I'm wondering if you can "paint" on decal sheets, that is, if they
are plastic. Can you use just any paint, like Floquil?
Yes. Clear decal paper is sold both by Micro Mark and Micro Scale.
You will find it much easier to paint your design on the
two-dimensional paper rather than on an unwieldy ship model.
Any hobby paint will suffice, although I find Floquil easiest to use
since it is unaffected by water (can't say that about all acrylics) and
is much thinner than enamels. Use a 50/50 mixture of Floquil and its
thinner, Dio-sol, to hand paint your design.
The process might look like this:
-
Using a sharp pencil, lightly sketch in your design on the
clear decal paper.
-
Paint your design directly over your sketch. Use enough thinner
that brush strokes and lumpy paint are avoided but not so much
that the colors run.
-
Overspray your design with a clear fixative such as Testors
Gloss Cote or Dull Cote to. This binds everything together into
a solid decal.
-
Lightly trace around your design with a new #11 blade to score
through the clear decal film. It's not necessary, or even
desirable, to cut through the paper. Just score through the film
to eliminate it outside the perimeter of your design.
-
Apply this exactly as you would any water slide or wet transfer
decal.
-
The application will be enhanced by brushing on a very dilute
solution of white glue on the spot where the decal is to be
applied to increase adhesion which will eliminate trapped air
which causes "silvering".
-
Use of a decal solvent such as Micro Sol will make the decal
snuggle down over detail and appear painted on.
-
Spray a clear coat of the appropriate gloss or flat finish after
the decal dries.
I've used this process for years with success, and a recent example
is the piratical Captain Kidd character which appears on both sides
of the forward stack on my 1/192 DD 661 U.S.S. KIDD.
Can you imagine painting that on the stacks directly?
{Bob Steinbrunn}
I'd like to get in on this one, yes, you can paint directly on decal
paper and than use it as a regular decal. You can also run decal
paper through your copier if plain black (or at least black outlines)
will help you. Then of course, you can take your colored artwork to
you favorite office supply store and have them copy it onto decal
paper with their color laser copier. I think decals made in this way
are actually superior to regular decals.
If black or black outlines will help, try this (laser printers and copiers
work for this). Draw your design. If you are doing it on the computer
you can even do the mirror image for the other side with a click of
the mouse. Then print out the drawing in the proper size. When you
run it through the copier, make twice as many as you need. Apply
one set of decals and let them dry. Use paint to fill in the colors and
let that dry. Apply the second set of decals to clean up all the lines
you messed up with paint. It might sound hoaky but it works.
Ink jet printers will not do the job because the ink "beads" up and
does not dry properly on decal paper. I even tried roughing the
surface of the decal paper with a coat of dull coat spray prior to
trying to print on it with the inkjet. It does come out a lot better
but no where as nice as a laser printer.
{Bob Santos}
I recently purchased a set of solutions and blank sheets of
decal paper from Microscale, Inc, in Costa Mesa, CA. They sell a
wide range of decals for the model railroad gang, for dollhouse
minature decals, and blank sheets in several colors. They have a
nice catalog which includes this three bottle set of solutions to
be used in the manufacture, application, and finishing of decals.
I did the hull numbers on the Mare Nostrun - A Mediterranean
fishing boat - using pre-printed number sets from their catalog.
When finished and sealed, they really did "disappear", even
showing the grooves between the planks through the decal.
I also did a rather elaborate set of panel markings for the
front panel of a home brewed electronic equipment. The panel had
a slightly textured finish which looked like it would present a
problem when applying the decals.
I designed the labels and other markings using Corel Draw and
printed them on blank decal paper on my 5P HP laser jet printer.
They turned out beautifully and really look better than a home
brew silk screening job.
In both cases, I slavishly followed the instructions included in
the Microscale catalog and was very pleased with the results. I
seldom have success on the initial attempt with a new technique
or process, so I'll attribute most of the success to the quality
of the product(s) and the instructions supplied by Microscale.
{Lowell Frazier}
This is a technique much used by the plastic modeling crowd. You simply get
some blank decal sheet from a hobby shop and print the pattern on to it with an
ink-jet printer (using non-water soluble ink, of course), then cut out the
decal, dunk it in hot water and transfer it onto the model.
The "classic" printer to use is something called an "Alps". I think it's out of
production however - but I'm just going from memory here so take it with a
pinch of salt. Anyway, the problem with "normal" printers such as you get from
IBM, Canon, Hewlett-Packard and such is that they won't print the colour white,
which the Alps does. Of course, if you do not need white on your decals this
will not be a problem!
A google search for the term
"blank decal sheet" will give you a number of relevant web pages
on this subject. Some of them are bound to contain links to suppliers of the stuff!
{Staale Sannerud}
Depends on your printer and what colors you need.
| for:
| color | white
| metallic | b/w paper
| see Note:
|
| ALPS Printer
| X | X
| X | X
| 1
|
| Ink Jet Printer
| X | NO
| NO | X
| 2
|
| b/w Laser Printer
| NO | NO
| NO | X
| 1
|
| Color Laser Printer
| X | NO
| NO | X
| 1
|
| B/W Copier
| NO | NO
| NO | X
| 1
|
| Laser Color Copier
| X | NO
| NO | X
| 1
|
| note 1.
| Regular clear decal paper. Many sources, one is:
Detail Master
P.O.B.2815
Purcellville
VA 20134-2815
and many hobby shops
|
| note 2.
| Special ink jet decal paper, many brands, some are:
Evan Designs
P.O.Box 176
Suffield, CT 06078
(no overspray required)
Vita Clear
11517 Los Nietos Rd
Santa Fe Springs CA
90670
(overspray required)
Similar to ones carried by Walthers and Micro Mark
|
{Bob Santos}
Basically, the decal paper that works with ink-jet printer needs a fixative
spray to make it waterproof, so you have to cost that in.
For Color Laser Printing, just copy your final artwork on the decal paper using
the color photo-copier.
The ALPS printer gives the best color output as it uses thermal dye transfer
ribbons. The best part is it also prints white. (If you're searching for this
printer, the OEM is OKI so you might try that too.)
Some other sources not yet mentioned are:-
- Imagination Gallery - they were
one of the first to come up with inkjet decal paper way before Micromark
and others.
- Tango Papa Decals
- I got my decal paper from him. He makes his own decal paper. It only
works with ALPS or laser printer. I think Tom also does custom printing
if you give him your final artwork.
I print the outline using laser printer and uses artist watercolor to color it
in. Then I waterproof it with Johnson FUTURE floor wax liquid.
{Lim Chan Hiok}
See also How do I get decals to "disappear"?
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