1:48 Splinter Camo Paint Mask Set Saab 37 Viggen

The Swedish hard-edged finish on the Viggen

The Viggen first flew in 1967 and was built from the start for the defense of a country that did not count on keeping its airfields. The canard surface ahead of the main wing and the thrust reverser let it land on an eight-hundred-meter stretch of ordinary road, where reservists refueled the machine and sent it off again within tens of minutes. Its appearance matched that: four colors divided into sharply bounded fields, meant to break the aircraft up against a background of forests, rocks and small fields seen from above.

What the set is for

The cut parts follow the shape of the individual fields, so the most laborious part of the job falls away, namely transferring irregular shapes onto a painted model. The boundary stays sharp along its whole length and the symmetry of the left and right sides comes out right the first time.

The recommended sequence of colors

You work from the lightest tone to the darkest. First the whole upper surface is sprayed in the lightest color, then the fields that are to keep this color are covered and the next tone follows. With every step the masked area grows, so the last and darkest color is sprayed only into the remaining islands. The paint has to set between the individual steps, otherwise it tears when the masks are peeled off.

After the masks come off

The edges are looked over against the light and any bleed is corrected with a fine brush. Only then come the varnish, the decals and the panel shading.

Before the first coat it is worth evening the surface out with a primer. On bare plastic the adhesive layer holds differently than on filled areas, and the difference would show up as an uneven edge once the masks are off.