I thought I would pass along a painting trick I learned over the years.
I have attempted to paint the walkway edging on my Rivarossi Cab Forwards several times and give up because my hands are not steady enough to to do that type of detail painting.
Before
What I needed was a miniature paint roller. I searched the Internet without any luck looking for one. Then I had an idea, the 1/2" diameter Dremel cotton buffer/polisher wheels. I slipped the 1/8" Dremel shaft in a 1/8" ID brass tube and I had a miniature paint.
I use the Automotive Pin Stripe Tape for a lot of stuff but the foot railing on my locomotives is just under 1/32” thick so my only choice was paint. The 1/32” yellow tape makes super road striping. That beats masking tape and paint easily.
Good for You…lotta uses for the Pin Stripe tape in the hobby. Fortunately for Me at 73, I can still paint small detail on things, as long as My hand is supported.
I got a few years on you Frank and I do pretty good at painting figures with my hand resting against something. I really enjoy painting figures with a super fine tip brush and airbrushing everything else.
I’ve been using striping tape for about 12 years and it really works out good. I think my best tape find was 3M Blue Delicate Surface masking tape, works better than any other masking tape I’ve tried over the last 40 years.
Yeah I know about the age thing…I believe Your 78.
I used to do a lot of custom painting yrs. ago on custom cars and semi’s, along with body work.so I have used a number of produsts over the yrs. My go to tape when doing multiple color paint schemes was always #218 Fine line tape by 3M, then masking tape and paper. Still use the same ways on miniatures. Some figures, I put together and hand painted for one of My Son’s, He’s a wargaming addict…He buy’s em and I build and paint them.LOL.
Take Care! [:D]
Frank
Btw: Thought I would throw in a pic’ of My 49 Ford that I restored and painted. Did four different cars over the yrs.
They are Warhammer 40k figures. They really don’t have a scale marked on them per se’, they are inbetween 1/48 and 1/64, I really never attempted to measure them. The medals?? The flag started out all Gray, like all the figures are. Air brushed it with a coat of Floquil reefer white, let cure and the rest of the colors were hand brush painted. LOL I usually do five figures at one time, starting out with flesh color. The kicker is…they have to be assembled first, torso’s, head, arm’s, hands and weapons in all different pose’s, that come on a sprue. LOL. My Son tell’s Me, some of His friends would like Me to do some of theirs…they will pay Me, My answer was…no way in hell. LOL.
OK, the ‘micro paint roller’ is a neat idea, but is there a reason the OP couldn’t have used a microbrush for this purpose?
I use them, they work fairly well, they come in different sizes (as the link above shows - I put that for comparison, you can find cheaper than MicroMark prices), and should do the job even for someone with, well, a “shaky” hand.
If I may offer My opinion and experience on Your question! For the length of the stripe on that locomotive, if using a brush or a Micro-brush, You would have to stop a few times to load the brush with paint again, thereby showing starts and stops when You did that once dried. With the roller method, You should be able to load the roller so You only have to make one pass, thereby eliminating the start/stop marks. That’s the way I see it.
Ask a pro-brush pin-striper and He’ll tell You a similar answer. A very good friend of mine did that for a living on Autos/Trucks unfortunately, He is no longer with us. One of the best.
I have used Sanford paint markers in the past, better control, but still hard to do with a shaky hand, with one stroke.
I have a pretty good stock of brushes of all kinds and sizes including the Micro-Mark brushes you mentioned, after spending many hours trying to paint a fine line down the sides of my Rivarossi locomotives I gave up. I spent an equal amount of time doing touchup as I did putting the white stripe on.
I do pretty good at painting figures and structures but a straight sharp line just isn’t doable for me anymore. The mini paint roller worked slick first try and only required a couple of very small touchups on more than a dozen locomotives. My problem is aged hands holding a brush steady, not the type of brush. The best brush I’ve been able find to do fine work with is a Winsor & Newton Series 7 Miniature Kolinsky Sable 3/0.
Thanks for the tip Mel, I’ve been struggling with these for years. I’ve had some success using a brush, by painting using the sides of the brush with small quantities of paint. Another way to do it is to paint the white line with a brush, mask it with tape, and paint the rest in black using my airbrush. I’ll try your technique next time.
