April 17th 2011: I'm very excited because today after an unintended long brake progress will be made. Ito-san is kindly sacrificing his free time to teach me something. All parts which require paint will be dealt with. First the parts are categorised into groups. The parts which will have a chrome colour will be painted shiny black first, the parts which will be matt black, the parts which will be silver and finally the body which will be Alfa red. The shiny black colour will be mixed first. Base colour mixed with thinner and hardener is mixed and then filtered before it is pored into the airbrush gun. Ito-san shows me with the front bumper how it should be done. I try to copy his way of working with the rear bumper and door mirrors. Of course the end result is far from Ito-san's result, but I'm pretty happy with doing the painting by myself. Luckily Ito-san reviews the parts I painted and gives some pointers on how to improve the result. In the end the result is not too bad. Now the airbrush gun needs to be cleaned to fill it with the matt black colour. The base of the matt black colour is the same as the shiny one but a whitish coloured additive is added. This group of parts is painted by myself. The majority of these parts get remarks from the master and need some rework, but again the end result is satisfying. One thing that surprises me is also the wheels are painted matt black. Ito-san informs me this will increase the realistic effect once the wheels are painted silver. I guess my teacher knows best so I just follow his advise. All parts are put in a climate chamber to harden the paint. In the mean time Ito-san has found some imperfections on the body and has applied filler to these sections. The body with filler is also placed into the climate chamber to harden. The next action is to mix the silver colour for the wheels. By looking at the colour itself it looks too shiny, but Ito-san has such an amount of experience I completely trust his judgement. After some time the parts are cured enough and taken out of the climate chamber. The body is now sanded down with 600 grade sanding paper to grind down any excessive filler. The wheels are painted by in silver and the advise of Ito-san to first apply a black coat proves to be 100% true. The wheels look very nice with the silver paint applied. The small details are still visible due to the black base coat. Now the body will have a coat of paint. The final colour will be Alfa red but this can't be achieved in 1 coat according to the specialist. First an initial coat which is less dark then the final colour has to be applied to ensure the grey base coat is not visible anymore. The mixing of the initial body coat results in a pinkish colour which is quite funny. The application of the paint is done by Ito-san because the body shape is quite tricky. The result is a very pink vehicle. Since this is the first coat the paint needs to harden the body is placed into the climate chamber. After some time the coat is hardened. The lines of the hood have almost disappeared as a result of the first coat of paint. With a small chisel and scratching tool the lines are restored. Now the mixing of the final paint coat can start. By looking at the colour chart the recipe of Alfa red is defined, however the colour looks to dark red so more white is added to get the correct bright Alfa red colour. During the application of the final coat of body paint the image of the vehicle comes alive. It looks fantastic! A usual huge thanks to Ito-san for his valuable time and patience.

Parts arranged by colour, shiny black, flat black, flat silver, Alfa red.	Body with applied filler in climate chamber to harden.
Hardened filler on body, ready for sanding with grade 600 sanding paper.	Filler to correct imperfections on body sanded down.
Shiny flat black and flat black parts finished.	Mixing of flat silver colour for wheels.
Flat silver applied to wheels.	Shiny black, flat black & flat silver parts in climate room to harden.
Applying first pinkish body coat.	First coat of body coat looks pretty shocking pink.
Mixing of second and final body coat Alfa red.	Body during application of second and final coat.
Alfa red coat applied and in climate chamber to harden.	Nice and shiny Alfa red body.
Base model, second resin cast and final body.