Ready for varnish

Well, I think all the initial painting is done! I did the black camo yesterday and all the detail painting today, but I wasn't home last night so I wasn't able to post an update. 

So the camo was hard, just as expected, I'm not very good at airbrushing and no matter how thin the paint was or how low or high the air pressure was, it always sputtered some paint, which, as you can imagine, is a disaster if you're spraying black over light sand base. I was able to fix it to a point where it's presentable, but if you look up close, it's noticeable. Also the color transitions are very soft and I wanted them to be much sharper, but it was beyond my capabilities. I guess it's again something to put more practice into, because this was my first airbrushed camouflage after, maybe almost a decade! 

So then I brush painted all bolts, rivets, handles and hinges, also a few details like fire extinguishers, and all the metal stowage so I can give it the same satin sheen with varnish. The large vivid green box is gonna be again that civilian splash of color just like the blue oil can on the Sherman, but I'm not sure if it fits well with the red flimsy can. Maybe I'll swap it with the light grey one. Fun fact - a lot of flimsy cans were left in civilian colors as well, so red, yellow, grey, white, often with logos like Shell, BP, etc. 

The only thing missing are markings, which are just tactical numbers on the turret. These are black, which poses a problem. As you can see, the other side of the turret is black. The numbers are black as well. That's because the Tamiya camo profile doesn't totally line up with the real tank, and I followed the real thing where it didn't match the Tamiya instructions. I didn't think about the decals, so now I'm left with a problem... what am I supposed to do? Apply the number only on one side? Paint a sand colored strip on the other side and place the decal on top of it? Try to re-paint the numbers with white? I have no idea...