Tamiya Panel Line Accent

[flashman]

Alex Kustov has a very well done tutorial on "How to use washes to accent panel lines" on automotive models on his "Italian Horses" website. Alex's technique is more realistic for cars than the methods currently in fashion on military models.

http://italianhorses.net/Tutorials/tutorials.htm

This link is to his Tutorials main page, so you can also check out his other tutorials as well which are all good and potentially useful. The panel lines one is the last tutorial listed on that page.
(Note: Alex recently posted on the AutomotiveForums.com car modeling forum that he has not updated his site for a number of years but is leaving it up as an archive for others to use. Thanks Alex!)

Cameron

[flashman]

The airplane guys use the black for panel lines but having just been to air show in Chino Ca. I dont know why. I saw no airplanes with black panel lines.

As JamesB said in his post, that's just an optical illusion technique attempting to make the models look more realistic to the viewers mind. These illusion techniques have been used in the art world (painting, drawing, sculpture, etc) for hundreds of years to fool the eye/mind into making the artwork appear to be more than it could actually be, since it isn't the real thing. For example, next time you are in an art gallery or museum, find an especially realistc looking painting, and then get real close, and you will start to see the simulated shading, highlights, perspectives, and other tricks the artist used to make the finished work look so realistic when viewed from a normal viewing distance.

Since modeling is really just as much an artistic medium, the current techniques of washes, pre-shading, post-shading, dot-filters, etc, are no different than the techniques used by other artists. Sure, some modelers have over-done these at times, but if we're honest you have to admit they often still look better than some models without them, depending on how well they are done and the viewer's individual taste.

Cameron

[taxidermist]

+1 and very well said, cameron.

[vadim]

+ 1 to Cameron! I could not say better.

[Tiffoc]

Alex Kustov has a very well done tutorial on "How to use washes to accent panel lines" on automotive models on his "Italian Horses" website. Alex's technique is more realistic for cars than the methods currently in fashion on military models.

http://italianhorses.net/Tutorials/tutorials.htm

This link is to his Tutorials main page, so you can also check out his other tutorials as well which are all good and potentially useful. The panel lines one is the last tutorial listed on that page.
(Note: Alex recently posted on the AutomotiveForums.com car modeling forum that he has not updated his site for a number of years but is leaving it up as an archive for others to use. Thanks Alex!)

Cameron

Hi Cameron...

Alex Kustov is ONE of (yes there's others) my favourite model builders. I first came across him when he wrote an article for Tamiya Model Magazine International, some years ago.
I was deeply impressed with his methods and techniques. I needed to know more, so I did a search on my PC. I found his website Italian Horses, I now use his website often as it's
great reference. It's where I first discovered that I wasn't the only person using that Panel Line definition method. Having such a renowned model builder as Alex using the same
method as myself to highlite Panel Lines made me feel pride and proved, to me, that at least I was doing something correct. It's also refreshing to see it's not only myself who uses
Alex's site. Nice to see I'm also not the only person mainly building just Ferrari cars. I do occassionally build a something different... but not too often

Steve.

[vanhookvintage]

Thanks for all of the help everybody.

Cheers,
Greg

[plastiksurgeon]

The method you describe is most often used by airplane modelers and I don't think it is realistic for cars. I have never used black as I think it is too stark. I use gray for white bodies and I use a darkened body color for everything else. I usually mix the body color with gray.

I try to mix the panel line color from an acrylic paint in order to make its removal easy, just a wet q-tip.

Just my way, I am sure everyone uses what works for them, someone passed this technique to me.

Regards and good luck,

Joe.

Plus one... I agree Black is far to harsh, said it for years... the method Joe describes is mine too!!!

Steve.

WOW, I would never had thought of a "darker body color" instead of black in a million years on my own ! THAT IS INGENIOUS THINKING !

Thank you both (artists Joe and Steve W) so much for directing me from the black !

Best regards,
Steve Mohlenkamp

[flashman]

WOW, I would never had thought of a "darker body color" instead of black in a million years on my own ! THAT IS INGENIOUS THINKING !

Thank you both (artists Joe and Steve W) so much for directing me from the black !

Best regards,
Steve Mohlenkamp

To be fair (and definitely not to further muddy the waters ), I seem to remember that Marcos Cruz did an article on improving panel lines in either Model Cars mag or Scale Auto. And if my memory is right, he used black in the lines after priming the body, and then applied the color coats in light coats which toned down the black lines. Basically accomplishing the same effect using different methods.

EDIT: Found a B/W copy of the article, which was in the Aug/Sep 2012 Model Cars issue:
http://scaledworld.net/tutorials/panel- ... arcos-cruz

As Joe said, everyone uses what works for them. Any way is right if the results look good.

Cameron