How would I paint panels like this?

[Sluis Van Shipyards]

I've got this kit and I'm wondering how they did the panel shading like this: http://www.federationmodels.com/model_k ... isplay.jpg (Federation Models' picture). Could someone walk me through how you can do this effect?

[Rogviler]

It's a little hard to tell from the picture, but it looks like they probably just masked around the edge of the panel and then either airbrushed or drybrushed away from that, which is really simple to do.

I could be wrong though.

-Rog

[TER-OR]

Yes, that would be masking and shading. Post-its work fine for this. You can use darker shades of the base color or transparent tints like Smoke.

It will take some practice, which is the case with everything.

[Sluis Van Shipyards]

So that's all they did just airbrushed it on? I thought it might be some kind of raised mask or something.

[Rogviler]

Like I said, it's hard to tell from the picture, and from just one angle, but that's what it looks like to me. Personally, the way they did it looks little too much like they were trying to make it appear that each panel is almost concave, which is kind of weird looking...

So I would probably do it with more variation so it doesn't look so much like the wings of an old biplane. Unless that's what you want of course.

-Rog

[TREKKRIFFIC]

You can do similar staining with a black gel ink pen over a flat finish. Blend and streak with a cue tip or cotton ball. Then seal with a flat or gloss coat enamel or lacquer. Avoid water based coatings over ink.

[Mark Yungblut]

There are two other methods I know of both using the postit idea. One is to use pastels and what you do is seal as you go. The other is to streak a panel with oils like many aircraft guys do. This would work nicely if the panel adjacent to the weathered one was painted like a new replacement panel.

Cheers,

Mark

[Sluis Van Shipyards]

Thanks! I'll just have to play around until it looks good.

[TER-OR]

Remember, if you want to use the pastel method the surface will need to be matte (flat). Personally, to emulate B5 texturing, I'd airbrush uniform but varied panels and then use the oil and pastels later to simulate grime and such.

[Sluis Van Shipyards]

Yeah I'm going to work on my airbrushing. Right now I'm like a caveman, just smacking the trigger to make stuff happen.

[TER-OR]

Og get paint on his eye. Ow.

[Rogviler]

This is probably too late, but I just came across this, which is an example of what good panel shading looks like. You can see how varied it is, so it gives the feel of real weathering.

-Rog