I am currently working on my F4U Corsair Cockpit. I painted the cockpit with a mix of Tamiya XF-26 and XF-4. The control panels were brushpainted on with XF-1.
Anyway, I wanted to weather it. I will be using Tamiya’s panel liner and such, since I do not want to spend money on weathering products yet. Do I have to add a clear coat on top of the base coat before weathering, or can I just add the panel liner in, because since it is enamel based, and I would assume that adding Enamel thinner wouldn’t affect it too hard.
But I just want to post it here to be sure. Should I do it?
I would also ask some advice as to how to weather it. I would say that a combinaton of panel liner and chipping effects should suffice. I wouldn’t try to add panel highliting (spraying a lighter version of the base coat to make the surface less uniform) because I don’t want to mess up the paint job, and because I hadn’t any practice yet.
Well you asked a question about the weathering and then answered it. So the next step is to do it and from that you will learn.
As to the paint, it’s already glossy. Actually too glossy for the final result but glossy enough to weather IMO. I’d weather right over that, I just wouldn’t be using your products because that’s not what I use for weathering personally ( not saying you shouldn’t or can’t, just that I don’t)…
I haven’t been too successful with using an enamel-based wash like Tamiya panel liner, and it didn’t seem to matter what kind of paint and/or clearcoat was underneath it…enamel thinner always started to remove the paint. You should definitely paint a test piece or plastic spoon with the color you used in the cockpit and check how it reacts with the panel liner. Using a Q-Tip to wipe off the excess will be a good way to see if the thinner is attacking the paint…if you see green on the Q-Tip, its going to damage the paint.
You don’t have to buy specific weathering products. You probably have the materials on your bench to make your own.
You can make your own washes with water-based acrylic paints, mixed with water or isopropyl. Or you can use enamels (or oils) and mineral spirits.
All of those types of paint can be used for drybrushing.
Go to an art supply store and get yourself a set of pastel chalks. For around ten bucks, you’ll get a range of colors that you can use to make weathering powders of all kinds of colors.
Those are just a few of the things you can do without paying AK, Mig, or Tamiya to make it for you.
There’s nothing wrong with using ready-made products, of course. But there is satisfaction in learning the techniques, and savings, too, if you’re on a tight budget.
I was gifted a set of (Doc.O’Brian’s Weathering Powders.) I find them to be easy to use over Acrylics as well as Regular Enamels and Lacquers. I don’t usually weather heavily, because most of my builds OF Course, are Motoryachts, Speed-Boats( multi-Media) and Coastal Working Craft (All Plastic Scratch-Built).They are refferred to as Freshies! Salties are there too.
I find as a rule that the viewers seem to grasp the whole picture with light weathering on the Working Craft. Now commercial Fishing Craft get tons of it, Just like Armor does. If a Trawler or other Fishing Boat Or Tug, is clean, it just got out of the yard or hasn’t begun it’s working life yet. There’ll still be a wee bit of rust in salty environments and some paint scraping here and there. Just not as cumulative a a boat tht’s fished for months!
Weathering in reality is very much a sbujective part of modeling.To suggest Age,Wear or Evidence of Violence around or against the subject.( As in Armor). Some folks like to see heavy weathering as a work of art. I sometimes see it as a method of covering up flaws. Either way, it definitely has it’s place in modeling for all disciplines!
The last thing I would suggest should’ve been among the first( SORRY) is to have a Mule, Car,Truck,Tank, Plane or Ship to practice on. Maybe a glue Bomb you picked up somewhere or, ) Don’t Laugh) go buy a Toy Car or something and practice on it. Say a Die Cast from a local Garage or Flea sale that is missing parts? This way it does NOT matter if the coatings react with each other!
Often for matte or semi matte I’ll do a single coat in a double pass if that makes sense to you ? I find less is better for matte as long as I get the desired effect. So I shoot down the piece and back again thus the two passes and they aren’t much wetter than mist coats. But it’s considered one coat.One coat meaning it never flashed off within the time frame of two passes.
IDK, we seek and find a way of doing things, that’s generally mine for matte. I’ve been burned once or twice by putting matte on too wet and too many coats. You just need enough to knock the gloss down, then it seems to dry clearer.
As to washes, my car grills get a black wash from either artist acrylics or craft paints thinned way out with plain old water or else one of my thinners I make up for acrylics. Engines get dry brushed or I use my water clean up Duncan oil stains ( sounds like an oxymoron I know but it is what it is). Rubber running boards and interior cloths get the craft paint treatment. All cheap, I stock it all anyway and they are effective. Windsor and Newton has an Artisan line of water clean up oils now or water mixable. I haven’t tried those yet but my Duncans work well, you just gotta be quick on the clean up is all or it’s forever stained. But as thin as I make them it’s not as though it matters a lot, often I even do a second wash and third wash to get the depth I want. I imagine the W&N are similar. You get a little tube of that stuff and you have a lifetime of washes, you only use a little dab of it at a time. But craft paints do fine as well.
Watch a few videos on washes you will catch on quickly,you’re a smart enough guy !
Hey teenage modeler, I have just read though all the posts to date. Lots of good advice, but I think one general rule might help you: nothing in real life is one solid color! Take your green cockpit for example. It would be several hues of green plus brows, metal showing through scraps, mud and oil stains and whatever. Use your imagination and Have fun.
When using a water based wash, make sure to add just a tiny drop of dish### washing soap to break up the surface tension so it will flow instead of staying in one drop.###
When using a water based wash, make sure to add just a tiny drop of dish### washing soap to break up the surface tension so it will flow instead of staying in one drop.###