Always paint?

Caveat don't try brush paintng with Tamiya unless you're an alchemist.

Or a space alien who has harnessed the technology required to make Tamiya paint brush onto a model.

To answer the question, I always paint. I don't really worry about what order I put the different types of paints on either (sometimes I go acrylic, enamel, acrylic!). 

Once the paint is cured, you an apply any paint over any other paint. The trick is not to use excessive amounts. When I'm doing bead work, for example, I'll paint the white background color, then add the more colorful "beads" or patterns.

In genreal, paint lighter to darker, since you'll need less paint for coverage. However, there are times when you're doing small details wher that's not practical. Small details, such as dials, knobs, etc, can be easily brush painted.

Caveat don't try brush paintng with Tamiya unless you're an alchemist.

Thanks all. That's kind of what I figured. On that note, if I first paint the entire base cab areas in the proper color, will it be ok to paint over that with another color for certain particular spots that are part of the main molding? There are a couple of details that I would like to apply a different color to, but masking them for painting the base color will be pretty difficult. I've heard that you don't want to apply acrylics over acrylics, though (or enamels over enamels, etc.).

It seems my options are:

1. Spray a coat of the base color over the entire cab floor part and then apply detail color as appropriate (again, doubt this is a good idea)
2. Mask off all areas to be detailed - no matter how small, spray the rest of the part, then apply detail colors to unpainted areas (not sure how I'll get all those tiny areas masked properly)
3. Just paint all areas individually with a brush.

I know these seem like really simple (or some other s- word) questions, but I'm hoping this particular technique is something I can get a better feel for without having to learn by mistake.