post shading

[Guest]

Has anyone tried to do any post shading of eg different pannels with chalk pastels and the drybrush technique over matt paint???

I tried to pre shade, but this was not a success and my skill with the airbrush is not nearly good enough to do this with the post shading.

I was thinking of using powdered pastel aplied with a soft thin brush to the pannel line area to give a little more "feel " to the P-40 in med collours.

Any ideas/sugestions?

Theuns

[Guest]

Never done it with pastels but I have done similar using an airbrush, it is not as difficult as you may think, just need a bit of confidence to have a go and a bit of practise on scrap or sprayed up milk bottles.

On way that you may want to try is the technique using filters of thinned oils where you use the filter to 'fade' the centre of the panels. The great thing about this technique is that it can be built up gradually and is very smooth and effective, you don't get the dusty, gritty look that drybrushing can give.

[Guest]

Good pastels can be used to give a nice soft effect like dry brushing but the problem is that you cannot build up the effect. The only way would be to seal one coat with a matt clear then apply another layer so by the time you are happy with the colour you might have too much clear on.

Pastels are great for adding softening and blending but not so good for buiding up colour. I have used them to make washes though, which are easier to control, and then use a final dry application of the same powder to blend it all in.

[Guest]

I will try the drybrus with pastels on the plane, i just wonder if it will make the collour of the pastel darker if I aply the clearcoat over it and then look overdone :-(

Only one way to find out.......................stay tuned

Theuns

[Ian M]

Theuns! What do you mean with the "my airbrush skills are not upto it". From what I have seen you do pretty good. Also If I can do it I'm pretty sure that you can too!

A trick I have found is to use a colour that is very near the base colour and thin it well. That way if(when) you go over the line and paint the wronge bit it will hardly notice. Unless you do it four or five times in the same place!!!

Another good pointer is its always better to under do it than to go over the top. Its always easier to give it another coat than to take it off.

Find an old kit or food container, paint it up and draw a few panel lines to get something to go after. Try with a single coloour and then with a camo pattern. At best you will find out its not impossible and the worste case it you have wasted a bit of paint and buggered your sandwich box!!

[stona]

I'm with Ian,it's not so difficult,just build up two or three different shades. You don't have to be panel specific,you can apply streaks and mottles more generally. Our armour friends call this modulation. I tried it on my last Spitfire and it worked well.

Cheers

Steev

[Guest]

Thanx lads. My problem was that I wanted to do the shading lines in one go and there in lies the problem, As you said, it is very difficult to work so fine and acurately.

I ended up getting a very nice effect on the underside Azure (using dark grey for the pre-shade) but on the mid stone/dark earth the effect was barely visable.Could be that the covering paint was to thick.

I did some post shading with pastels and a brush and needless to say I went totally overboard , but it does give a rather nice "feel" the the plane making it look less plasticy.

On the A6M3 I will try the pre-shading again and it should be a little easier as the whole thing is light grey.

Theuns

[Guest]

I always use dark green or black (depending which I have most of) for pre shading. If you pre shade,make sure your top coat is a tad thinner than you would normally do. This enables you to build up the colour more gradually and gives better control when judging the effect. Also, doing it with thinner layers there is a tendency for the top coat colour to ease back when drying revealing the post shading a tad more than when wet. Again, this gives better control, remember, you can always add another layer if after drying and waiting to get your eye back on the job but you can never take one off.

If you have multiple colour top camo, E.G. Dark Earth and Dark Green, don't spray all one colour first or you will be adding far to many layers over the pre shade when you do the second colour. Try to mask off or spray freehand the lighter of the two colours only where it will be, not under the next colour. This will give a much better chance of the pre shade having some effect on the darker colour to.

[stona]

Wot 'e said ^^^^^^^

Cheers

Steve