Oil paints for streaking

@BGT would a wet pallet work for oil paints or is it better to use just cardboard?

Gregory_J_Copplin all I do is put a small dob of oil paint onto a piece of cardboard. The cardboard will draw the oil out of the paint. I found using the oil paint out of the tube made it too ‘slippery’.

I’m new at this to so I’m on the learning curve. I found less is more. I would imagine it would be way too easy to over do the technique. Build it up slowly.

Here’s a Panzer iv J I have just finished. Apart from some pin wash everything on the vehicle is oil paint. (The road wheels have makeup on them).

bruce

@Gregory_J_Copplin - in the other thread about the PLA vehicle you reckon you think it is ‘a tad bit of overweathering’ which I think is the correct instinct. (Though some vehicle interiors can be really dirty especially in wet and muddy conditions.)

First time I tried this technique I ballsed it up. Same with other techniques. So don’t worry too much about it!

The reason cardboard is used as a pallette in this technique is it very effectively leeches out the oil carriers in the paint. These oils make the paints, in ordinary use, workable for a long time (for months sometimes depending on the brand)- we don’t need that. We want them to dry quicker. If you put them on fresh out of the tube they won’t behave the way we need them to. So let them sit on cardboard for 45mins or so before using them.

Also when you do your ‘dots’ you want to use a small, pointed brush (like a 3/0)- the dot needs to be small too- just a bit bigger than the size a Sharpie pen would make on a piece of paper.

It will get better with practice as these things do :+1:!

@Karl187 Yeah it’s a Tad bit over weathered. I had to go back multiple times to fix it. One problem I had was that my grey and black didn’t seem to want to cooperate. I would dot them on and then try and streak them and instead it looks like they didn’t streak at all and there’s dark dots hidden on the vehicle. What could make that happen? I do enjoy the look of the floor and parts of the wall. The umber color i used on the walls reminds me of the interior of my stryker after it’s been in the field for a month.

@BGT yeah i got a little excited and went tube to toothpick to model and did a few colors at once. It rain bowed on me but then never smoothed out. I practiced on a Russian Green T-34 and ran a few tests with yellow and I started getting the effect I wanted.
Now one other technique i want to try and have seen is that some modelers put a thin layer of mineral spirit on the part of the model they’ll dot filter then go back and place the paint on it and proceed, is this a worthwhile method? Also can you build up streaks , say I do a few yellow then go back and add red or white rather then putting all the colors on there at once?

Read this thread and Mike Roof answers all your questions.

@SSGToms thank you, i missed that answer previously!

Went back and reworked the interior with some cotton swabs dabbed in water and then pressed against paper so there isn’t excess. Tan it across the hull in an down to you motion and ended up pulling tons of leftover paint up and getting a better streaking motion. It also cleaned up a lot of the walls and makes it look in my opinion a lot better. The floor i played around with using the same method, it cleaned up a lot of the excess but i still like how the effect came out. It looks grimy and as if there’s been a lot of movement around in the compartment.




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Much better!

May I ask why you used water on the q-tip? Water and oil aren’t miscible (don’t mix). Thus the oils can smear. A cotton bud damp with mineral spirits will off the excess oils

@Mead93 honestly i figured the water would pull most of the excess oils that shouldn’t be there. I may have just been dumb lucky for getting this rather then a bunch of smears.

Hey if it worked, it worked! Regardless I think it looks better! Good save

@Mead93 it appears i have made a big goof when i bought my oil paints. I didn’t pay attention and didn’t realize that W&N made watercolor and oils. I bought two oil paints and then bought four watercolor paints not realizing till right now why the q-tip in water worked so well

That makes sense! Also explains why the streaking was a little harder to achieve

@Mead93 looks like I’m making another trip to Michael’s to pick up more paint. May just narrow it down to umber, black, white and orange ochre.

That what I bought to start. I figure I’ll add more on as needed basis. I got titanium white, raw umber, ivory black, and ochre

@Mead93 is there any used for watercolor paints in modeling?

That i am not sure about.

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@Mead93 whelp you love and you learn

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This is my take on “subtle.”

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Sounds like something I’d do, wondering what was wrong until I look closer at the label :rofl:!