General question and just curious…has anyone ever tried painting over their decals to give a painted look? I figure if the paint is thin enough…it should not end up being to thick?
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Yes indeed I’ve done that a lot, particularly on standard AFV German crosses which are typically way too intense black & white. I paint over them not so much to give a crude painted look, but to kill the intensity by painting fairly dark grey over the black & light grey over the white. I tried using a greyish wash instead (I use exclusively acrylics) but couldn’t prevent it bleeding outside the decal and leaving a dull patch.
So it needs a steady hand - which I used to have - slow & steady won the race. As for paint consistency it obviously needs to be thick enough to cover (you don’t want to have to apply a 2nd coat), but thin enough with a very fine pointy brush to get into the corners without blobbing. I can only suggest finding that Goldilocks consistency by experimentation on something that doesn’t matter. Example…
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Can’t say I have, but I do dull mine down with oversprays of Buff or Earth. And I’ve actually hand-painted things that need to look like a guy with a brush did it. But most of the markings on WW2 tanks were stippled through stencils so don’t look painted with ragged edges or lumpy streaks.
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There’s no way around putting the decal on right - this mostly means melting it down with a decal solution so that is fuses with the underlying paint.
BUT
After that is done, you still can do something to the decals, like weather them together with the rest of the model. Put a wash on them to tone them down or unite them with their surroundings.
Once I did apply some OD with a sponge over decals to show some chipping of the white and yellow paint:
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Once I did apply some OD with a sponge over decals to show some chipping of the white and yellow paint:
Good trick!! I’m starting to use
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Sorry guys I should have been more clear…I am doing 1/16 scale…I meant after putting on a decal… for example the V tactical sign on the side of IDF vehicles… if I put a light coat over the decals and then go over the decals with paint so it doesn’t look so super neat instead of cutting a stencil.
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Ah that’s a different story! If you do it with a brush (the classic “hairy stick”) it will look hand-painted, but if you wanted to mimic stencil overspray you’d need a stencil and an airbrush to get that spatter effect.
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