Making home-made decals (on clear background) more opaque?

Fred,

I've done both techiques before, and they both work. - but I find that printing on white paper is a better solution, especially if you have a lighter color over a dark background.

Here's 2 examples, the nose art you see is printed on white paper, but of course this was a easy one as the decal was applied to a white background.

 Here's the second one, it's a white Chinese 1930's star. I cut along each star's 'spikes', but the color betweent he spikes and the circle is color printed to match the background. Just a word of advise here, make copies of your decal graphic and then lighten/darken your base color a bit on each copy. Then print them out and pick the best fit.  Unless your printer and monitor are color corrected against a standard, the colors wiill not printout exactly as you see on the screen.

That's not a bad idea, Don.  Blue Angels blue is an FS number, so I can track down a swatch from the IPMS Stockholm page and match it in photoshop.

Hopefully, I'll have some time to try it tonight - well, making the decal tonight, but I'll have to wait for the setting spray to cure overnight, before I can attempt to apply it.

-Fred

This is an inherent problem with light colors.  Inks pre-suppose you are applying them to white paper.

In order to do very light colors like yellow and other light colors, you need to use white paper.

Then, of course, the problem is cutting the decal perfectly to get rid of the light background.  The way I do it is to set the background color in my software (a photo editing program that also allows creation of graphics) to the color the model will be painted in the area of the decal.  If it is an unusual or difficult color to match, you can scan a sample painted on scrap.

I still then try to cut as close as possible to the decal, but this way if you don't cut exactly on the line, the remaining background won't be very noticeable.

Look at the 1/8 scale sprint car at http://www.usfamily.net/web/stauffer/carmod.html

The white D&D logo on hood was done this way.

Jon_a_its

A Tough one... I deal with it by not finishing many wingy things

Or print 2 sets of the lettering, applying the first, then laying the second on top.

Good luck & please post pics of your progress.

I refuse to let this stupid issue beat me.  I've spent too much time hunting down all the Blue Angels in 1/72, to be defeated by a stupid set of yellow decals.

Now this, might be a good idea.  I never considered stacking decals, but it just might work.  The decal paper is thin enough and with enough setting solution it might just work.

-Fred

A Tough one... I deal with it by not finishing many wingy things

Unless you can get aftermarket lettering in the size, style & colo(u)r you need, then you are a bit stuck!

Other than white, yellow is about the hardest colour to deal with. 

Think about getting someone to print it on a colour laser printer for you, (on laser proof transparency sheets) the yellow is a bit more solid.

Or print 2 sets of the lettering, applying the first, then laying the second on top.

Good luck & please post pics of your progress.