WWII German Panther Type G, Late, 1/35 Tamiya

[Whiterook]

This is a bit of a break from the norm in presentation… it’s a reimagined work. Two things are at play with this kit:

1. Last year in June, I found myself in need of a model I could quickly put together as a pro bono donation to an August, Advanced Squad Leader tournament that I’d promised the organizer, a good friend who takes a loss financially every year hosting that event for the love of it, and time is running out quickly
   
2. My building chops were subject, as I’d only just retired in March, had a nasty injury a month in, and had just really decided prior to those events to get back into the hobby!

I decided, it’d have to be one of my already built models from my reentry into model building a dozen or so years ago; prior to that was building back in the 1970’s as a kid and just slapping them together and those are all gone. The model of this subject thread was actually, my first kit built upon reentrance, and it shows! I’d never done paint work to that degree on models back in the 70’s, and I’d not discovered the airbrush or liquid cement yet at that time! It has been sitting in my workbench area on a shelf for well over a decade since building, and looked like this…










A lot of rookie mistakes here… antennae too thick, decaling subpar, tracks not weathered correctly, and missing a lot of dirt and grime, as well as battle wear. Yeah, I know… it was my first, so not bad overall, but it could be better. I’d joined a Group Build at a forum called Armchair General and this was my entry. My favorite accomplishment with the kit (besides actually building it) was the sag in the tracks.

So back to the tournament… it’s called Tussle on the Tundra, implying Winter. Even though the criteria of “want” for a donation was anything WWII military vehicle, I thought a winter scene would be more in spirit. Plus, he wanted it on a plaque base,so I would do my first ever diorama base! My plan was to tweak what needed tweaking, paint a whitewash over the existing ambush camouflage, and then weather. Finally, place her on a winter diorama base.

I also looked at it as a chance to breathe new life into a model collecting cobwebs, and repurpose it to paying it forward to a hobby (wargaming) that I love.

[Whiterook]

I was thinking of something along these lines, at the time…

[Whiterook]

So on the diorama, I’d only done one for a model, with a cut piece of felt covered paper (from the craft store) glued to an old award plaque… that was for an IPMS showing. This would be the first that I attempted to do one with actual terrain… nothing too ambitious, though. The plan was that it would be a winter scene with at minimum, built up snow in which the tank would be sunk into, in movement, with maybe clumps of snow covered brush and such.

I’d previously bought a couple unfinished wood (pine?) plaques from Hobby Lobby for another build.

Inspiration pics that struck my fancy back then, from my wargaming miniatures morgue, provided me a basic roadmap to follow, but was sure I’d diverge to my own overall design; however, these had elements I liked, providing me a real picture of possibilities…



…that follows my initial thoughts of a tank treading though snow covered open ground terrain. I also found this next one, that shows road movement, which was intriguing…



…and of course, I could have done something stupid nutty like this next idea, but I thought not for an tournament award  (…supposedly, that’s the actual #413 tank in the Ardennes, Battle of the Bulge!)




So, I was definitely pushing the envelope with this diorama, even though it was a planned simple one… but it set me up for more ambitious projects on model dios.

[Whiterook]

So work progressed on the conversion to Winter camo and a dio base… more on the Panther later! The diorama base again, was new territory for me and it proved to be a great learning experience. I didn’t want to go nuts with an elaborate scene… just a simple snow scene with maybe a bit of earth showing.

My method chosen was simple… foamcore board, cut to a generic squared oval shaped base; which was then covered with spackle drywall compound, applied thickly for texture. I used an art spatula to sculpt the surface a little. Then I allowed it to dry to the point where I could touch it without disturbing the spackle surface. I then flipped it and applied a generous amount of white glue on the bottom foamcore, and then placed in the wood base. As an aside, try looking up, “how the hell do you attach diorama material so a wood base” …NOTHING! …at leas5 I couldn’t find anything…someone needs to write a nice tutorial on that!





I was originally going to airbrush black to the base and white to the groundwork… but I was running out of time, leaving for the gaming event on the Thursday I did this! …yeah, I was a contestant in that tourney, by the way…did OK! 3x winds, 1 loss. In the end, I decided to go with brushed on Apple Barrel white and black acrylics. One coat of each and this is where were at in the process on these next shots…



…looked stark in contrast so, and I’d planned to maybe put a coat of brown on top of the black, on the wood base, and maybe finish it with a coat of Future floor acrylic for shine.

The a Panther had white camo on it by this juncture, but more on that in a moment. I’d finish with some weathering and fake snow.

[Whiterook]

I changed the base to brown, as the black was too stark in contrast to the white snow to come. I needed to dirty up the groundwork, add some small terrain features. I used Tamiya “Red Brown”…I hated using that, as the wood soaked it up like a sponge, and the stuff ain’t cheap! …but in a pinch. In for a penny, in for a pound!

The tank needed some snow… with snow on the diorama, too. I needed to find the fake snow I used on the Russian “Snow Coach” build a few years ago.





The brown acrylic is still wet in the pic below, so it looks crappy on those pics… it would dry over night.

Oh, and the tank is toooooo white… that’ll probably be dirtied up a little with a Citadel acrylic wash in certain spots. My fear was, in rushing, I could potentially screw up parts of the paintwork, but fortunately I’m very good at fixing mistakes.

[Whiterook]

The conversion project was done in time for the tournament!!! Overall, it came out very nice and think it met my goals. It was to be an auction item, so whatever proceeds it gained went to the event to support its overhead. This year, I repeated my pro bono work offer and it’ll be the 1st Prize award,

The brown base paint dried nicely… I was going to put a gloss coat on but opted to leave it as is. I dirtied up the snow a tad, especially at the track prints. Added some moss to simulate brown, and a few rock pebbles gathered from the driveway that morning of completion. Added some snow mounds on the ground and tank. Applied some Citadel “Devlin Mud” wash for a dirty look and mud streaks in the Panther. Glued the Panther down with white glue. I’ll let everything cure and then sign the underside with the event name as well.














This one literally came in under the wire! …I left for the tournament the next day, so it was cutting it close. So many things came up over the past weeks that I just couldn’t get the time into it, but it nonetheless came out where I was satisfied with the results.

Oddly enough, it looks better than the original paint job, and took care of the mistakes on the original paintwork. This model holds a lot of good memories for me, in being my re-entry Kit to modeling, and a Build entry on the old Armchair General modeling forum. I think it’s apropos and fitting that it had a little life breathed into it and went to a good cause. Hopefully, it brings joy and good memories of the tournament event to the new owner.

Thanks for following along!

[mustang1989]

First off, your first efforts are way better than anything I could pull off at this point in the game but that second batch of photos with the winter weathering really brought this track to life. I really like what you did with the snow effects and the base.

[chromdome35]

This looks great! Well done.

[buddho]

This is an outstanding job, weathering and base make a picture perfect setting. Well done!

[`Boots`]

Whatta fabulous winter wash WR........a perfect little scene all round

[transammike]

Wow, thats some super impressive work.

[Whiterook]

Thanks all… much appreciated!!!

[Leon]

Very nicely done!