Hey thanks for the support guys
Well I said I was gonna try something new and here it is. Black Basing Technique. It's a technique thats been around forever. Usually used for aircraft modelers but caught on with the mini guys. It's not the traditional pre-shading painting all the lines and shadows. Ya just prime the whole model in black so at the very least you'll have a shadow effect.
Then using the base color and other colors if you choose you spray a marbling pattern with random squiggles. The more random the better. Then with a well thinned basecoat you slowly spray and build up layers until you decide youre done.
I sprayed at 10 PSI, 70% thinner with a.3 needle for the marbling. Lowered the pressure to 8PSI and thinned the basecoat to 80% thinner and used a .5 needle and just broad strokes layered the paint till I was happy. 2 things here, I could still add more layers if I wanted to and if I wasnt happy with it I could just continue heavier with the basecoat and paint the regular way. BUT I really like how this is coming out. It provides a worn and weathered look before I've even started to weather it!
I experimented with several different colors for the marbling and found I liked the basecoat color as well as highlights with plain white.
The Basecoat I wanted was a RAL 8000 so I mixed Tamiya 4 parts XF4 then 2 parts XF52 and 1 part XF 60. Thinned with lacquer thinner because it just sprays so silky smooth and I am working at a low pressure. Anyway less talk-
First I sprayed XF 60 randomly
Then I sprayed white and highlighted parts
Then the homebrew RAL8000
It's a pretty close RAL 8000 clone I checked my paint chip from the S13 Tiger project. It's lighter but for modeling purposes that's a good thing because when I add all the weathering it'll get darker.
I'm looking forward to the turret next for sure.
This will be a cool technique to use for the Stug next since it'll have those flat plates and angles. perfect to break up the real estate.
"Charlie don't surf"- Lt. Col. Bill Kilgore