New To mast ship building

First, if you are doing a full hull model, weather the copper bottom to look like tarnished copper. You can even cover the bottom with real copper and use compounds found at Model Expo to tarnish it for real. (the copper bottom material is also available at Model Expo) To imitate real wood, paint it as normal if it is painted such as the topsides but the deck was rarely painted on American sailing ships so you can paint it a base oak wood color and paint streaks in it to simulate grain. Weathering the outer hull involves simply remembering that the material under the paint was wood instead of metal and painting wear where it happened most such as on boarding ladders and places where equipment scraped the hull a lot. Remember, though, that sailors on a ship such as these were constant in maintaining the ship especially the outer hull even at sea, so weathering would be minimal. There is an old Kalmbach book about building plastic sailing ships that would be invaluable if you could find it. Another great way to simulate wood is to use real wood especially for the decks and masts and yardarms and stain it as you would the real thing. The bare wood would be flat and the painted areas would be a gloss paint.

Hope this helps

Paul

there are plenty of build threads in this forum as well that show some of the members different techniques for producing realistic wood textures. Grem56 did an amazing job on the deck of his Revell viking ship. and his heller Chebec. i've since "borrowed" his technique for my "jolly roger" build and my current WIP Heller Royal Louis. any ways hope this helps. and have fun!

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i'm pretty interested to see how you Constitution turns out. this ship is next in line to be built out of my stash.

 

I use Tamiya acrylic copper. This will resist a wash of oil paint ( ivory black wash) which I do next. I then use Tamiya Olive Green reduced with water and sponged on the copper paint, and wiped off with a dry cloth. Its pretty realistic for tarnished copper, and won't break the bank.

 

Wood, exposed at sea (with certain species excepted)  is almost a gray color, just keep that in mind. The deck color to be found on the Cutty Sark website photos, to me is a good starting point or benchmark. 

I love the way your "Jolly Roger" came out,  enemeink, its beautiful, you have now inspired me to build one of my own, in a while off course.

 

I know this is a noob question, but how did you do the weathering on the decks???

 

 

thanks for the help guys.

colombian JJ wrote:

I love the way your "Jolly Roger" came out,  enemeink, its beautiful, you have now inspired me to build one of my own, in a while off course.   I know this is a noob question, but how did you do the weathering on the decks???     thanks for the help guys.

No such thing as a noob question around here. here's what I used on the Jolly Roger deck; Tamiya deck tan for the base coat. Then I gave it a clear coat and let it dry. So if I made a mistake it would be easy to clean off and start over. This is the hard part to explain. I used water soluble oil paints. I put a small smudge of black on a plate and then dipped a stiff bristle brush in some water and mixed the paint with my brush. I kept repeating this until I was happy with the consistency. This effectively does two things. It loads the deeper bristles with a less diluted paint while the outer bristles have a thinned out mix. So if I choose to not press hard then just the diluted mix comes out. But if I add a little pressure then you will get the impression of wood grains. Sort of like a wet-dry brush method. I did this same step with burnt umber as well. Then after I knew where the deck fixtures were going to be I went back with my diluted oils with a smaller softer brush and added more black and brown where there would be foot traffic. While that paint was still wet I used another dry clean brush to blend the edge of the paint into the deck so that it would look more natural.

Anyway I hope that helps and is not to confusing.

enemeink wrote:

colombian JJ wrote: I love the way your "Jolly Roger" came out,  enemeink, its beautiful, you have now inspired me to build one of my own, in a while off course.   I know this is a noob question, but how did you do the weathering on the decks???     thanks for the help guys. No such thing as a noob question around here. here's what I used on the Jolly Roger deck; Tamiya deck tan for the base coat. Then I gave it a clear coat and let it dry. So if I made a mistake it would be easy to clean off and start over. This is the hard part to explain. I used water soluble oil paints. I put a small smudge of black on a plate and then dipped a stiff bristle brush in some water and mixed the paint with my brush. I kept repeating this until I was happy with the consistency. This effectively does two things. It loads the deeper bristles with a less diluted paint while the outer bristles have a thinned out mix. So if I choose to not press hard then just the diluted mix comes out. But if I add a little pressure then you will get the impression of wood grains. Sort of like a wet-dry brush method. I did this same step with burnt umber as well. Then after I knew where the deck fixtures were going to be I went back with my diluted oils with a smaller softer brush and added more black and brown where there would be foot traffic. While that paint was still wet I used another dry clean brush to blend the edge of the paint into the deck so that it would look more natural. Anyway I hope that helps and is not to confusing.

 

I think i got it

now i can't wait to get my ship, this will be my practice ship till i'm ready to actually build the good model.

that's what i did. i bought two ships at my local hobby shop for $10 a piece. a perfect way to test out new stuff.

enemeink wrote:

that's what i did. i bought two ships at my local hobby shop for $10 a piece. a perfect way to test out new stuff.

 

haha i'm exited to get this build going, ever since i was a little kid i have always build airplanes and helicopters, and last year i tried an armor and after that i build the uss arizona, and the other day i watched master and commander and i was like i want to build one of those ships, so here i am, thanks for all the help again.

colombian JJ wrote:

enemeink wrote: that's what i did. i bought two ships at my local hobby shop for $10 a piece. a perfect way to test out new stuff.   haha i'm exited to get this build going, ever since i was a little kid i have always build airplanes and helicopters, and last year i tried an armor and after that i build the uss arizona, and the other day i watched master and commander and i was like i want to build one of those ships, so here i am, thanks for all the help again.

I had plenty of help around here when i first started. so i'm happy to pass what i know along. and if you ever need some pictures of the HMS surprise i have those too. it's docked in San Diego. and i've been to the museum a couple of times.