Once the panels were attached, I then sprayed them with primer....
I've decided to use a slightly different technique for painting the mandibles and upper hull. So I airbrush black in the panel lines of the mandibles. What this does, is after the body color is applied over the airbrushed areas, they are slightly visible as shading between the panel lines.
In this picture below, you can see the slight shading in the lines.
After painting, I then attached the side metal framework, so the top and bottom halves can be screwed together.
And my recesses, which were painted in my post Pt 24, were attached as well.
At this point, I've already attached all of the greeblies to the side panels for detailing. So as with the top and bottom mandibles, I preshade with black airbrushing...
And then the body color..
And then glue the sides to the metal frame.
The front of the mandible has an LED that attaches to it for the headlights of the Falcon.
Now, because of the small possibility of the LED burning out, I do not want to glue the front on, as the instructions call for. So I purchased1/16" super magnets that I will glue to the frame and the front end to hold it in place so it can easily be removed if needed. You can see the size of the magnet next to the pencil tip.
And you can see the magnet attached to the frame center left.
And the front end just snaps right in place. I then taped off the areas to be painted gray and red.
After painting the ares, I attach all of the external piping to the mandibles.
I then do a black wash over the mandibles...
And sides...
Then some airbrushing of gray, black and brown, as well as a little bit of rust pastels on the sides.
And here we have the completed mandibles.
And a test lighting of the headlights.
So there we have the mandibles. Next is painting the sides of the Falcon.
So stay tuned. MUCH MORE TO COME....
