Figurehead and Head Timbers

I had a little trouble getting the grating to line up correctly with the entry but after a few tries I did manage to get it to stay on in the correct place. Since the figurehead has a little detail I thought painting it would look better. Model Master Camouflage grey and Model Master Neutral Grey were painted on and flat black painted around it. A black wash was applied after the paint dried to bring out recessed detail and dry brushing with silver and flat white to highlight raised detail. The head timbers and catheads glued on easily with super glue. After it all dried I touched up the paint where needed.

Bulkheads and Stairs

After a couple of tries, I figured out that the best way to install the stair landings is before the bulkhead is glued to the deck. Preferably when the bulkhead is still on the spru.

Transome and Forward Bulkhead

There is a ton of detail painting here. I started by laying on a coat of flat black. The windows were painted Dark Ghost Gray the same as the windows on the stern galleries. I wanted the carvings to have depth, not just gold paint, so I layered colors on starting with Testors flat brown, making sure to get the paint into the recesses. Next Testors gold was painted on using a heavy dry-brushing technique to apply paint to the higher surfaces and skip the darker recesses. Finally Testors silver was dry-brushed onto the highest surfaces to give a shiny effect. The royal coat of arms on the stern was painted mostly gold. The lion was painted Testors red brown acrylic, dry-brushed with flat tan and the horse painted Testors Model Master Camouflage grey with flat white dry brushed highlights.

Hull Assembly

After the black paint on the strakes dried I removed the masking tape. Some touching was still needed. After finishing the paint on the stern galleries, they were installed with alligator clips and liquid cement. Since I want the individual planks of the hull to stand out I mixed up a wash of dark brown water color,with a drop of dish washing soap added, and applied it liberally to the light colored part of the hull and let dry. I also mixed a lighter brown wash for the gold and dark red wash for the red areas. After all the washes dried overnight I carefully removed the excess from with a wet paint brush and q-tip.

I have kept the 2 hull halves separate up till now because it makes it easier to do all this detail painting. But now, before I paint the bottom below the water line, It's time to cement the hull halves together. The alignment of the halves is very good and required no trimming or removing any of the alignment pins, just put it together with liquid cement and as many clamps as I could get on. Let it dry overnight.

The bulkheads for the deck piece were painted Testors Flat Red and Gold with Middle Stone on the railings and cemented in place. After the cement on the hull dried I gently pried the sides apart just enough to get the deck in place. Starting from the stern and working forward, I positioned the deck and cemented it with super glue. After the whole deck was in the correct place masking tape was used to hold the sides of the inner hull against the deck edge. I was careful to make sure the tape was only on the top of the rail and did not touch the gold paint on the hull.

More Hull Painting

It took two coats of Middle Stone to completely cover the hull area below the black. Middle stone was also painted on the railings. After all this dried I masked off the strakes and painted up to them. After the paint dried I masked off the space between the strakes and painted it middle stone. Time consuming but it's the only way I know to get a nice clean paint separation between the black and the middle stone. I began painting the flat black on the stern galleries. The decoration at the top of each side looks like feathers and a picture of a painting of this ships shows them white. I painted them Model Master Camouflage grey. I'll dry brush the with flat white when it's dry. These stern galleries still need a lot of touching up.

I waited until most of the hull was painted to paint the bottom because I was trying to decide between white or light grey. Finally deciding on Testors Flat White spray can after looking at photos of other modelers work. Although I'm pleased with the result, waiting this long to paint was a bit of a blunder. During the masking process some parts were knocked off and some gold paint was damaged. After repairing the damage all good again.