Dot Filters: Oils or Enamels?

I have never used enamels for this technique but think that you will have more control with the oils. You will be removing just about all of the color, just leaving a slight trace so I woulnd't worry about it being too dark.

Thanks for the response.

I think you are right - ie, oils have more control.

I gave it a try with my most recent project.  (Dot filters only applied to the turret in these shots).

These are the before filter shots:

Post dot filters - i used MM enamels.  It doesn't show as well in the photos, but under my own eyes i can see very faint lines/dot filter effect.  Overall, however, i was happy with the sublte way they tied together the overall scheme and softened it a bit.

I think in hindsight, maybe dot filtering works better if you use oils, as you have a bit more time to play with the colours etc before they dry.  I found the MM enamels tended to dry a little too fast.

Also, i think the effect with oils would work better with mono paint schemes - perhaps with a mottled scheme it's harder to recognise?

I know this is a late response but I used both.  Bill Plunk, aka wbill76, uses MM enamels for dot filters all the time and you can't argue with his results.

Hi Marc,

Thanks for the response.  I followed Bill Plunk's method that i saw in an old edition of FSM and tried out MM enamels.

However, i'm now questioning if i should have gloss coated the model first.  I found the MM enamels tend to be removed very easily and don't have have the "staying power" of oils.

I'm not going to give up though.  I'm certain enamels can be used.  I guess it's all part of the fun of experimentation.

Regards,

No...

Stick with oils...

Hi.  What is a Dot Filter?  Is that kind of like a glaze?  Can you go into some more detail for me?

Thank you.

warmumcher....  Yes, in a way it is kind of a glaze.  The purpose of a filter is to change the underlying color and a dot filter is just one method of accomplishing that.  The simplest "filter" would be to overspray a base coat with a 95/05 thinner to paint mix of color.  Depending how many coats you do it will alter the overall appearance of the base coat.  An example may be say on a 3 color German, dk. yellow, green, red-brown,  camo scheme.  as a first step I may go over that whole thing with a lightened dark yeallow filter at 95-05 to just tone things down and oull all the color togther.

A dot filter is a series of different color dots of oils paint that are then blended with a brush with clean thinner or spirits.  The different colors will give tonal variation.  Using different color dots in different areas can represent shaded areas etc.

Bear in mind I am speaking in the broadest of terms.

Check out this tutorial by the doog.  It really show the basic idea but there are variations on variations of the same method.

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