Rubicon M10 Painting SBS

And here we go.. after the review of the build of the Rubicon M10 kit, here is the process to paint it up.

As you can see from the top photo, it is quite weathered, but also a bit darker than the lime green Sherman of previous. Though not as olive colored as the M3 Halftrack I did before.

Starting out with the tank is where we should also begin. A primer stage. I have worked this one with the a series of Aerosol cans. A primer grey as a base to give it a hardy base to work with due to the amount of materials that will be used. But this was followed with a black, and then dusty with white.

I then proceeded with the base colors. A dark green from Vallejo Model range, combined with the US Green for the upper sections. I had mixed in a slight amount of Japanese Uniform Yellow to give the highlights some more power and umpf. But had lost some of the contrast after this highlight ( damn poor airbrush skills on my part ).

To bring the contrast back, I mixed the dark green with some black and resprayed the recess areas.

Once that was finished, I would paint up the tracked in Tamiya German Grey, and the shells in Bronze/Brass. My first applications of Gloss Varnish was also happening at this time.

The reason for the such brightness was for this step with the Oil applications. Black Oil for the grey colors to darken them up some, but the armor itself was given sections of yellow applications. I really like this, although it is a weird in spots.

What I like at this stage is that the texture on the armor plates now was a bit more random. And the thing gets a ton brighter which is good for the next steps ( but not mutant lime green like the Sherman ).

I might have gone a bit overboard on the decals for this tank. I really like the star with broken ring around it.. I had even tried to do a squad marking for it making it the A13 marking, but I really messed up one side. So had to scrap that idea and move back to the basic tank markings. Thankfully I did not mess up the application this time, and got them semi straight on the flanks of the M10.

It was then covered in more gloss varnish in time for the weathering aspects to be taken on next.

And this brings us to my most favorite part of the painting. The weathering of the vehicle.

Starting with the chipping in black and then German Brown. This was then followed up with the Humbrol Enamel Brown Wash which was rubbed into the crevices and some of the larger sections.

I would do this a few times throughout this part of the process. Making some sections thicker and darker than others.

Though there would be a mistake being made at this stage also. I would attempt to make some lighter rain marks also, but it just wiped out the brown coloring. So it made me have to redo those sections in the end.

The only thing left to do is add pigments to the tracks, but I am still experimenting on those sections to be done. And once I figure it out, then I will redo all the American tanks so that they have a consistency amongst them, even if the overall tank colorings are different.

Hope you enjoyed this as much as I did to paint it up ( and then write about it ). And hope to be able to show more of such pieces in the future ( be it new builds and paints or repaints of older vehicles ).