Large ground-vehicle models show everything, including the small tactical numbers and lettering on a turret, and that is what these 1:35 sheets are for. The subjects hold one line: medium tanks across a series of production versions, a self-propelled gun, a command vehicle, an anti-aircraft gun, and alongside them captured machines in foreign service. Particular episodes decide the markings you get, among them the fighting for Berlin, Prague in May 1945 and the North African and Italian theatres.
1:35 is the most widely used scale for ground vehicles, so finding a model to match a sheet takes no searching. The packet contains the printing, not a kit.
At this scale a medium tank is over twenty centimetres long, and that changes what a decal has to do. On a large model a coarse number will not pass, because the printing sits next to engraved detail, moulded lettering and rivets, all visible at once. The printing therefore needs crisp artwork and a thin carrier film so that it disappears into the surface once the clear coat goes over it.
On vehicles built in series the turret shape and the position of the marked panels changed during production. Check not only the type but the version and the year, or you will be applying a marking to a place the real machine never carried one.
Markings date and place a model as strongly as camouflage does. A captured vehicle with two layers of insignia, or a machine from the May days of 1945, gives a model a context that paint alone cannot supply.
The more dust and mud you intend to add, the bolder the markings should be. Small lettering disappears under pigment, so match the choice to the finish you have in mind.
Finish the camouflage, lay a gloss coat and leave it at least overnight. Cut the printing close to the artwork, soak it, and let it float on a film of water on the model until it is exactly where you want it; only then press the water out from the centre towards the edges. On riveted panels and around welds a setting solution helps, as does scoring the edge with a scalpel. A second clear coat follows, and washes and dust only after that.
The same subjects in small scale are in 1:72, and the full printed range is under ŘOP armour decals.
