Desert Panzer
by Richard Reggio
With this Tamiya 1/35 Panzer III L, I tried to create a diorama of a scene with might have occurred in the Libyan desert during World War II. The ground work is made of a Sculptamold base with a kitty litter topping. The barbed-wire is home-made. I did this by looping the wire between 2 nails.
The soldiers are from DML soldier and are sunken into the base. A lot of modelers just put them on top of the groundwork. I’ve found that pressing them into it gives it a more realistic look. A little Tamiya red brown on the faces gives the troops the sunburned desert look.
Model Masters german brown and lay a wash and then dry brush
I used the “salt” method to give the tank “chipped paint” effect. After painted the tank panzer gray, I applied tale salt and water. I then outline the base coat with yellow. When it dried, I chipped off the salt crystals exposing the gray paint underneath.
I used a lot of photo-etched brass on the IIL. I also added welding lines by super gluing stretched sprue onto the hull. The rack holding the road wheels was scratch built using brass strips to which I added tiny bolts on top.
Hand painting the red divisional triangles on the turret rounded out the decaling. Black stains were created using pastels. The tank was finished up with an enamel wash.
Photos by Jeff Junker
.