Paint on old sailing ships. question

Bill, thats a question that I see several answers to.

Railroad colors were my first experience with acrylic paints in the hobby. The Polly Scale Line. I'm operating from memory here which gets increasingly risky. I liked those immediately, because they dry nice and flat, little to no odor.

The colors themselves are usually pretty devoid of a lot of chroma, all sort of medium value. Whether by accident or design, they seem to work well on subjects that by their nature are intended to appear to be outdoors in the sun.

The above two attributes certainly fit ship modeling.

Where i've never had much success- is white in anything other than what used to be referred to as enamels, i.e. solvent thinned paint. But mix and match.

The ochre on my Victory was done using a secret brew which i'd share if i could remember it. Something like 1 part Reefer Orange to 4 parts Santa Fe Yellow.

Which looks great to me but is apparently proven wrong...

My favorites include Steam Power Black, Grimy Black, Concrete and Depot Buff.

Nothing wrong with it whatever. Lots of colors with railroad-sounding names are fine for ship models. Union Pacific Yellow is a bright yellow ochre. Caboose Red is a bright, pure red. Grimy Black is an excellent color for fittings. Conrail Green, with some weathering applied, looks remarkably like oxidized copper. Etc. etc., etc. And I've never found a color that beats PolyScale Aged Concrete for bare wood decks on twentieth-century warships.(Fortunately Vallejo is now producing a match for that color.)

So many hobby paints are on the market nowadays that the newcomer can get bewildered by them. The best solution is to visit a good hobby shop and pick your colors for yourself. (There are few paints specifically mixed for sailing ships, but don't worry. If it's labeled Schwarzgrau, Grimy Black, or Weathered Black, and it looks right for what you're going to paint, buy it.)

I've never believed in dictating color choices for models. If it looks right to you, it is right.

Unfortunately, few of us live within driving distance of good hobby shops any more. So we have to rely on mail order, and that's a little tricky. You can't trust the colors you see on the websites.

Model Shipways does sell a line of acrylic colors designed for sailing vessels. I've used several of them recently, and I like them. You can order them through www.modelexpo-online.com . When the line was introduced, quite a few years ago, it picked up a bad reputation. But nowadays the company seems to be using a different formula, and the jars I've tried have worked fine.

One suggestion if you're building H.M.S./H.M.A.V. Bounty. I'm convinced that the blue hull of the replica built for the 1959 movie (the one with Marlon Brando) originated in the imagination of some Hollywood art director. Lots of pictures painted since 1959 show blue hulls, but I have yet to see any contemporary evidence supporting that color scheme. I put a little blue trim on my model, but if I were (gawd forbid) doing it again I'd use nothing but black, yellow ochre, and dull red. Live and learn.

Gentlemen,

Model Master has some interesting acrylic colors that they produce for the Railroad hobby.  Smoke Black, Depot Buff, Leather, Concrete, Aged White, Yellow Ochre, and Caboose Red are perhaps the most useful.  I particularly like the Aged White for non-coppered lower hulls. Check them out if you can. My LHS carries a great supply.

Bill

warshipguy

Congratulation on making Captain!

Thank you kindly.

Was my boss' doing as he is retiring.  Ymining is suh that Congress will probably not confirm before I'm out, so the retirement will be on O-5 pay.  Such is life.

That's alright.  I am on SCPO retirement pay.  I made MCPO but did not wear it long enough to be paid.

Bill

Another useful color is Boxcar Brown. I've used it for anti-fouling color on older dreadnoughts etc. as it gives a nice aged look.

One other thing, and I apologize as this isn't strictly related to color. I never had an airbrush all of the time I modeled railroads. These old Polly S paints, all brush really well.