guys out there can go to sleep now! ) Essentially, drybrushing is the art of painting with almost NO paint on your brush. If you have ever tried painting a concrete plastered wall with a brush full of masonry paint, eventually the paint will be almost gone from the brush and all you do is paint the topmost 'lumps' in the plaster - that's drybrushing!

In the first photo below, there are a selection of brushes shown, all of them have been used for drybrushing. The first four are natural bristle, the last two on the right are good quality nylon and the one I have been using for the most part on the Victory is the fifth one from the left, the smaller of the two nylons. It has already been said on other posts that drybrushing is the quickest way to ruin good brushes and that can be very true so if the model allows it it's always better to use old or disposable brushes when you can. Old bristle brushes are great for drybrushing 'rough' scenery on dioramas like rocks and walls for example but in the case of wooden period ship models, the details to be drybrushed are nearly always
A) Small in size and
B) Sharp edged as you will see below.
For this kind of highlighting I can't beat a good quality fairly soft flat nylon brush. My favourite one mentioned above and in the pics below is about 1/2" wide (a Rowney No5 Nylon artist's brush which I've also used in watercolour painting)
Pictures 2 and 3 show this brush being readied for the drybrushing technique. After thoroughly shaking the pot of Admiralty White, just 'touch' the tip of the brush into the lid of the pot to get the amount of paint shown in 2 and then get rid of most of that same paint by brushing it off onto a sheet of kitchen roll (or in this case expensive toilet roll - sorry Mum! )
Once most of the paint has been removed it's time to apply whats left to the model. The easiest way to describe the actual action of drybrushing is to imagine that your model is covered in a layer of dust and that you are using the drybrush to 'dust it off', in actual fact my best quality sable brushes are used simply for that - dusting off my finished models - they're far too good to get wet!!
Concentrate on the sharp edges of the model and the 'dusting off' action will leave a very fine lighter edge on the item, using the same technique on something like the bowsprit will lighten the top of the curved wood leaving the natural shadows underneath accentuated (I'll be doing that bit later on in the build)
Photos 4 and 5 are simply to illustrate that this technique can also be used (spareingly) on bare wood as well as painted wood as seen in Pics 6 and 7. Both these examples use the mainmast belaying rack mentioned earlier. This was built up in the same way as the focs'l racks earlier in the diary except that they have no brass pins in the base - I couldn't get any drill down through the rectangular hatches the posts pass down through! The rail is glued on the base of each post and against the wooden surround so it's pretty secure.
The final two photos show the difference between a section of the hull in the basic paint scheme and after drybrushing the top edges of the wales and the edges and sills of the gun ports - hopefully you can see the difference, drybrushing is nearly always more noticeable with the naked eye than it is in a photo!
So that's all there is to it! In these examples I've used plain white to highlight the Victory's details but any colour that is lighter than the base colour will produce the highlighting effect, models in natural wood finish will look perfectly good without this 'finish' but it certainly can improve the painted wooden ship when not overdone. (If you do overdo it, either wipe off the excess and start again or just repaint the base coat and try again!)

Hope you enjoy this simple little technique and apologies again for boring all the non beginners out there!

Coming soon ... the waist stern barricade!

Robin

Thank you for the great tutorial Robin. Will be used soon.

Hi All again and many thanks for your comments.

Hi Daffy09, many thanks too and I'm glad you found the drybrushing installment useful! What I forgot to mention however is that as well as the highlighting examples given, the drybrushing technique can also be used for adding darker effects too, for example on the X-section, where the iron chains and supports meet the painted hull under the chain plates a little rust red drybrushed downwards will give a subtle rust stain effect too!

The aft waist barricade is now under way as you will see below but first a little addition to the waist in general. The first photo shows the waist is now covered over with an offcut of clear perspex, (complete with scratches). This can remain in position until the final stages when the launch supports will be added. The glazing serves two purposes, firstly it will protect the guns and eventual crew figures from any dust and debris during further construction and secondly, the restaurant and souvenir shop beside the Brodie Stove can finally open for business!!!

Onto the Barricade!
Pic 1 below shows the tiny little wooden blocks which will produce the first part of the barricade structure: the bases which sit on the deck up to the black waist surround. These are a mere 3.4mm tall and are almost impossible to cut accurately to be the same size. They are also next to impossible to hold securely to sand them down so after a bit of thought I came up with the solution in Pic 2 - stick them all down in a line onto a used lollipop stick with as small a drop of PVA as I could get away with.
After 24hrs of drying I was then able to use the lollipop stick as a handle and gently sanded the entire strip down until they were of uniform height as seen in Pic 3.
The next step I did wrong! I used the rat tail diamond dust files to file down the rebate which fits along the surround along the whole line of blocks. What I should have done was to file the rebates at right angles one block at a time, removing each block when completed. Doing them in a line was far harder and the rebate tended to be ok at each end but shallower in the middle due to the rocking action of the file. Still, learning is good for the soul (is it hell!) and I ended up removing each block in turn and finishing it off, held as lightly as possible in long nosed pliers.
The end result is shown in Pic 4 (the right hand base is a little drunk but it was levelled up before the glue dried!)
I have since fitted the three individual shelves in place and the next part will be the decorative pillars on top. I had hoped to use some pillaster type mouldings I had left over from Grimsby but looking closely at the drawings they now appear far too fat! Next installment I should hopefully have worked something out!

See you soon

Robin

Hi to all and thanks for the great comments!
Unfortunately, the second part of the barricade has been put on hold for a few days whilst I take care of a small (not!) problem which is extremely embarassing especially after Han's comments!
I have just had a PM from Sparks in which he thankfully pointed out a really bad error which I had completely missed. I have been so busy rectifying all the little errors and upgrading the less than satisfactory kit components that I completely overlooked this fault! I built the main ship carcase as per the DelPrado instructions with the exception of the stern galleries which were extensively re-designed around better quality components. I built the waist section exactly as per the instructions with the four skid beams resting on the ribs as can be seen in the close up photos adding the supporting columns beneath.
As Sparks has pointed out and I confirmed with a check of the reference books, the bloody ship has SIX skid beams NOT FOUR! Also,and this part I had noticed before but had either forgotten or ignored it, the skids are actually almost level with the deck, not stuck underneath it! So it's all hands to the razor saws as I cut away the skids and replace the whole set with six new ones relocated a bit higher (no wonder my scratch built Marine was too high!) The perspex screen will still fit ok afterwards thankfully, but I'll have to layer some tissue paper across the cannon to catch the sawdust and the Marine drummer will have to duck his head for a while!
Still, many thanks to Sparks, this job would have been a nightmare if I'd finished that spindly barricade and had to saw around it!!

Bloody DelPrado! I expected to super detail the beggar, didn't expect to have to re-build this far into the diary!!

See you soon.

Robin

Hi Robin, sorry to hear about this error but it just goes to show...... you're human.... . Still, marvellous progress you are making with this and although it's a setback I'm sure it will work out for the better in the end......

Regards

Alan

Hi there Alan and Martyn, thanks for the comments!

And thanks again Sparks, your pics are great! The rebuild is coming along fine and is very close to the methods you used with the exception of the cut out notches in the sides. After gently removing the skid beams , I've cut and fitted a panel to run underneath the waist surround very similar to yours and have cut the six new beams to simply rest on the ledge for now.
This is really turning into a good opportunity to improve, rather than the set back it was, I only wish I had realised the error back before I started fitting in the cannon, with the skids removed there's tons more space to work in (which I could really have done with trying to get those guns down there!) which will come in very handy when I get the crew made up!
When I've finished the skids I'll leave them loose until all the figures are in place but then I will glue them in place, I know from the Grimsby what looks like an open area in the waist now, is almost inaccessible once the running rigging has spread all over the place!
What I do need to do now is to take a very thin edge off that perspex cover, I made it so damn accurate to the size of the waist I nearly couldn't get it off again!

Thanks to all again and I'll post the 'recovery' pics up in a couple of days or so.

Robin

Super job Robin . Glad to see it sorted well done Rgd Martyn

Glad you're making progress with the alteration.
Those diagrams are really neat, what did you use to produce them.
All the best
Alan