Titanicus - Legio Loki

The actual painting of the hazard strips is really easy what takes the time is the prep work before you start painting. All of these were done with the airbrush which I find is the best and for me the only way I can paint a reasonably smooth yellow. For me the trick with these stripes is taking my time and masking everything up carefully. I used some Tamiya masking tape in a couple of sizes for the different areas but whilst the size of the tape was different the process was the same. The first piece of tape is used as a guide that everything else works from. With this piece in place I then place another piece of tape on either side before removing the original piece. Then I put the original piece alongside one the other bits of tape to act as a spacer before applying the next piece alongside this. It’s then just a case of rinse and repeat until you have the area you want to paint covered

For the carapace I added another step right at the start to establish the centre line and laid the strips up to this. Once all the stripes were in place I used a sharp knife to cut the stripes in line with the centre piece and then pulled this off. The result is all of the stripes lining up with the centre line. Then the stripes on the other side are centred on the once already in place.

Once all of the masking is completed, and for me this is the part that takes the longest it’s time for paint. My method for painting yellow is to use the air brush and I start with a yellow Vallejo Surface Primer playing down a few thin coats. I find that taking your time and doing thin coats gives the best results. If you try to cover everything in one go the paint is to ‘wet’ and ends up either streaking or soaking under the tape. Once the primer is dry I then use thinned down bright yellow, in this case it was a scale 75 one. Again it’s about building up thin layers so the paint doesn’t get runny and streaky.

Then once everything is touch dry I carefully peal of the tape and touch up any bits where the yellow has run or there is any overspray.