Sorry, no pictures. I wanted to ask if anyone has had luck with painting the decals on your aircraft. I am starting a new corsair and was thinking I could paint on the star logo on the side and wings. If anyone know where I can see pictures that would be great to. I remember seeing not too long ago a wildcat or corsair that had such a good paint job on it and it looks as if the decals were painted on. Does anyone remember that photo?
There’s a company that sells precut masks for the various insignia and shark teeth… I think they only offer a limited number of scales and planes. If I can remember who they were, I’ll post a link here (or maybe somebody else will beat me to it)
Beyond that, I’ve thought about improvising something on my own, but to do it right takes 2-4 masks, depending on the insignia, which need to be cut and aligned exactly.
Edit - found the link: http://www.montex-mask.com/html/porady_en.htm
and a review: http://www.largescaleplanes.com/reviews/Decals/WW2/Montex/montex_super_mask.html
The stars and bars on my F6F Hellcat were painted on using Eduard masks.
Mal
Both EZ Mask (a fantastic product put out by a very nice Canadian man named Chris Loney) and Eduard, to name just two, put out masks of national insignia, including those for white US star-and-bar insignia. They also make various German and Japanese insignia masks/stencils. I prefer EZ Mask, since Eduard has not yet got around to changing their insignia masks to the newer Tamiya masking tape, as they are doing with their entire inventory of old, vinyl masks which don’t work well on compound curves at all. However, looking at Mal’s beautiful F6F, those old Eduard masks can’t be all that bad. I have a set of 1/32 Eduard star-and-bar masks (sized for the Trumpeter kit, but will fit others I’m sure) I have no real use for, but they are, again, in the old vinyl material.
Now, EZ Mask is also vinyl, but it is an entirely different type than the old Eduard stuff, and the adhesive (which, after all, is the most important part) used by EZ Mask is nothing short of miraculous. If you get it wet, it sticks better, and yet I’ve never had it pull up my paint.
TOM