How-To Review: Sherman Tanks Vol. 2 (WWII European Theatre of Operations)
Reference: AMIG7170
Acrylic Colours Set. 6 jars 17mL
Price: 13,80 €
Olive Drab...
I won’t carry on about the origins or the intricacies of the colour ‘Olive Drab’. There have been numerous pieces written on the colour over many years. A quick Google search will offer you hours and hours of enlightening reading.
What is Olive Drab I hear you say? This is what a quick look on Wikipedia had to say:
Olive drab is variously described as a "dull olive-green colour" (Oxford English Dictionary) or “a shade of greenish-brown" (Webster's New World Dictionary); "a dark gray-green" (MacMillan English dictionary); "a grayish olive to dark olive brown or olive gray (American Heritage Dictionary); or "A dull but fairly strong gray-green color" (Collins English Dictionary). It was widely used as a camouflage colour for uniforms and equipment in the armed forces, particularly by the U.S. Army during the Second World War.
The first recorded use of olive drab as a colour name in English was in 1892. Drab is an older colour name, from the middle of the 16th century. It refers to a dull light brown colour, the colour of cloth made from undyed homespun wool. It took its name from the old French word for cloth, "drap".
Olive drab was the colour of the standard fighting uniform for U.S. GIs and military vehicles during World War II. U.S. soldiers often referred to their uniforms as "OD's" due to the colour. The color used at the beginning of the war by the U.S. Army was officially called Olive Drab #3, which was replaced by Olive Drab #7 (hex code #3C341F) by 1944, and which was again replaced by Olive Green 107 or OG-107 in 1952, and continued as the official uniform color for combat fatigues through the Vietnam War until replaced in 1981 by M81 woodland camo fatigues as the primary U.S. uniform pattern (based on the ERDL pattern used by some soldiers in Vietnam), which retained olive drab as one of the color swatches in the pattern.
As a solid colour, it is not as effective for camouflage as multiple-colour camo schemes (e.g., U.S. Army Combat Uniform, Tigerstripe, MARPAT, Multicam etc.), though it is still used by the U.S. military to colour webbing and accessories. The armies of Israel, India, Cuba, Venezuela, and Austria wear solid-colour olive drab uniforms.
There are many shades and variations of olive drab; one common version is defined by Federal Standard 595 in the United States.
Taken from Wikipedia
For me, I don’t tend to get too wound up in the ‘perfect colour’. To be honest, I think anyone who states they use the exact colour for anything is living in a dream World. You hear it everywhere, though don’t you? Does it drive you as crazy as it does me?
In reality, colour is affected by light, density, reflection and even interpretation. Then consider that a batch of paint may differ to another and even more than that, paint is subject to fading, weathering and wear. So, all of a sudden, the perfect colour has become quite a broad proposition hasn’t it?
All that before we have even considered the fact that we are painting in scale, so there needs to be some compensation for the way light reacts to colour at scale.
Some of you may be aware of the release of the new AMMO colour profile book based around the Sherman (still hanging out for mine…) To complement the release, Ammo has also released a number of new colour sets based on the Sherman and its paint schemes.
The sets come boxed with the 6 paints sitting in a formed plastic tray. These colours have been formulated for maximum performance with both brush and airbrush. The Scale Reduction-Effect has been accounted for with the colour formulations in order to give the modeller a corrected colour to allow for scale.
The paints come in 17ml jars and include a stainless-steel ball agitator to help ensure the paint is mixed correctly prior to use.
The paints are water soluble, odourless, and non-toxic and perform best when thinned using A.MIG-2000 Acrylic Thinner. The paint dries completely in 24 hours.
The sets are as follows:
Including 6 Acrylicoloursrs:
AMIG0061 BS 381c No.61 Light Stone. Widely used from 1940 to 1943 in North Africa and Italy
AMIG0110 SCC 1 A. Camouflage colour in use during 1941-42.
AMIG0111 SCC 2. Standard base colour during the 1942-44 period. Also used in 1941
AMIG0112 SCC 15. Bronze-green colour used in monotone schemes since 1944
AMIG0113 Khaki Green No.3. A common base colour from 1939 until 1941, but also in use in 1942
AMIG0217 BS 381c No.34 Dark Slate. Used as camouflage colour from 1940 to 1943
Includes 6 Acrylic colours
AMIG0024 WASHABLE WHITE CAMO
AMIG0046 MATT BLACK
AMIG0105 WASHABLE DUST (RAL 8000)
AMIG0135 BURNT CINNAMON
AMIG0138 DESERT YELLOW
AMIG0926 OLIVE DRAB BASE
Includes 6 colours
AMIG0046 MATT BLACK
AMIG0135 CINNAMON
AMIG0138 DESERT YELLOW
AMIG0139 RED EARTH
AMIG0915 Dark Green (BS 241)
AMIG0926 OLIVE DRAB BASE
The set we have to try is the second set in the series, Set Sherman Tanks Vol. 2 (WWII European Theater of Operations)
I HAVE A COUPLE OF BUILDS coming up that I am planning on using the set for, so the set crossing my desk has come at a great time. That said, I wasn’t quite ready to paint my showcase model, so in order to test the colours, I called on my old, trusty, ‘sacrificial KV2’.
As a side note, everyone should have an old model on the desk to try new things and use as a sacrificial model. My poor old KV2 has about 20 layers of paint, but it is something I call on regularly.
The set comes packaged in a simple, neat box that clearly shows the breakdown of the paints you get in the pack.
The paints are set in a slide-out plastic tray. Unfortunately, when I opened my box it became apparent that one of the paints had leaked in transit.
The culprit!
Here you see the initial spray job on the KV2 turret. The model hadn’t been primed or especially prepared. The Olive Drab base was just sprayed directly to it. The paint was however thinned using the AMMO acrylic thinner to help it flow through my airbrush.
As you can see, the paint covered the surface evenly and cleanly. Looks like Olive Drab to me.
Interestingly the set comes with Desert Yellow. Rather than use that as a solid colour, I mixed the OD and the yellow, and used the mix to add highlights to the horizontal surfaces and top edges of the piece. Keeping the mix well thinned ensures the mix is somewhat transparent blends well with the base colour.
Now I work on the darker shades. A thinned mix of the Olive Drab and the Matt Black are now sprayed to the lower sections of the turret and some of the recessed areas.
You can also see vertical streaking has been added through spraying the paint through the airbrush in a downward motion.
Burnt Cinnamon is the next colour to go down. A very simple, hard edge mask is made using masking tape. The paint again showed good opacity and sprayed well. The scheme was loosely inspired by the examples on the rear of the packaging.
A smaller section is now masked and sprayed using Matt Black.
With the masking tape removed, you can now see how the colours all work together.
A washable white comes as part of the set. This washable range of paints is designed to be applied with either brush or airbrush. Once the paint has had time to dry, it can be removed using a moist brush. The effect that is left is a faded white tone that replicates a weathered whitewash.
But first, the top of the model is sprayed.
After about 10minutes of drying time, a brush moistened with tap water is scrubbed against the model to remove the whitewash. Experimenting with different dry times and different types of brushes to get different results.
As you can see, the paint leaves a chalky, worn look on the model
The Washable Dust is now applied to the lower edges of the turret in order to simulate dust.
I also thought I would try something a little different with the washable dust. It was not uncommon for the tankers to apply camouflage patterns to the tanks using mud in the field. This was often slapped on in a random fashion. In order to replicate that, I used the tip of a cotton bud and applied the washable dust in that way.
Whilst the marking looks quite bold, the effect will be lessened when we start the removal process with the wet brush.
After about 15 minutes of drying time, the washable dust is now partially removed using a moistened brush in a downward motion.
As you can see, it is really simple to achieve some realistic looking results with a minimum of effort.
I know in the past, some people have complained that Ammo paint is hard to spray, and they can’t work with it. For me, I have never had an issue using the paint. The rules are pretty simple:
1. Shake it well before using it…and when you have done that, shake it again.
2. Use the correct thinner to thin the paint - A.MIG-2000 Acrylic Thinner
3. Build your paint up gradually – don’t flood the surface of the model.
Pretty simple really. Having said that, I’m not sure if it is just me, but I actually think the formula of these paints has become a little more forgiving and user-friendly. Maybe I am just used to working with them.
Paint sets like these really do make painting your subjects a simple proposition. Everything is there for you to create your next masterpiece.
Another paint set highly recommended.
Clayton Ockerby
Thanks to Mig Ammo for this book to read and review.
See more of Clayton’s work at his website “Workbench Hobbies” or join him on his Facebook page
Clayton will be doing a demo showing just how he applies this paint at this weekend's Greater Sydney Scale Model Expo on Saturday the 17th and Sunday the18th of March. We will be sharing the tutorials on line so keep tuned iin or see you at the expo!
