VFA-204 River Rattler Aggressors Inbound

Good evening ladies and gents. I want to share with you a skin I've been working on. She was just about done, then I found a photo of flap markings so I need to redo them. This one will probably become VFA-204 412.

I'm trying to make them as accurate as possible. No easy task with the shortage of needed photos. There always seems to be that angle you need in a pic to be sure you are laying the paint out correctly.

Feast your eyes on this sucker! This thing is gorgeous in the sim. :thumbup:

I've got three more sister aggressor ships to package up with this one before it is released. Then I'm moving on to the camo line birds. After that, a centennial and several of the old legacy gray schemes. All packs will have a new, used and worn scheme for each bird. I'm going to be a busy guy. Anyone planning on doing VFA-204 might want to hold off. Many more to come

UPDATED: 8/3/2018 - All pilot patches have been corrected using authentic patches for the squadron. Aircraft numbers on the flaps for all aircraft have been increased in size. If you downloaded the c.2011 and/or the c.2015 packs before 8/3/2018 you'll need to download them again to get the updates.

PACKS ARE NOW AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD.

Be sure to grab all three packs. They are not the same.

DOWNLOAD LINKS:

Pack 1 https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3301401/

Pack 2 https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3301400/

Pack 3 https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/files/3301866/

A few more shots.:smilewink:

Pretty good timing too. VFA-204 just gave up their A+ to get the C model.

All these beautiful skins are going to fill up my drives. Pretty sure my livery folder exceeds the size of the actual Hornet by now. :)

Looking forward to these. Excellent!

Pretty good timing too. VFA-204 just gave up their A+ to get the C model.

I didn't know that. I just read an article from some years back stating that the squadron was almost disbanded and the A+s were at 6000 hrs on the air frames. They were hoping to get 9000 hours out of them. :cry:

Very cool. That looks fantastic.

Hoping their CoNA jet (and the other CoNAs) make their way as well.

Very cool. That looks fantastic.

Hoping their CoNA jet (and the other CoNAs) make their way as well.

Yes, I will be including their CoNA jet. Got some pretty detailed photos of that one I can lift markings from and create the needed decals. That one is going to be easy. These camo birds are tough to get the paint to match up across panels. Perhaps when I get done wioth the VFA-204 stuff I can go after the other CoNAs birds. We shall see.

Looking great and accurate from all angles!

To my knowledge the CoNAs are already being worked on by someone else, you can even find them in the User Files section for the old 3d model. Perhaps you can combine forces.

But no one said we can't have two!

Yes, I will be including their CoNA jet. Got some pretty detailed photos of that one I can lift markings from and create the needed decals. That one is going to be easy. These camo birds are tough to get the paint to match up across panels. Perhaps when I get done wioth the VFA-204 stuff I can go after the other CoNAs birds. We shall see.

Excellent! Thanks

Looks amazing

Thanks. I've spent some time tweaking the decals and a few other things since this one is going to be the base for the others. Most of the decals on this thing are hand made.

I did run into a dilemma though. The flap as original on the plane looks terrible. It does not match the rest of the camo at all. It looks like they may have taken a flap off of another bird and put it on this aircraft. I'm torn between painting the left flap as I see it in pictures or leaving it alone as it is now.

Here's a few picture of the real bird from behind. Look at the left wing flap.

Thanks. I've spent some time tweaking the decals and a few other things since this one is going to be the base for the others. Most of the decals on this thing are hand made.

 

I did run into a dilemma though. The flap as original on the plane looks terrible. It does not match the rest of the camo at all. It looks like they may have taken a flap off of another bird and put it on this aircraft. I'm torn between painting the left flap as I see it in pictures or leaving it alone as it is now.

 

Here's a few picture of the real bird from behind. Look at the left wing flap.

Leave it alone. All aircraft throughout their life get components replaced and sometimes there isn't the time to match the surface finish. Please keep the standard color across the entire aircraft.

I agree. I tried it and it looks like I don't know how to skin. Really looks bad. So leave it as is I will.

Lots of changes since my last screens.

1. Recreated all text decals as the originals were too bold.

2. Corrected the size, color and position of text decals.

3. Corrected decals on the canopy. They were in grey blocks. Blocks were removed and grey text added as on the real aircraft.

4. Added Beware of Jet Blast and Arrestor Hook warning text, replacing the originals in grey blocks.

5. Changed the tone of the white to reduce the cartoon look.

6. Created a new, what I call, M wrench on the right LEX.

7. Changed the tone of black decals to reduce cartoon look.

8. Widened the faux engine nacelle grey paint to match that of photos. Originals were taken off a decal sheet and were too narrow.

9. Added lot number to the fuel tanks and recreated the River Rattlers decal as the original was too bold.

10. Camo touch ups here and there.

11. Changed the flap bort numbers to black as they are on the real aircraft.

With that, this bird is done. I will be moving on to the others now.

A few pics of the "used" version I will be releasing.

Nice skin , from my own experience I know how much effort you have put into that skin , so well done !

Nice skin , from my own experience I know how much effort you have put into that skin , so well done !

Camo birds are never easy. Couple that with the fact that many of the decals on the f-18 model run across template sections results in tedious alignment of those decals. You're looking at roughly 50 hours of work to get this one done. the following skins will be easier now that the base is done. A few changes to the camo here and there and a change of numbers will be all it takes.

If you want make a CAG and line jets :music_whistling:

If you want make a CAG and line jets :music_whistling:

Yep, those are in the plans. And then some. Thanks for the images. Will come in handy, but the second one is not displaying for some reason. :thumbup:

You wouldn't happen to have a high-res image of these would you?

Download it ;) It is in PNG format, an the background not visible.

Looks great! Good job. :thumbup:

Download it ;) It is in PNG format, an the background not visible.

Yep figured it out after I pulled it. I already have the two images you posted here. The pic of the air brake paint job you posted is different than the one for the two images I posted. So, I don't know what the tail art is for the one with the Fleur-de-lis is.

Well, just hit a major snag on the CAG bird I'm painting.

I'm having to recreate the air brake panel by scratch because there is no photo I can find other than the one in the image below which is so skewed there's no chance to lift it off of the photo. So, as I lay the first trial layer onto the model and view it in the model viewer, I get this. Aaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrgggggggggggggg!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Show stopper for sure.

Why? Just why? :(

The good news is, I'm not so sure that the real panel has fleur-di-lis on the corners and I may be able to move the gold line more toward the edge of the panel where hopefully it's not mis-mapped. The bad news is, the other CAG birds I was planning on doing cannot be done because of this. This is the kind of stuff that wastes hours of time.

Ok, gents. I tried as best I could to create the original comedy and tragedy masks air brake on the camo bird. There's just not enough detail in the photo for me to see and/or to lift to get a decent looking graphic. So, I made a compromise.

I've added a different CAG VFA-204 board. It's based on the picture previously in this thread, but I had to create quite a few parts for it since the original picture was skewed and halfway cut off. It's about the best I can do for this bird unless someone has a decal or a head on shot of the airbrake on the VFA-204 400 aggressor.

If you could, when you publish this, could you make sure it's set up for AUSAF coalition so it also defaults to the Aggressor side? Skin looks awesome!

If you could, when you publish this, could you make sure it's set up for AUSAF coalition so it also defaults to the Aggressor side? Skin looks awesome!

Thanks. Yes they are setup countries = {"USA","AUSAF"}