140 replies to this topic

[Duffy]

I've been doing this painting thing in earnest for about six months, I guess, since about the time a work accident limited my facility with my dominant hand and cut into my chassis-building. So, part physical therapy, part I-just-get-a-royal-kick-out-of-it. I figure I'll put up some bodies I'm painting and try to get some talk about techniques going.

There're two things I'd like to be talking about with this, if I'm real lucky: brush techniques, and color layout. I figure there're more ways to approach these topics than there are characters in A Game Of Swords who you just know're gonna die spectacularly, but I've been inspired by the guys who do this well and I'd like to see some techniques getting discussed for the benefit of future generations. Or guys who tune in tomorrow. Whatever.

Anyway, I'll start filling up bandwidth in the next couple days; in the meantime here's some color to brighten up the first post.



Parma acrylic inside, 1-Shot lettering enamels out. I hope you guys are all old enough to get the Sly & the Family Stone joke in the theme.

Lacking progress shots (I don't know what'll become a useful Teaching Moment until after it went horribly wrong), I'll just remark here, the aluminum color was s'posed to be pearl white, but I thinned it too much and the silver all sank to the undersurface. I'd been pushing the acrylic through a too-fussy Thayer & Chandler airbrush...since this, I got an entry-level Iwata double-action unit that I can push the paint thru at 40 lb.

This managed to cop a Concours win at a local meet, and now I'm all ambitious. If I ain't fast, at least I can be pretty.

More later.

Duffy

[Pablo]

SWeeeT

[John Streisguth]

You're my pick to take the concours trophy this year.

[Duffy]

You're my pick to take the concours trophy this year.

Awww. Well, like a good sportsman I must modestly declare that was only like maybe 70% of my intent here, 85% tops. And the real fun part is, if you glance around the table you'll see at least three guys who alla-sudden got their eyes on that pretty Jose Rodriguez plaque! Gennlemens, we gots ourselves a race here.

I have to spend the next few days tuning a couple cars for The Fall Brawl, but pretty quick I'm gonna want to get up a brush-technique diagnostic here. Next week.

Duf

[Chewy]

Nice, Duffy, I wanna take you higher...

[NY Nick]

Ok Duff what about Sex machine you know that one?
The Body great, will you be painting more?

[Duffy]

Nice, Duffy, I wanna take you higher

Right, Jeff, & I guess it's not real clear in the pic but up front is the punchline: "I wanna TQ Higher!"...
And, no I don't have plans of doing any James Brown-themed cars at the moment.

[NY Nick]

No Duffy there is a sly stone song same name, from the same album.
will you be painting for racer's?

[NJ Racer]

Duffy

A very refreshing topic to say the least. Lets see more soon!

[Tex]

Nice lookin' paint job, Duffy!

[Duffy]

No Duffy there is a sly stone song same name, from the same album.

I was having a small joke...

will you be painting for racer's?

But -but - this is a racer. I know, I'm slow, but still...
Okay, all seriousness aside: let's get into it.

Here's one with a few things to talk about in it. About this time, I was beginning to think about "Sponsors" and how race cars started sporting all kinda stickers for different brands & such. More recently I got to thinking about how those became part of the overall paint theme, and how I might try to do something like that - but not yet.
So, this is the start of it all, and hopefully we'll be able to address how that progresses from here. If I ever manage to paint anything more, that is.



Like I said, all the spraying is Parma acrylics. I don't have the ventilation here to do lacquers. This was my first successful pearl-white: just a dusting of pearl then back it up solid with plain white, and it's blinding in person! Then, Fasblue backed up with a spritz of silver and all sealed with white.
The "Sponsor" credits here are all for fun. I had just got an assortment of good brushes recommended by my Mentor Noose, and was learning how to make 'em do what they're supposed to. A lot more on this as the thread continues, and hopefully some suggestions and where-I-went-wrong from you guys! This ain't a Vanity Thread, I need critical comment.



For starters, look at the red cheat line here: it's intended to be about .030" wide, and it was laid down in 1-Shot Lettering Enamel using a 18/0 Loew-Cornell Golden Taklon Script Liner.
I wish I'd taken pics as I painted -
I spent some time loading the brush and getting the feel of it on a blotter. I was taught to fill any brush not past half its bristle length; true for these? - And then, to move the loaded brush only as fast as paint flows down onto the work. I was holding the brush at a medium angle here and laying the bristles almost down flat but not quite, so to allow the long bristles to sorta weathervane along and not wobble witth my shakey hand.
Still, there's a lot of wiggle and variance in the width of the line when you look close.
Hey, my wife just got back from voting and my cat's having a sneezing fit, so I'm gonna stop typing and let you experienced guys tell me what I'm doing.

Duffy

[GearBear]

I'm not sure how Noose does it as I have never seen one of his bodies in person. I don't have the lettering/striping skills to do it like he does, so here is how I would go about it if I were painting the F1 car, I would draw up a mask in Inkscape, and then import it into a program called "Make the cut". This then would be "printed" to my bottom of the line 12" vinyl cutter from USCutter.com. I would then use some masking tape (I don't have any true transfer tape yet) and transfer the vinyl to the body. Thus, I would have the Pearl area with the line around it and the numbers masked. If I felt lucky, I might even do some of the lettering that way.

I would then work on the details for the motor and driver. Once they were done, I would shoot the blue and then back it. Then pull off the surrounding line shoot it red and back it. Then pull the pearl masks and shoot that and back it. Etc... Since I use water based paints, I would be hitting the paint with a heat gun between each spray to heat set the paint.

I always like to shoot from dark to light if I can. Otherwise you can get bleed through that can really affect the colors.

BTW: That blue totally changes color if you back it in white vs backing it in black! Backed in white it is a nice bright blue. Backed in black it is a beautiful midnight blue. I typically back things in white rather than silver. I'll have to do more work using silver to back up the colors.

One of the best things I ever did for my painting was buying the vinyl cutter and software. The make the cut software is easy to use and very easy to take a set shape and put a border on it either inside or outside of the shape. I use the Avery paint masking in my Vinyl Cutter.

[Guardrail]

Sorry, no critical comment from me they look great!

[GearBear]

Please note Duffy, I'm not criticizing your work. I'm just sharing with you how I go about painting something like that! And my work likely won't be as clean looking as what you did on either of the posted bodies! I just don't have the time (nor the eyesight) to devote to getting that attention to detail.

Typically, on my bodies, the only thing done on the outside of the body is some sponsor stickers, body line details done with a fine line drafting pen, and the driver details done with colored Sharpie or Identi-pen pens. I prefer the Identi-Pen's as they have better color saturation IMHO. One of these days I need to invest in some good quality flat paints and some fine brushes!

[Noose]

First, it is Jose Rodriguez there Duffster. We honor his memory as a slot racer that built gorgeous scale looking cars besides having many other talents.

Now on to your work. I am the judge of concours out here and nine of my work or any other commercial painter's work is eligible. Work like Duffy's is what it's all about.

Whether a brush is full or half full is something I give little thought to. Maintaining the line that is intended in striping or lettering is what is important. A minimum amount of a stroke with the right line to accomplish the objective is key.

Color coordination is something inherit that you have to feel IMO. The challenge is not whether it looks good to you but for whom it it is intended. In your case of course it is to please your eyes.

One of the fun things though is when around half way through doing a body you feel it sucks. The thrill comes when that toad becomes a prince when it's done and you can sit back and say damn that did out pretty good.

Paint on!

[Duffy]

Please note Duffy, I'm not criticizing your work. I'm just sharing with you how I go about painting something like that!

Gary, and EVERYBODY, this is exactly the sort of comment I want filling this thread, and including the links to and hard information about the tools and resources. Thank you, and as much as you are able I'd like to beg your time and effort to keep posting in the sort of detail you've demonstrated here - it gives all of us what we need to make choices about what we're trying to do.

I've tried using vinyl mask, and it's some intriguing stuff. Got a roll from Blick & tried cutting some stuff, freehand...and here's what happened:
I was going for all-across-the-bod which made for a big mask, so to make it easier to fiddle in I did it in two symmetrical pieces. To get matching sides, I sandwiched vinyl on both faces of some clear plastic (no nice software here!) and snipped it all out; then tried to peel the thin vinyl off the carrier with tweezers. Ehhhh-not-sooo-good, but not disastrous.
Then, it was a mess to get the vinyl into the bod.
My question about Make The Cut software is, does it work in more than flat form? What do we do when skinning around a curvy shape? Easiest, I imagine, is to just pre-think the design so we have some fudge room in our masks, just like we'd do with any other medium.
All the tools we have are only as convenient as they are, and no more. We'll have a learning curve with anything. Pun not intentional. No, really.



I gotta admit, part of my nasty mind is plotting some paint schemes that make it more dufficult - you know, I'm gonna leave that typo right as it sits, "Duffycult" ought to become part of the accepted Slotblog vernacular - anyway, more difficult to manage without a lot of fussy set-up: like, wrapping around the curvier bods like the Lotus 40 so popular in Jaildoor Sports Car. I am an evil little choker, I am. Above is a pic of a couple of works-in-progress that show the kind of muss I'm intending here. We can talk about them as they work up to the top of the pile.

Let's keep this part of the conversation going, as it's a BIG deal. I'll get into stories about masking tape soon.

Duf

EDIT:

First, it is Jose Rodriguez there Duffster. We honor his memory as a slot racer that built gorgeous scale looking cars besides having many other talents.

Ohhh AAARGH! I've corrected that blunder in my first post. -duf

[Rick]

Gotta hand it to you Duffy, you are man of many talents and the above bodies are outstanding pretty!!! Nice job Michael.................

[Duffy]

Couple other points (it's Election Night, and this is WAY more fun than hanging off the front of the flatscreen!)

Whether a brush is full or half full is something I give little thought to. Maintaining the line that is intended in striping or lettering is what is important. A minimum amount of a stroke with the right line to accomplish the objective is key.

A statement like that, it's by no means a concrete or definitive one; there's no "quantity" to it. And I suspect that that's precisely where the learning and the experience will lead, is the understanding & utilization of that nonspecific statement.

One of the fun things though is when around half way through doing a body you feel it sucks. The thrill comes when that toad becomes a prince when it's done and you can sit back and say damn that did out pretty good.

I figure that moment will happen more regularly after I've already dragged through a whole peck of bods that NEVER GET BETTER EVER. Y'think?

Duf

[Mike Patterson]

Hey Duf, Nice Stuff!

You were asking about color coordination. I would Google 'Munsell's'(I don't remember the title), and see what you get. We used Munsell's book in art school, and it taught me a lot.

I think your cut lines look pretty good. When are you going to tackle some flames?

[olderracer]

Duffy:

Those bodies are awesome. Wish I could hand letter like that!

---------------Regards-------------Jack

[GearBear]

Duffy,

I use the Make-The-Cut software to do the layout on the vinyl. Ialso use it for making the Number and lettering masks. I use Inkscape to do the vector drawings. You could do this with any Vector drawing program but Inkscape is freware so I chose it.

Trying to get the paint mask to go into the nooks and crannys on our bodies is one of the most difficult aspects of doing a good paint job IMHO. I try to use a heat gun to soften up the vinyl so I can stretch it if needed to get it to stick to the recessed areas. One of the other keys is to use a transfer tape to hold the various parts of the masking in position after cutting and weeding it. To start with I have been using the green Frog tape for this after detacking it on my shirt. I have also used clear packing tape for this. I think it works better.

[NSwanberg]

^{Sweet! Sly would be proud. Boom Shaka Laka Laka? Isn't that the sound the car's of professional slot car track wall testers make when their cars hit the wall? I've been accused of wall to wall racing a time or two.}

[Noose]

The problem with vinyl IMO whether heated or burnished to death is that it will still lift when hit with paint. This of course for me is something that occurs because I use lacquer paints. That's why I sometimes don't use vinyl window masks too.

Not getting to much in any one area is the only way to avoid this.

[Duffy]

I use the Make-The-Cut software to do the layout on the vinyl...I try to use a heat gun to soften up the vinyl so I can stretch it if needed to get it to stick to the recessed areas.ED: From earlier post - Since I use water based paints, I would be hitting the paint with a heat gun between each spray to heat set the paint.

The problem with vinyl IMO whether heated or burnished to death is that it will still lift when hit with paint. This of course for me is something that occurs because I use lacquer paints. That's why I sometimes don't use vinyl window masks too.

I'm copy&pasting these entries to put these important bits together. The demands with acrylic versus the enamels need to be looked at as we go along. I helps to remember who's using what & all.

Not getting too much [paint] in any one area is the only way to avoid this.

Well, that's just about Rule One in airbrushing, ain't it!

I know there're basic tutorials here and elsewhere that cover aspects of painting in depth. We oughta link them in here for the convenience of readers. Then, this thread functions as a real discussion thread, I-use-this-because kind of stuff.

Duf (still blushing over the Jose Rodriguez goof...lucky I didn't pull that stunt with Jerome Havlicek, he'd never let me off.)

[Samiam]

Duff,
That is some very nice work.I can see the "NOOSE" influence.
I saw the chassis you built for Blaha last night at SAL.Nice work.
Are you up to traveling ?