Last week I had the opportunity to paint a 1:10 scale driver’s head for a friend. It was for his R/C off road vehicle – but I’m not sure which manufacturer’s – I suspect Tamiya but I could very well be wrong…
I used Tamiya flat acrylics diluted with Tamiya acrylic thinner (for airbrushing) or water (hand painting/washes).
After cleaning the plastic parts with SuperClean I airbrushed the head with a stock skin tone then darkened that skin tone slightly with a tiny amount of brown for the faint shadow underneath the cheeks, chin and ears.
While the airbrush was still within reach I painted the cap with another stock dark olive colour. All of the airbrushing was done using roughly a 50/50 mixture of Tamiya acrylic paint and thinner to get a milk like consistency that I find perfect for airbrushing. Three light coats gave me enough base coverage.
For the hand brushing I always start with the hardest or more detailed parts first – in this case the eyes – since if I screw things up I don’t lose as much time if I have to apply the base coat over again. For the eyes I washed in some off white (which I think is still too bright – next time I’ll add more colour to the white) then painted the iris blue and then the pupil black. I added a little line of diluted brown both above and below the eye for his eyelashes.
Then I added a few very diluted washes of red over the lips – starting with the most diluted coat first over the whole lip area followed by a touch more pigment to the centre of the lips until I was satisfied with the result. Brown hair and eyebrows were next followed by some lightened highlights.
Cleanup for everything was with Dollar store nail polish remover (with acetone) and so there was never any unpleasant smell. Soaking the airbrush parts in this solution for a few minutes then scrubbing them clean took all but 15 minutes…
I did not use a primer and although I cleaned the plastic the paint can be scratched off with a finger nail if one tries… fortunately this head will not be handled much (if at all) so this was not a concern – but I would use a primer next time…
…hope this helps!
The Happy Canadian Scale Modeler!
