How to print chrome silver as accurate as possible.

[airdave]

Colour laser?....if so, you are still dealing with a colour issue...how best to represent dynamic reflective metal with a static print.
Your printer doesn't matter too much in this case.
But inkjet is the industry standard for colour printing...all professional printing is done on inkjet.
The colours, colour ranges, and duplication of colours is more precise.

To clarify, you are not trying to replicate "chrome"...you are talking about polished aluminum panel.
Not chrome...which is just mirror reflection.
And not silver colour....which is a single colour.

Metals...and Aluminum is basically a distinct pattern of grays....I tend to introduce blues and greens when I am doing metals.
The amount of polish will decided how much reflection the metal has, so you might layer some black and white reflections.

Keeping in mind, that if you are going for realistic wartime finish, its not going to be highly polished like you see in a Museum.
But some of those passenger aircraft will be a little better polished.

I wonder if clearcoating was used, like automotive companies started doing with aluminum wheels?
Highly polished areas on custom aluminum wheels are clearcoated to protect the polish.
Unfortunately, the clearcoat also crazes and fogs, so in the end, the polish is dulled.
Wheels take a real beating from the elements.

I say go for a less polished look, that way reflections don't have to be as clear and focused and aren't dynamic.
They aren't required to move with your eye.
And its not as complicated to design.

Often I will create a gradient sample...one colour fading to another...maybe even two or three gradients in the same panel.
I stick to green grays and blue grays, but I sample the colours from a photo of an actual panel of polished aluminum.
Thats basically how I did the P47...I sampled the colours from photos of that actual plane in the Smithsonian.

[Paper Kosmonaut]

Originally Posted by RickPink65

By the way, I don't use inkjet. I have a laser printer which is definitively better and more stable as time goes by.

Inkjet printers add their ink into the paper. Therefore the paper will keep the ink where it is. Discolouring can be prevented by spray-coating the sheets of paper with an UV-protective layer after printing.
Laser printers work by static electricity. They put a thin layer of coloured powder on the smooth surface of the paper. This layer can get loose and start to flake off in time. So it actually is not definitely better than inkjets.

There are white printing printers but they are ridiculously expensive, let alone the cost of the white ink. Some people use those for printing accurate full-colour decals for their plastic scale models. You could try and use metallic paper and build the model, then tape the areas off you want to have in the white colour and just spray paint it.

Further, most of the planes you mentioned, like the B-29 and DC-3, originally are not polished chrome but just a more dull metallic. They were actively used planes and the weathering caused a more dull kind of shine and usually there was no need to polish them up to that showroom shine. The real bling bling chrome is not really suited for these kinds of planes and they actually need a more or less 'dull side of aluminium foil'-look.

[RickPink65]

Thanks. My main interest is not war time colours. The Enola Gay, is resting with a beautiful highly polished aluminum colour. Yes, I mean printing insignias on "polished Aluminum" as you very correctly say. I have access to a professional laser printing machine. The problem will eventually be printing white but in that case, as in the US insignias on the Enola Gay, can be applied separately as decals.

[RickPink65]

I have always preferred laser printers based on experience. Some years ago I printed with inkjet a couple of models and in a few months they faded. My laser printed models have withstood the passing of time, lots of sunlight etc. with NO fading and exact colour tones. I am not an expert on printers, I am only commenting based on my results. Perhaps wrong inks, or wrong printer for what we card modelers need.

[RickPink65]

You are right when you say that the gleaming silver colours oxidizes and it turns more a dull gray. but still it is metallic colour not gray ink or paint. A compromise must be reached as I can see in this very interesting subject.

[airdave]

Metallic colour means paint/colour that has small flecks of metal dust in it to produce a shimmer and shine.
Metallic papers are rough...with surface particles to create a shimmer.

Gray (ink) is actually the closest thing to metal colour.
"Colour" means colour. Its a colour...or assortment of colours (gradient).

What you are confused by, is the dynamic reflective surfaces of metals, especially polished metals.
Dynamic = they reflect like mirrors but the reflection moves and changes with the angle of viewing and light sources.

Unless you want to use a "metal" coated paper, you cannot achieve this effect with printing.

You must accept a static view and extrapolate the GRAYs and print that the same way an artist paints a picture.
Gradient grays are what will make it work, as opposed to picking one single shade of gray.

But, that one single shade of gray is still there...in your metal...whether you like it or not!

Once again, Enola Gay has been polished for the Museum. Not realistic.

John Dell did a great job with his Stratoliner, using gradient grays with a few bands of reflected colour.
Darker shading where the ground reflects and horizon line reflections.
But the underlying "colour" is gradient grays.

[RickPink65]

Thank you very much for your interesting information. One simple question, what gray would you use for the attached sheet of the Caravelle? Just an example. The Boeing Stratoliner, beautiful!! But perhaps too much work for me.

[murphyaa]

When I need natural metal, I use some sample images I found off of the internet, based on how shiny the model is supposed to be. It's not 100 percent effective, and I'm still learning how to get it right (I'm not an artist like Dave is)

For highly reflective surfaces, I use this:

Polished aluminum gets this:

and brushed aluminum gets this:


I do rotate them so that the they get lighter towards the top of the fuselage, and darker towards the bottom, to add some natural shading. Plus changing the opacity to lighten or darken the metallic effect (That's where I'm still experimenting).

[deki]

My experiment: I applied air brush layer of silver humbold colour (over 15 years old) to blank 160 grams of matte paper. I used color early for plastic models and then printed basic lines, panels on a black and white laser printer. Then I glued the stickers with the markings and color lines on the model Saber E of the former Yugoslavia Air forces late 50`s.

.

[MichaelS]

Very clever!!