Wednesday, March 23, 2016

Lucky #13, Asuka Langley Soryu

Like the last few figures, this one started out a bit handicapped: the skin was painted and finished long ago with the Yoko figure - when I had much less experience shading with an airbrush, and when I still finished the skin pieces with a glossy finish. Instead of trying to sand all the skin, which would have taken forever and which, even then, I couldn't have guaranteed a good job, I decided to just stick with what I had and try to make up for the glossy skin with quality everywhere else. Easier said than done.



I'm still a novice with the airbrush, though getting better every time. In my case, I'm changing the procedure I follow to paint different parts of same piece different colors. Previously, I just chose a color and did that part, masking the rest, then continued with the next color I chose to do. After watching some youtube videos, I saw that they actually had a mechanism to choosing the color. If I was to do things in layers, I wouldn't need to mask near as much. The process I chose was to paint "lower" colors first. Since figures are 3D, some parts of a piece are lower, or under, others. For example, with this figure, the skin is the lowest color. Which is great, because that's the color I've already done. The next lowest color is the spandex, which is black. The highest main color is red, so that was next. Then came the minor colors of silver, green, and orange. I was torn whether to do the orange before the red. And I should have, if I followed my own rule of "lower" first. But I was eager to get the red color done, which is most of the figure, so my eagerness beat out my process logic. In the end, I regret this, because it forced me to adjust which area I would paint orange (to be explained later).

Lesson 37: Paint "lower" colors first, even if it's small and boring.



As I said, black was the first color I decided to do for this figure. The whole point of this new "lower first" painting process, was to avoid masking as much (which in turn creates smoother color borders, which in past figures, could have a 'lip' due to the masking tape). So, previously painted areas were masked, and unpainted areas were not. I wasn't all that careful about keeping the black paint within the areas to be colored black. It didn't seem to matter. All was well until I masked the black area, and started to paint the red (which was mostly black at this point). Because the red paint is much thinner than the black, even after several layers of light red color, the end result is a very dark red area. So, unfortunately, it turns out that my 'bright red' is more of a 'brick' color.




Lesson 38: When painting darker colored areas, you have to mask areas which will eventually be painted lighter colors. OR, if you intend to shade those lighter colored areas, you can forgo masking and while being very careful, can use the darker color as the future shading of the lighter color.



So there you have it - when layering and painting a lower layer, if it's a darker color, you have to mask what is to be the lighter color area, or use the darker color as the shading of the lighter (but you have to be careful). In my case, I was able to recover as long as I accepted a very brick, dark red as the color of the jump suit. I did accept it, because I was thinking of doing something lika that anyway, and it looked good. Now that I've finished the figure, I think it's a bit too dark, but hey, it's not bad.



There are a few differences between my paint job and the real figure. I've never liked the hot green color of the clavicle piece of the suit, so I felt like changing it. My choices were between gold and silver. I had already painted the silver on the shoes, so it was either go back and paint both gold, or just continue with silver. I chose to be lazy, but I can't help but think gold/brass would have looked better. The contrast is nice, though.



This figure also marked the first time I used putty. The right hand of Asuka was actually split it two pieces which fit together horribly. This was intentional and incredibly stupid on the part of the figure maker. I had to try three times to using putty to get the seam sealed correctly. It was a good learning experience, one which I'm sure I'll need again. In the end, it's still not perfect after all my effort, but that's fine with me. I'm just unhappy that the flaw is on a prominent part.

Lesson 39: Let putty dry overnight, and always apply way too much, over a much larger area than you need.

Lesson 40: Don't wait till you've already painted before you discover you need to use putty. Before painting, place all your parts together to see if you need to putty it.



Another first I did for this figure was to use black masking putty. I only used it once, and it was just a test. The putty performed nicely, in that it had a solid seal and it came off without pealing any paint from under it. I did learn, though, that it's easy for the putty to move, and when it moves, can uncover some areas. I think in the end, I'll only use putty on parts which I absolutely cannot accept the paint pealing off.

Lesson 41: When using masking putty, paint soon after applying the putty. The putty will move, so be sure that you don't try to grip the piece by the putty. Also, be careful to line the putty up along the correct border, because you can't see under it, it's hard to know whether it's placed correctly.



Another problem I had with this figure was with the finish. To prevent the masking tape from pealing the paint under it, I applied a finish over each layer of color. However, with glossy finish, masking tape left a residue on it. It's only visible at a certain angle, but at that angle, it is very obvious and looks very bad.

Lesson 42: Don't use masking tape on areas with a glossy finish



Lesson 43: If using a spray on finish, shake your spray very well! If it's gone bad, and they DO go bad, then DONT USE IT. For me, when they 'go bad', the spray is very clumpy when it comes out, rather than smooth and event. When you get used to a spray, you can tell when it's gone bad by looking at it and listening to it as you spray. You can hear a bit of a sputter and the spray mist is a bit whiter.

Lesson 44: Don't use triple thick glossy finish. It leaves a color.

Friday, March 4, 2016

#12 - Sinon, from Sword Art Online 2: GGO

This figure started out a bit handicapped, because I did things a bit out of order long ago. You see, on my 10th figure, Yoko, I got really 'excited' and did the skin tones of several different figures, all at once. I thought I was being clever and efficient, but what I was actually doing was depriving future figures of much needed airbrush experience. I, still being new to airbrushing and the procedures around it, made three mistakes - and those mistakes I now have to live with for this figure and even the next few. Those mistakes were: I made the skin glossy, I got the color wrong, and I didn't shade the skin either. I also masked the skin portion of the legs long ago, and didn't do a great job, which was something I had to recover from.

So aside from those mistakes, which I've already discussed in previous posts, I still made a few new, large mistakes with this figure too.


I'll start with the largest mistake: trying to make a small amount of airbrush paint stretch enough to finish a job, when it's apparent it's going to be a close call. Really, so much effort put into a figure, just to get lazy about waiting to order more paint. What happened was that I was running low on white airbrush paint. I already knew that white was terribly thin, and took dozens of coats to get a solid white. That's why I often use a white primer instead of a white paint. Which is what I did as well. Ok, back up, let me start from the beginning. This is regarding the white on Sinon's jacket, and her scarf.


Firstly, the jackets is very crumpled up, making it hard for the masking tape to stick to it. This was always going to be something hard. Knowing it would take 20 layers of white paint to cover up the underlying green, I instead used two layers of a white primer first. And this, was actually ok. I should have just stopped there. But I was getting cocky at everything so far working very well - so I added a blue tint as shading on the white, like I've read online (but never done) before. Turns out, it looked pretty bad. I was hoping that I could cover it up with white paint, but after two coats, it became apparent that using the white airbrush paint would take forever. It's at this point, that I decided that blue looked really bad as a shade, so I change it to grey instead, meaning I had to start over with the white to cover it up. Again, after a few layers of white and little result, I was almost out of white paint. Instead of doing the smart things and just ordering more paint and sticking with the airbrush paint, I tried using a thin coat of primer again. I didn't think it would work, and it didn't. It forced me to completely cover all the shading I had just done. So that's two more layers of primer. I tried to keep it thin, in order to keep some shading, and in parts I succeeded, and on parts I failed.

Lesson 32: For white surfaces, use primer, not paint.

Lesson 33: When shading white surfaces, blue isn't always best. As well, since white is thinner, the shading you apply should be as light a color as is possible.

Lesson 34: Don't try to make paint stretch. Don't start a piece unless you are confident you can finish it with what you have.


After all this, it still didn't look nice, but it was presentable. But there were two other problems all this caused: first, after 4 layers of primer and 6 layers of paint, the white part of the jacket was about a millimeter thick, which is huge. The other problem caused, is that after painting this 10 times, mistakes in the masking tape accumulated to something pretty massive. In particular, the finish actually got under the tape better than the paint did and left some ugly impressions on the back of the jacket. These were hard to clean up.

Lesson 35: Finish can get under tape easier than paint. When applying finish, just be patient and apply very thin layers rather than trying to get it all done in one layer.


I also had some problems with the torso. First, it was just hard, because of all the straps. I initially tried to do it by hand, but it was really starting to look bad, so I ended up using airbrush anyways. But the damage was already done - the straps have 3D brush stroke marks all along them. Oh well.

Lesson 36: Don't paint by hand anything thicker than a brush width, unless it's small.


Other than those things, no other huge mistakes were made. Lots of success stories instead. What worked: painting the thighs (skin) by hand. Using lots of water, I was able to avoid the 'brush stroke marks' and keep the thighs smooth. What worked: same thing for fixing the green portions of the jacket which were 'infected' by the white paint mentioned earlier. I spent several attempts to find the right color, and I used lots of water to keep the paint smooth. What worked: painting the black lines on the jacket by hand. What worked: the eyes turned out to be everything I could hope for. The cast didn't have a well defined groove for the eyes, so I kind of had to find my own place for them. It took several attempts, but I took my time, did it over again, and things worked out well. I used some of the methods I learned from YouTube several figures ago, and once more, they served me well (basically, work my way from the outside to the inside).