WIP: Eldar Crimson Hunter

Quick update before a few days of radio silence.


Here's a quick shot of what's next on the Crimson Hunter. This is a "behind the scenes" type process. When airbrushing, its not uncommon the get what's called an "orange peel" finish on glossy paint, especially here in the south where temperatures and humidity fluctuate wildly from day to day. There are lots of causes, from humidity, tinning ratio, psi, distance sprayed, and on and on. Every one of those is a variable, meaning if one changes a little, all the others need to change as well to compensate, so even the best prepared airbrushers (and I certainly don't claim to be one) will experience this.

So, moving, on, the big issue is that you end up with what is an almost bumpy finish. While its certainly serviceable, and looks decent from far away...

it is kind of a bother up close:

The biggest "tell" is the way the light reflects. My lights look "diffused" and spotty, when they should be almost a mirror reflection in the gloss paint. Sure, the black is glossy, and like I said, I could paint on top of this and it be "pretty good," but pretty good isn't what I'm after at this point.

The next best step to take once this starts to crop up is to get out the micro mesh. I start at "low" grit, 3600, and lightly scrub the surface. Be careful on the edges and corners, as oddly enough, its fairly easy to remove paint on those areas. I move up and up, all the way to 12000 grit, then wipe with a lint free cloth and then its time to respray.

Now I wait for a new jar of enamel thinner to come in and then time to spray again!