Sgt Sarkis Bartigian has been described by some as the "greatest painter of nose art of all time" and by others as "the Michelangelo of WWII aviation art".  His imagination and skill with paint was certainly exceptional and he was perhaps unique in seeing the side, indeed the whole, of a B-24 as his potential "canvas." Working during the closing months of the war and in the isolation of the vast Pacific Ocean enabled his imagination to run wild.  His creations stretched the entire length of the aircraft in some cases, from nose turret to tail gunner's position.  They were enormous works of art that would have stretched any artist working under ideal conditions let alone the windy, sand-strewn wastes of the barren airfield on Ie Shima.  It is reputed that his amazing "Dragon and His Tail" was the last of nearly 14,000 B-24s to be scrapped at the reclamation plant -- the workers there could hardly bear to chop her up and hoped, right up to the final minutes, that a buyer could be found to save her.... although Bartigian's "Dragon" did have one final twist in its tale!

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I decided to remodel my built B-24J as a two-sided rendering of two of Sgt Bartigian's finest works - the left side is B-24J-160-CO 44-40428 Cocktail Hour, while the right side is B-24J-190-CO 44-40973 The Dragon and His Tail, both of the 43rd BG, 64th BS based on Ie Shima in July 1945.

I pulled the whole plane apart and rebuilt it from scratch, deciding to remove some of the interior to balance the model for inflight display.  I also (foolishly) decided to do the natural metal finish in kitchen foil, using ordinary PVA glue as an adhesive! (It worked, although not as smoothly as I wanted, but better than I expected!) The decals went on to the foil over a thin coat of Klear (Future) floor polish. The Cocktail Hour decals were from Zotz, and included a full set of stencils and national insignia.  Really excellent quality, I applied them with Klear with great results.  The Dragon decals were from a very old Scale-Master set, and needed a lot of care to apply successfully.  Again, I used Klear to apply them, and they went on perfectly.  The whole model then received an overall brushed coat of Klear.

I used MV lenses for formation and navigation lights, and my darling wife's hair as radio aerials!  Both aircraft were Block 160/190 respectively so did not have the rubber de-icing boots fitted to the leading edges; they did however have the large bubble windows on the sides of the nose which I omitted to model because I am lazy.  All the flying surfaces and wingtips were painted in Gunze Mr. Metal Color Aluminium to reflect the doped fabric finish - this is great paint - it works like Testors Metalizer and is buffable to a very high reflective finish.

The stand was made from a discarded cupboard door, wire coathangers and some PVC pipe and took about 20 minutes to assemble.  The base picture was printed on inkjet paper from a photo blurred with Photoshop.  I know it's rubbish but I needed to put the finished model somewhere!

Deciding to go for an inflight model with any prop airplane represents a problem - how to do spinning props?  I was looking for the Prop Blur accessories but they seem to be long gone.  I tried making my own out of very thin card but it wouldn't remain straight after cutting.  I ended up using yogurt pot lids, cut into circles and roughed up by spinning them on 600-grit sandpaper. I simulated the blurred blades with pastel chalks, and then superglued the discs to the cut down stumps of the kit props.  I would recommend this method as it looks quite effective, though I say so myself!

Overall this was a bit of a test-run for various techniques more than a project in itself, so hopefully this will pay dividends in my future work.  I am moving off props for now and have a few jets to work on.

Thanks for looking,

Alan

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