Detail painting tutorial?

[jackdaw]

Hello, I see all these beautiful paint jobs with all these details, I wonder if someone could do a tutorial on masking and painting darts and such. Preferably with lots of pictures.

You guys do such great work and I'd like to learn from you.

I've looked through about 20 pages of the how-to section and haven't found what I am looking for, if it's there, please show me!

Thanks

 

[azchopshop]

I can put something basic together for you. It will be about two weeks before I will have the time to do it though.

 

[jackdaw]

Right on. I just saw someone used stencils, do they stick on? Where do you get them?

 

[Turtlesixfour]

I would like to know also!

 

[CRASH]

+3 :mrgreen:

 

[CyborgAbeLincoln]

Here's what I did when I was working on my Speedster (now the Squidster). It works for positive and negative stencils:

1. Design something (I think I used Inkscape [http://inkscape.org/] - it's a free vector graphics program) and print it out

2. Put strips of painter's tape (the wider the better on a piece of wax paper

3. Put more strips of masking tape on top, perpendicular to the first layer

4. Tape the printout on top

5. Cut out the stencil with a sharp knife

6. Peel the stencil off the wax paper and slap it on the bike

7. Paint it
8. Pull the stencil up before the paint gets too dry
9. Touch up with a brush as needed

I really needed minimal touch-up using this technique on the chainguard and fork, even with the really complex squid design. However, you want to make sure that the stencil is pressed down very well all around the edges or you'll get bleed-under.

I'm sure there are better/faster/easier ways to do it, but this way is super cheap and you can probably do it with stuff you already have on hand.

 

[jackdaw]

Sweet! Nice and easy. That is a cool squid design too, squid are weird and fascinating animals. And grilled calamari is the BEST!!!

 

[Uncle Stretch]

I have had good luck with stealing my wife's stick down shelf paper and cutting out what design I want
peel the back off ...stick it on....shoot on the paint and then peel it back off.
That 1/8'' tape that 3m makes will let you design quiet a few darts and then use the blue masking tape
on the edges to cover what you don't want to paint. Trust me though if you do a dart and then want to
mask over it and spray a line like pinstripping , if the paint isn't really dry like a couple days, it will lift
the bottom one when you peel the tape off.