scale paint, adding white?

[aiireland]

met a military miniature guy yesterday who was talking about adding as much as 10%-25% white to his paint when painting his 1/35 or 1/48 scale model kits. he said for n-scale he would add as much as 35% white (which seems high to me). he also said that you can't ruin anything by adding white.

1st, does everyone add white to achieve scale color?
2nd, is 35% white correct for n-scale?

ai

[orsonroy]

Paint color is almost al a matter of taste. One person will see the "correct" color, while someone will say it's way off. Distance DOES play a huge role in paint color differences, but so do a lot of other things that really turn this from a technical to artistic question.

Moisture in the air and time of day will REALLY screw up the equasion. I'm a military modeler too, and most MM's get paint color wrong, IMHO. The colors are either way too washed out, or they darken them up too much. WWII US vehicle color isn't a khaki/sage color, for example, but that's what they all THINK it is, and so that's what Testors came out with for a paint.

Lots of model railroadres DO add white to their paint, but mostly to achieve a weathered/faded color. Yes, using "true" paint colors will tend to darken up the model to a point of unbelievability, so adding a LITTLE white won't hurt. But 35% white for N scale isn't a good idea, unless you're specifically going for an old. faded paint job. This would be really correct for modern equipment (especially boxcars) but not accurate at all for the steam-era, when cars got DARKER, due to being pulled around by steam engines and Alco diesels!

On my N scale stuff, I generally like the colors that M-T uses. I'll almost always darken this base color with weathering, adding light washes until I get the car dark enough to suggest relative age. I've never deliberately darkened an N scale car, except to add grimy black to "true" black cars.

Hope this helps!

[Anonymous]

I have never before seen a reference to "scale color". I understand what you mean, but as orsonroy says that's a bit of a judgement call. It's entirely possible that no two of us could agree on the "scale color" of a model.

[Anonymous]

To get an idea of scale colour,take a figure in your scale and hold it as far away from you as you would view it on your layout....15 to 20 inches or so.Ask a friend to walk away from you until they are the same size as the figure,then compare colours.As orsonroy says,there are lots of variables,but this may help to judge the degree of colour change.

[aiireland]

I did a little more research on this "scale color" thing and found a few modeling books at the library. A couple paragraphs in 2 books talked about it. Both were in chapters on military miniatures, which makes be think this is something that tank and airplane modelers do. While talking to guy, i found the subject of scale color interesting, but at the same time i thought it kinda wacked. If some of the colors on my freight cars are out of scale, well so be it.
thanks, ai

[Virginian]

Aha! At last, an explanation why all the N&W red engine stripes have been wrong. They were going for scale N&W red and I was wanting just plain old N&W red. How silly of me.

[ragnar]

When painting steam locomotves with engine black I always add two or three drops of white so as the finished product doesn't look like a black blob sitting on the track,it will lighten the color just enough so the details show up quite nicely...

[orsonroy]

QUOTE: Originally posted by ragnar

When painting steam locomotves with engine black I always add two or three drops of white so as the finished product doesn't look like a black blob sitting on the track,it will lighten the color just enough so the details show up quite nicely...

I've seen this technique done before (a lot) and it can be done successfully...but usually isn't. I've hung out with a LOT of steam engines, and guess what? They're BLACK. Even as far away as 1/2 mile or so (at least, according to my videotapes). I prefer to highlight detailing with weathering, but I have to be careful with that too. Not only are steamers BLACK, but they stay SHINY in many places, even long after the base color of the engine is road grime tan. You cannot properly replicate shiny black by painting a model grey and then grunging it up a lot.

[tstage]

I custom-mixed a 1:1 (50% white) ratio of Floquil Concrete and Reefer White for paintig the coaling tower that I just completed. I felt that the regular Floquil concrete color was just too dark for this application. I was very pleased with the final color that I achieved. Concrete comes in a variety of shades and colors anyhow so I didn't have much of a problem lightening things up a bit.

Tom

[LuthierTom]

I'm also an airplane modeler, and I generally add about 10% white for 1/72 scale models. I use a lot of pastels for weathering, and will darken lines of panels or joints which move (control surfaces) or are removed a lot (daily access panels). I have noticed a trend over the last 5 years or so, though, where I think the amount of weathering being done is being way overdone - darkening EVERY panel line, paint chips missing everywhere, extremely faded paint, etc. That might be OK for WW II in the southwest Pacific, but where they had the resources and time to keep their aircraft well maintained crew chiefs generally did (and do) so. I guess I'm a member of the "keep it subtle" school, which doesn't seem to be in vogue right now.

[LuthierTom]

One final thought I forgot to mention above: if you *really* want to get a realistic representation of a prototype, if you can find the real thing (hard to do for historical subjects) or something very similar, step back to a scale viewing distance (say 50 to 100 yards for an aircraft you plan to model in 1/72 scale) and compare what you see at that distance to sample color chips you hold at arm's length. Then pick the color that looks right. I did that with the #3 F-20 when it visited the Dayton Air Show in the 1980s. The aircraft was painted in BMW Ascot Grey automotive lacquer, which on a 1/72-scale model makes the model look like solid pewter! However, at 50 yards, that color looks like a medium-dark gloss bluish grey. I found the closest Federal Standard color number paint chip that matched the color at that distance, and used that color on my model. I must have done something right, because that model took a third place in its category in a national contest.

[davekelly]

Another reason that some folks add some white (alot less than 35% I'm sure) to black when painting steamers is related to light. Most layouts are seen in light which is at a level much lower than what exists in the outdoors. Painting a steamer black sometimes causing the detailing to get lost in the shadows. Lightening up the color a bit allows one to see the details better. Why spend all that time detailing if you can't see it! I would stress, however, that the resulting paint used it not gray, perhaps it can be called "light black"?