Superior & Seattle Railroad Build

[Zephyrus52246]

Interesting that the Micro Lux paint appears shiny.  Vallejo paints (MicroLux is a Vallejo blend for MicroMark) are very flat.  I have some of the Tru Color grimy black I bought at the NG convention, but haven't used it yet.


Jeff

[deemery]

The MicroMark paints are thinned for airbrushing, I think they are the Model-Air formulation rather than the Vallejo brushable formation.  I haven't specifically sprayed Vallejo ModelAir to see if it has the same level of shine as MicroMark paints, but it wouldn't surprise me that the medium used to make these air-brushable is the culprit for shine.


(For at least some paints, "flat" is produced by adding nano particles of something like talc.  That's not a problem for brushing paints, but could cause airbrush clogs.)


dave

[S&S RR]

You could have problems matching even one run of Floquil against another (particularly 'new Floquil' after Testors took over, vs the old independent Floquil - don't forget they changed the solvent/medium, 'new' Dio-sol wasn't quite the same formulation due to cancer/toxicity concerns...)  The Tru Color paints are nice, but they're pretty much airbrush-only.  (Although I haven't tried brush painting the new flats.)  Some of the shine issues are just a property of acrylic medium, that can be solved with the application of Dullcote or similar flat finish.  Note a lot of oil paints also dry with a sheen.  I guess I just plan to do a final matte coat no matter what kind of paint I'm using. 

dave

Dave

Thanks for the input - you bring up some very good points. I'm just switching back into the structure building phase of my layout after spending the last 5 years working with plaster and laying track - so I need to relearn many of the painting techniques I used in the past. I have a stash of floquil paints but they are all 5 or more years old and so far seem to be in good shape. I will burn through these and then it will be all acrylics.  So I'm going to start experimenting with the new paints and switching over ASAP.

One last point, all the paints I used for the plaster mountains on my layout were craft style acrylic paints and they dried very flat.

Experiment one is to try the  Microlux paint by itself and see if the shine was caused by the floquil paint I used as a first coat.

[S&S RR]

Interesting that the Micro Lux paint appears shiny.  Vallejo paints (MicroLux is a Vallejo blend for MicroMark) are very flat.  I have some of the Tru Color grimy black I bought at the NG convention, but haven't used it yet.


Jeff

Thanks for the input Jeff.  I will be very interested to hear how the Tru Color paint works out for you. I will be doing lots of experimenting and will post anything I learn here.

[S&S RR]

So here is what I did to fix the roof on the Stone Roundhouse. I started with a Paynes grey extra dark PanPastel in an attempt to get rid of the shine. It worked great. Then I started dry brushing with a neutral grey PanPastel. I used a brush and just kept adding more until it looked the way I wanted it too. The same technique I would have used with chalks. Here are a few pictures of the process and a final close-up showing the final look.  What do you think?



Step one Paynes grey extra dark PanPastel



Container labels for reference.



Picture showing the grimy black painted roof, the dark grey roof, and the finial neutral grey.



Final roof on upper area - lower roof is painted only with grimy black.



Close-up of the roof with the final brush of neutral grey PanPastel.  The amount of shading and highlighting can be changed by brushing on more or brush off more in any given area.  I'm going to let this sit for a couple of days and see if I continue to like the affect.

[Zephyrus52246]

I think it looks great. 

Jeff

[deemery]

The one suggestion I'd make is to go back and see if you can gently change the color/tone on some individual strips, so it doesn't look like each strip of roofing paper weathered identically.


This is a great application of Pan Pastels to achieve coloring/color blending, weathering and flattening.  They're a lot of fun for this kind of project.



dave

[S&S RR]

The one suggestion I'd make is to go back and see if you can gently change the color/tone on some individual strips, so it doesn't look like each strip of roofing paper weathered identically.


This is a great application of Pan Pastels to achieve coloring/color blending, weathering and flattening.  They're a lot of fun for this kind of project.



dave

Thanks for the comments Dave and I agree.  I'm going to take some pictures with the SLR before I move the Roundhouse to the layout.  Looking at the pictures on my monitor vs. on my IPad the close-up really washed out the differences in color that I see with my eyes.

Any changes will be under the layout lights.

[S&S RR]

I think it looks great. 

Jeff

Thanks Jeff

[deemery]

[size=78%]Thanks for the comments Dave and I agree.  I'm going to take some pictures with the SLR before I move the Roundhouse to the layout.  Looking at the pictures on my monitor vs. on my IPad the close-up really washed out the differences in color that I see with my eyes.[/size]

Any changes will be under the layout lights.

I think it was John Allen who first highlighted the use of a camera as a modeling aid...


dave

[S&S RR]

[size=78%]Thanks for the comments Dave and I agree.  I'm going to take some pictures with the SLR before I move the Roundhouse to the layout.  Looking at the pictures on my monitor vs. on my IPad the close-up really washed out the differences in color that I see with my eyes.[/size]

Any changes will be under the layout lights.

I think it was John Allen who first highlighted the use of a camera as a modeling aid...


dave

Dave

I believe you are correct and I know it's one of my most important tools. I'm always amazed at how different pictures look with different cameras and different monitors. The retina display on my Ipad has become my standard - looks the closest to what I see with my own eyes. Look at the difference in the colors from the overall shot above to the close-up. Same camera just how the iphone camera was dealing with the white balance.

[S&S RR]

The work on the Stone Roundhouse for the S&S, that I wanted to complete on the workbench, was completed today.  I took a few photographs on the workbench before the move.

[cuse]

Just great. Just like the Aspens, those colorful doors and accents will "pop" against the stonework and rocks behind.


John

[bparrish]

John

I'll say it again......

I sure hope you don't spoil this great engine house with diesels.

Great build

Thanx
Bob

[ACL1504]

John,

Fantastic work John and well worth the wait to see it finished.
I sure miss the other forum little icons so you have many thumbs up here.

Tom