For years now after the FSM article on making your own decals I have had pretty good sucess, however; my full potential has not yet been realized using editting sofeware such as Adobe Photo Deluxe or MicroSoft paint. [V] My printer on the other hand is a very excellent Minolta Magicolor Color Laser printer. I am now looking for an ideal software program that can handle vector type graphics, skew text (common with Naval lettering), and can handle resizing images without losing image quality. Anyone have any suggestions on good software available? I have PhotoShop Elements but haven’t tried it yet. I have heard some modelers have used Adobe Illustrator as well…what do you all think?
Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.[:)]
You might try Cannon Creative Image and Print Master. Both allow Adobe and Paint Shop Pro images to be exported for editing. Both progams can be found at any good computer store carrying software.
Adobe Illustrator s definately the best. You can import images from Photoshop, and images do not lose quality when they are enlarged. Its a fairly expensive program, and takes some time to master. You can also, vector, skew, and have the type assume any shape that you want.
You can enlagge images gradually in Photoshop by going to IMAGE SIZE, setting it for “percent” (rather than pixels, inches, cm, etc.), and typing in 110%, & repeating until you have the size that you want. That way, the computer doesn’t have to “invent” all the pixels in between at once. You can skew with Photoshop, also. Go to EDIT>TRANSFORM> and select what you want to do. The type needs to be rendered first, to turn it into an object. If you rasterize it, it becomes uneditable as type.
Hope this helps.
Thanks Pixilater, after reading your reply I did some experimenting and so far I’ve made one small decall sheet consisting of simple yellow and brown missle bands for modern AIM-7M’s, AIM-9L’s, and AIM-120’s. I also made stencils and it was reletively easy once I got used to some of the tools in PhotoShop. Thanks again for the suggestion. Does your forum name imply your career field?, that is; do you work in computer graphics?
At home we also use Illustrator.
My Decals are printed on the Alps Micro Dry Printer using appropriate sheets.
I like the Alps as it allows me use White, Gold, Silver and metallic colours too.
Glad it worked for you, Greg. I am a Media Arts major in college (although I’m 48 !). At another website, I have some Photoshop tutorials. You may find them useful, as I go into detail there and show examples. I’ve been using Photoshop for 4-5 hours a day for about two years now. If there’s anything you’d like to know, just e-mail me. You’ll find the address in my profile.
Here’s a link to the pages :
http://www.scalehobby.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=57
some hobby stores carry a testors product with decal film and the software right inside the package
Walmart does too for about $6.
If your willing to spend some extra bucks, check out this site:http://www.tlai.com
I just recently bought the Testor’s software box with decal software, and it was the worst thing I’ve ever wasted 7 bucks on. The CD has only a few images, and you can’t import anymore unless you pay for another upgrade online from Testors…[banghead] Unfortunately I bought it while on vacation, and can’t return it…anyone up for frisby!!!LOL
I use a software program called ULEAD PhotoImpact. I’ve got version 7 now and I’ve been using the program for five or six years, starting with version 4. I use a Minolta/QMS Magicolor 2350 to make decals. The program is cheap and works for every decal I’ve ever wanted.
The learning curve for the software is steep but it can do everything if you can figure out where the options are. It is not an easy program to use but it does so much.
I’m building a Korean War F4U-4, and need some specific lettering. Can anyone advise me on where to find the right font? I’ve blown about 5 hours surfing the net, and can’t find anything close. I tried to draw it out, but all I have is MS Paint, and it comes up 'way short!
Wess in Albuquerque
“They’ve got us surrounded now, the poor bastards.” Chesty Puller
How’s this for a nice font to use? Tell me if it is close.
http://www.dafont.com/en/voir.php?libelle=Amarillo+USAF
http://www.tlai.com/med_des/amusaf.html
Dat’s it! That’s exactly what I wanted. Thank you! I had looked at that site, but couldn’t
get a sample of the font, and couldn’t figure out how to download it.
Thanks again!
Wess in Albuquerque
i was going to post a similar question, glad someone else has. thankyou. the answers will be well recieved on this end also.
I’m sure most of you guys have it, but if anyone needs acopy of PhotoShop 7, just email me!!!