T-Rex,
I'm in the painting stage on the Tamiya 1/35 scale Triceratops. One suggestion on seams (especially those most visible like along the head, back, and tail)-- I used liquid cement, and held the parts tight enough to allow a bead of cement to squeeze out along the seam. Then I used a seam scraper (better than an exacto blade) to remove the excess and ended up with an invisible seam line that required no filling at all. Also, for some of the other seams that I did have to fill (leg joints) I made use of the wrinkles and folds that are molded into the plastic--- extending them or creating new ones across and diagonal to the seam line. I mostly used files for this, but in one spot I used my 15watt soldering iron with the fine tip which I also used for making zimmerit on my Tiger I. This technique effectively makes any seam lines disappear into the generally wrinkled/folded look of the surrounding skin.
Painting is both easy and hard. Easy in the sense that no one knows what these animals really looked like, so anything you do is "correct". I decided that triceratop males displayed "mating" colors, so I embellished my base green and brown coats with yellows, oranges, and reds along the spine, around the perimeter of the circular skull plate, at the bumps on the skin, and on the cheeks and snout. Painting is hard in that you really need to do a lot of preshading, highlighting, and layering and blending of different colors. I used Tamiya acrylics and my AB, but I can see where artist oils might be another way of accomplishing the blending and shading that is necessary to get a "natural" look.
I have the T-Rex, Stegosaurus, and Raptors yet to build, but I'm really enjoying this (my first) dino kit. It's such a change of pace and perspective from the mostly "pre-determined" approach to aircraft, armor, and ships.
TomB