coloring edges

[duditz72]

Anyone have any good tips on coloring edges of pieces? I do fine cutting and putting together parts but it seems like the one thing that keeps from doing "great" builds are those pesky edges Thanks for any input I am currently building a Marły Modelarz Chi-he in The Armory if you want to look and see what I mean.

[silverback920]

Try running a colored pencil along the edge. Sharpen often because paper tends to carve trenches into the pencil lead. Try to match the color to the surroundings.

[Burning Beard]

I like water color pencils. Dry they seem to work better than standard color pencils, and you can always lick them to get a little more coverage.

Beard

[Tim Crowe]

If i'm doing a normal build I use felt-tip pens

For a great build I would use paint

Tim

[Jim Nunn]

There are many ways to color the edges. My preferred method is to use water color paint. The reasons I prefer water color paint are that you can mix up a nearly exact color match. It dries quickly. it is low cost, with a Michaels' coupon you can purchase a set of 12 colors for less than $10. you can tint acrylic paint with water color paint. Water colors can be used to shade the model and be used to add weathering.

Tips on using watercolor paints. Purchase the paste paint in the small tubes and get the Gouache paint. Gouache water color paint is opaque, most water color paints are transparent. Add a drop or two of liquid soap to the water that you will use to thin the paint. The soap helps the paint to flow.

Jim Nunn

[SCEtoAUX]

If you can not match the colors you can use a shade of gray to edge the parts.

Do the edging with the printed side facing away from you so if and when you slip with the edger the graphics will not get marred.

Try to edge before glueing. In many cases the dried glue will prevent the color being applied. If that happens you can try scraping some of the color off of a colored pencil and mix it with some glue to give the glue some color then apply that mixture to the area with dried glue that will not take the color from the edger. Or you can try some other medium to apply the color.

Sometimes you will see a slight misalignment with some white of a glue tab showing. You can often prevent that from happening by coloring the area along the glue tab where it and the printed area meet before you do the assembly.

If there is a blank area on a part where another part is to be placed then color around the perimeter inside the blank area.

[Kugelfang]

Has anyone tried oil pastels for edge coloring? I recently bought a set of 48 colors for less than 5$ but haven't had a chance to build with them yet.

--jeff

[mbauer]

Originally Posted by Kugelfang

Has anyone tried oil pastels for edge coloring? I recently bought a set of 48 colors for less than 5$ but haven't had a chance to build with them yet.

--jeff

Hi Jeff,

Yes, I have, They work great, except for one major issue. When rubbing them on the edge, little tiny balls of color will roll off of the stick. These little balls, if they get on the part, will smear a streak of color if you try to brush them off, far better to use air to clean them.

Mike

[ridetheory]

I use gouache paint, which is essentially watercolor in a tube.

I have a little Altoids tin, into which I've pressed some baked Sculpey polymer clay, with some indentations for the paint. I've mixed most of the colors I commonly use, and keep that tin on hand. The colors are:

A brownish brick color.
A dark forest green
Black
White
Two shades of grey.

There's a blob of yellow on the inside lid which I use occasionally to lighten a color.

These colors, and various tonal mixtures, will cover about 95% of my needs. I very seldom have to open up my drawer of gouache paints for any other colors. Really, I could rub along with just Neutral Grey, which I end up using a lot.

I use a waterbrush, which is one of my favorite tools. It's a paintbrush with a squeezable handle filled with water. A little squeeze gives me the drop of water I need to get the dried gouache up to the viscosity I need, and then another squeeze and a wipe onto a paper towel to clean the brush when I'm done or ready to move on to another color.

Four little spots of poster tack on the underside of the tin keep it from scooting around on my cutting board.

This tiny kit has lasted me for years. I occasionally clean out the mixed colors and add another drop of gouache to the indentations, but even the quantity you see here is good for dozens and dozens of models.

I have a nearly identical tin in my travel kit, which is less messy than this one.

[umtutsut]

My simple, effective -- and cheap -- method: A 96-pack of Crayola crayons. Works on both cardstock and photo paper edges. You can match pretty much any color.

Les (The Voice of Authority -- website coming this century)