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This is Juan Contreras' Jagdpanther (Early). This is the DML kit No. 7241 built OOB. It is in 1/72 scale and represents a vehicle serving with the 3/schwere Panzerjäger Abteilung 654 in France, 1944. This unit suffered heavy losses and was later refitted with Jagdpanzer IV/L70 and a few more Jagdpanthers. It later fought in the Ardennes and surrendered in the Remagen area (see references)
Kit
The kit itself is quite good. The areas that require attention are the fron hull, the fit is poor and it requires a bit of filling. As with DML kits produced some years ago (this one is from 2004) the tracks are quite bad. I did not glue them and instead, I covered them with the side skirts. The PE parts are ok, but are better done in DML's Tiger ausf. B.
Assembly
I did not add the tow cable and did not attach any antenna, as per my references some early vehicles had them either just beside the access hatch on the back or simply the item was missing for some reason. I could still have added it to the top of the engine cover as per the kit's instructions but I ended up finding no acceptable wire to represent a scale accurate antenna. DML decals are a bit thick for this scale, but sometimes you get good ones. Here, I used Micro Sol to little avail. In some areas they didn't set properly and in some others they look acceptable.
Paint
The camouflage was done with Testors Model Masters II's enamels (Dunkelgelb, Olivgrun and Shokoladenbraun). I gave it a base coat of Dunkelgelb and made some stencils with a hobby knife. With several irregular non-standard shapes I sprayed the Olivgrun and Shokoladenbraun in irregular patches all around the vehicle. This still required a smooth coat of Dunkelgelb to blend and matt the vehicle. Otherwise it looked very shiny and unrealistic, at least for this scale.
I did a bit of weathering here and there, specially on the access areas and tools, etc.
I could have added a lot more of weathering but I'm not a big fan of it. In some cases it is frankly overdone so I chose to finish my vehicle in a somewhat clean finish. Considering jagdpanthers at this stage of the war fought more on the defensive role and more likely covered with foliage. It was finished with Humbrol's Matt Cote.
Epilogue
Finishing this kit was the funnest part. My usual digital camera broke down so I had to get someone else's to finish the work. Interestingly, a few shots gave this good result. The vehicle was photographed against natural light on my kitchen table near the window, with printing paper as background. I filtered the colors and balanced them to retain the right bright without any further retouching.
I finished this vehicle inspired by Russ Takashima's build log. It had been sitting for more than one year until I decided to finish it. I know now I can do much better than I thought. I'm currently working on a Jagdtiger.
Hope you like it.
References
http://www.wehrmachtslexikon.de/Gliederungen/schwPzJAbt/schwPzJAbt654-R.htm
http://www.achtungpanzer.com/pz15.htm#jagdpanther
http://www.track-link.net/forum/site_blogs/8649
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