This is the meaty part of an email Alex sent to me, hence the style.....
I should really say that most of the credit for the paint job should go to my Iwata HP-CPlus airbrush, bought recently to replace my ancient De Vilbiss.
Following a good clean & degrease (No.2 paintbrush, Ajax and hot water) I spray some Teroson etch primer (bought from C&L) into a pot, thin it well with Cellulose thinners, and mist the model, not a coat, just enough to take the shine off the brass. Then two light coats of the base colour, in this case Humbrol 86 well thinned with Precision Quick Air Drying Thinners. Leave to dry at least two days.
Then mix base colour and mucky black of your choice to give a very dark version of the base colour. Thin well with turpentine and brush along "shadow " areas. Have a cotton bud dipped into turpentine handy to wipe off/spread the dark wash, you can't erase completely but you need to avoid 'hard' areas of dark wash. Leave to dry well.
Apply a thin mist of base colour to the model to soften the wash & brighten up the base slightly. Leave to dry. Mix a lighter version of the base colour (brighten green with yellow, etc, not white) and using mostly the thicker pigment "dry brush" across detail. Dry brushing relies on most (99.9%) of the paint being rubbed off the brush onto a tissue before it is flicked lightly across the detail. If you're doing it properly you can see hardly any paint buildup on the first couple of brushes.
I suspected 'Warhammer' techniques came into it somewhere! Many thanks to Alex, and congratulations on producing models in 1:76 which could easily be taken for 1:35 or 1:43! |
