Sorry for the dumb question, but I would like to know what the best way to paint a structure is. What I have been doing until now is to brush paint the different pieces before they are assembled. I have achieved a pretty nice result this way, but not perfect. For example, I can’t get a really sharp edge between the wall and the window / doorframe. (I have only tried DPM and Cornerstone buildings so far, and it’s all N scale). Should I invest in a air brush? How do you get a sharp line between wall and window frame? Do you use masking tape, or do I just need more practice and a steady hand. Thanks Jesper
I simply choose a brick color and spray the building. When it dries I use wood filler rubbed into the morter spaces and then wiped off with a damp cloth to suit. I use Testors paint markers to paint trim and window frames. Hope this helps.
An airbrush is definatly the way to go for almost all model railroad painting. I've got a cheap little Testors Aztek A320 I bought for about $40 and it's been serving me well for about 3 years now. I will say it's getting a bot worn out, but after hundreds of models, I'm very satisfied with it. Masking tape works very well for edges, but I STRONGLY recommend getting the 3M blue stuff. Yes, know it's stupid expensive, but it is a whole lot less likley to destroy whatever is under it than the cheap stuff. Another technique I use for painting close to the edge is to mask itwith just a pirce of paper held in your other hand. I refer to this as a cheaters mask, but with a fine line tip in the airbrush it works just fine. Finally, for little spots I use somthing called an erasing shield to mask of very small spots for touchup work. the sheild is a thin piece of metal with little holes cut in it like a template used for masking when you're erasing pencil marks from drawings. Any decent art supply store will have one, usually for less than $5.00. If you're going to do a lot of structures and you use the Aztek airbrush, it's worth it to get a large coverage nozzle as the little medium coverage gray nozzle that comes with the brush doesn't put out much paint.
