Help with painting stages

[Guest]

please can I ask you all for some help?


I am trying to get to grips with using oil paints, enamels and acrylics together to achieve weathering, dust, filters and mud.


I have been using predominantly acrylic Tamiya paints, with very very few enamels for fine detail at the end. All my weathering so far has been done with Humbrol weathering powders, and either Matt cote or decal fix.


Watching some videos on getting better at my modelling, I see some use acrylic pains for the main base coats, then apply dots of oil paints and use white spirit to drag it out. Also they use enamel paints to streak, pulling it again with thinners.


I understand the process of getting the result, but what I am confused on is the intermediate procedures so my questions are:


1: on a model painted with Matt acrylic Tamiya paint, do I need to apply a Matt or gloss varnish BEFORE I do this enamel wash/weathering?


2: if I gloss coat the model and then do the pin wash, how do I get the paintwork back to a deep Matt finish? Do I simply airbrush a Matt varnish over the model to finish?


Thanks everyone, these are probably obvious, but I'm lost.

[Guest]

Dave, my advice is this sequence


Base coat, camo (if necessary)


Gloss coat


Decals (apply gloss coat over them once they're dried)


Pin wash


Dot filter (if desired)


Chipping (if desired)


General weathering


Matt coat


Pigments / pastels


I use a mixture of Tamiya acrylics & Humbrol enamel paint. The gloss coat I use is Humbrol Clear (an acrylic product) & Humbrol Matt Coat at the end. I don't matt the finish down too much as I think it makes the end result look too dull.


You can check out my Jagdtiger build as an illustration of the sequences involved.


Hope this helps


Patrick

[Guest]

Hi Dave


1) Although I don't use enamels, once I paint I will always use a matt or satin varnish just to seal in my paintwork, then I can think about either enamel or oils for weathering, my personnel preference will always be oils as I find them easier to work with.


2) After any washes or weathering I will always seal this with another coat of matt or satin varnish as I find gloss too shiny, and when you have finished your paint work give the kit a coat of Matt varnish to seal everything in and protect your paintwork it also removes the shine from gloss varnish.


scott

[Guest]

Thank you both!


So I need to seal the base and camo finish before I start using oils/enamels with thinners,


Will the thinners affect the acrylic if not sealed?

[BarryW]

My sequence Dave


1/ Prime - I now use the new Badger primer. This enables you to see and correct flaws while alsom providing a good base for paint.


2/ Pre-shade (I use a primer) - this is the first weathering stage and is part of tricking the eye into see variations in the colour due to the effect of light falling on, what would be in real life, a large surface area. I pre-shade along panel lines, into nooks and crannies and areas that would be shaded. It is best not to be too neat, it needs to be uneven, even blotchy in places. People lijke me who are mediochre with an airbrush do the best pre-shading!!


3/ Base coat (I use acrylic, Vallejo or AKI) - lightest colour first. This is in three stages, a light base ensuring you stop while the pre-shading shows through. Then I mix in about 20% white to the base colour, thin it about 25% more than for the first stage and spray into the middle of panels and areas that would catch the light. Finally after cleaning the a/b I do a mist of a very thinned down base coat to bring together the pre and post shaded areas to get the effect I want of a variable base colur shade. Some parts of the model may get more of this treatment than others. You can also eliminate any problems or mistakes in the first two stages this way. I go through that process for all colour making up the camo scheme one by one with progressive masking for each. All the masking except around cockpits and clear parts is removed only after all base coats are finished.


4/ After all the camo work is done I spray a acrylic gloss coat such as Alclad Aqua Gloss.


5/ Decal


6/ Gloss again to seal - the paint any last details such as red/green wing lights, guns and so on.


7/ Panel line pin washes - I use AKI enamel washes. I also do a wash in areas of detail to emphasise shade.


8/ First matt coat - I use Vallejo acrylic matt.


9/ Weathering stages best done on a matt surface - pigments for smoke/exhausts and silver pencil paint chips and dry brushing in areas of detail.


10/ Final Matt coat. I then apply the last of the weathering, oil stains and leaks again using AKI enamels. Gloss is also applied where needed where wing tip lights are 'solid' painted not clear parts for instance. Last masks are removed.


11/ Final fittings....

[Guest]

Thank you both!
So I need to seal the base and camo finish before I start using oils/enamels with thinners,


Will the thinners affect the acrylic if not sealed?

You stand a good chance of damaging the Tamiya acrylic without putting down a sealing coat first Dave. Oil based products are chemically ' hotter ' than acrylics, so they're likely to attack the paint.


It's therefore possible that the oil based products could attack the acrylic sealing coat, but I've never had that problem ..... provided the sealing coat is given sufficient time to cure - I wait 48 hours minimum.


Barry's advice is excellent for aircraft models, but I'm thinking you're talking about armour - that's based on your description of a dot filter in your OP.


Some steps in aircraft painting ( like pre-shading) are generally not used in armour building.


You could have a look at an old thread of mine


http://scale-models.co.uk/threads/painting-a-t-34-85.8621/


It covers most of what we've been talking about.

[Guest]

The Tamiya flat paints are truly flat, so agree with the above posters, you do need to seal it with something! Also want to stress that these are not rules set in stone - with a few plastic bottles, you can experiment to your heart's content, and whatever works for you, go with it! I have to say though, in my experience, oil washes and filters are SO much easier to work with, allow you to build up effects and most importantly, can be corrected easily even when dried, which cannot be said about any acrylic washes (ask how I know!!). For this reason I have 2 brush jars, one for Acrylics and one for Oils.

[Guest]

Thanks all, yes dougie, I'm talking about the tank I'm building,


I've gone ahead and painted the camo, and covered the whole thing in Valejjo polyurethane gloss in the airbrush,


So I'll leave that now probably till next week, as I'm away this weekend.

[PaulTRose]

personally i hate tamiya paint.....never been able to get it to airbrush right and not been keen on how it brushes on, might be me though


i like using oils though.....ive got a vid saved somewhere that shows how to do a spot wash to create weathering, i will try and find it


good thing about oils is if you dont like what you have done you can 'wash' it off with oil thinners......which sometimes has the effect of creating what you were after in the first place!! lol


i like enamels for washes....a little bit in white spirit goes a long way...not too keen on bought washes, i find them too thick and its soooooo easy to make your own anyway (and cheaper )

[Guest]

Thanks Beowulf, I like the idea of making my own washes, filters and chipping paint, because then I can make whatever colour I need.


I gather the filter is made with one drop of colour to ten drops of thinner,


Washes are three drops of paint to ten drops of thinner and streaking and chipping paint is 7 drops of paint to ten of thinner. Does that sound about right?

[PaulTRose]

. Does that sound about right?

no idea lol......im a splodge it on and see what happens person lol cant be doing with being that precise lol


cant find that vid


if you go on youtube and i can really recommend vids by humbrol and scalemodelmedic....its the same guy, very talented and he has a way of explaining it in simple terms

[Guest]

Lmao! At least you're honest!


Funnily, I have watched a fair few of his, and that's what got me into the Humbrol wealthering powders.