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                        Painting Camo

                        1928 views
                        5 replies
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                        Anonymous
                        • Member since
                          November 2005
                        Painting Camo
                        Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 9:40 PM
                        Well I recently became the proud owner of my Badger 150 airbrush. I have brushed one model with it and for a first time I am happy with it. The plane was a USN Wildcat and was a 2 tone paint scheme on top and bottom with a fade so required no masking other than the usual canopy etc. I really love the finish over my old brush. So I picked up this Hasegawa Spitfire Mk. Vb and spent a while getting this one togethether. Now I face a deilema I never have before: camo. I know that the RAF used plastic mats to make the camo scheme wich produced a very sharp edge so this model obviously requires a sharp edge. I started to pencil the camo lines on the aircraft but it was hard to get the pencil to show on the smooth surface so the lines came out awful. I got the idea of using some sort of brush on mask to get the lines and taping over it but not sure if that is the best or easyest way. So here I am looking for some advice on how to succesfuly mask and paint my spitfire.

                        Thanks
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                        Bgrigg
                        • Member since
                          May 2005
                        • From: Left forever
                        Posted by Bgrigg on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 10:16 PM
                        I just painted a 1:48 Mossie with the 150 (great brush by the way!) and I simply sprayed the entire upper body with the Grey. Once that was dry (2 days, I used Tamiya Acrylic), I masked off the upper surface, drew on the camo lines and with a new SHARP #11 blade carefully cut through the tape. I mean really carefully, as it is VERY EASY to score the plastic! Then I simply peeled off the parts I wanted green, sprayed that, then when it was finger dry, peeled off the rest revealing a perfectly sharp edge. My wife is out of town with my (I mean our) camera, so no pics tonight!

                        You can barely see where I wasn't quite careful enough...Blush [:I]

                        So long folks!

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                        darson
                        • Member since
                          February 2003
                        • From: Melbourne, Australia
                        Posted by darson on Thursday, February 16, 2006 12:17 AM

                        Blu Tack is one method that I have used often for camo jobs on aircraft.  I simply roll out the Blu Tack snakes in the pattern required and then spray away.  Depending on how you do it (how tight you put on the Blu Tack) you can achieve a variety of camo schemes from hard edge to feather.

                        Here are a couple of happy snaps of Tamiya Brewster Buffalo I did last year.

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                        ABARNE
                        • Member since
                          February 2003
                        • From: Southern California, USA
                        Posted by ABARNE on Thursday, February 16, 2006 2:16 PM

                        What I do is to make a rough paper outline of the wings on which to draw the camo.  I then use scissors to cut out the shapes, holding them over the model to see if they look right.  I then put strips of tape (I think Tamiya Yellow tape is the best) on a self healing cutting mat, and use the paper template to trace the edge onto the tape which I cut with a sharp Exacto knife.  I find the fuselage to be a little easier, so I typically only use the paper to give me an idea on how long an edge to cut, and then I'll cut a wavy edge that seems to match the camo pattern.  I wasn't difficult, nor particularly tedious.

                        Here's a 1/72 Battle of Britain Spitfire I built last year

                        http://photobucket.com/albums/v624/ABARNE/Spitfire%20Mk-I%201-72/

                         

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                        osher
                        • Member since
                          April 2003
                        • From: Edgware, London
                        Posted by osher on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 3:07 PM
                        I've just done my first wavy camo, using blue-tac.  Not bad, in places, but those tight turns can be difficult, and I also didn't press down hard enough in places.  Plus, I filled the spaces with Maskol, but it seems in places the paint made it way through, so I guess I didn't put the Maskol down well enough in places.

                        Also...(and can anyone advice here), sometimes around the edges of the bits I was painting the brown (1/72 Airfix BoB Spit camo colours), was darker.  Not spraying right?

                        Thanks for your technique Arbarne, think I'll try it with my next wavy camo job (a 1/72 Airfix MiG-23 in Libyan colours, radome, underneath, plus 3 more on top, 5 colours in all!).
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                        jwb
                        • Member since
                          February 2006
                        • From: Parkton, NC
                        Posted by jwb on Wednesday, March 1, 2006 6:32 AM
                        I've never done this myself, but in this month's FSM they have an article on a guy who used Silly Putty to mask a tank, and it appears in the photos to produce very sharp lines. The author seemed to be able to get some very intricate shapes with this method.

                        I thought it was cool since you get to mess with silly putty. :-)

                        Jon Bius

                        AgapeModels.com- Modeling with a Higher purpose

                        "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." ~ Jeremiah 29:11

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