I've seen pictures of a T34 where areas of light and shade were very successfully created using yellow and blue oils with thinners on the green background

Using yellow and blue on green seems logical. My question is what colours to use on a panzer grau or dunkel gelb. Also, can the technique be used on camo patterns and if so what colours would you use?

Thanks

Hi Andy,

I would suggest that you start with developing an idea about what the final effect that you want will be.

In the simplest terms, you can do two things with a color: You can alter its tone (or value) by making it darker or lighter, and you can alter its tint (or hue) by altering mix of primary colors used to create it.

(For simplicity, we can consider chroma - or the gray scale to be the same as tone/value. Technically it's not, but on a model the practical effect is about the same, at least at this initial level in the discussion.)

So, a good example is with green. You can make it darker by adding a filter of, say, dark gray or black or you can make it lighter by adding a filter of light gray or white. Doing this doesn't change the tint (or hue of the original color) but it does change its tone (or value).

But you can also take that same green and make it more blue or more yellow (because green is a secondary color made of the primary colors blue and yellow). Doing this changes the tint (or hue) altering the base color itself.

Now, adding black or white generally makes the original color "grayer" which may or may not be what you really want (or maybe for for sun-faded faded paint, that is what you want). So you can also change the tone (or value) and tint (or hue) by adding a color's complementary color (the color that is opposite from it on the color wheel). This will make the base color darker but not "grayer."

The closer a color is to one of its primary color components, the harder it is to make that color lighter but not "whiter." So for Dark Yellow, for example, if you want it brighter but not faded, you need to add a lighter yellow (not white). For a red brown, you might need to add a red and yellow or orange color. The possible examples are literally endless.

A color wheel is an essential tool for figuring all of this out. You can find them at just about any art supply store and in many book stores.

So, where does this take us with models and filters and color modulation? Remember that both of these techniques work by adding a semi-transparent layer of pigment over the underlying base color which then alters that base color (in either tone/value or tint/hue or both.

Yellow Ocher and White work well on German Dark Yellow to make it lighter and or brighter, but you can also use other colors like seinnas to make it darker (but also redder).

On Dark Gray, Payne's Gray and Indigo and White, but again other colors, like Prussian Blue or Ultramarine Blue will alter the tint and tone of the base color.

On Dark Brown, you can try either of the two Siennas, Burnt or Raw and white, but Yellow Ocher can have a nice effect.

A lot of the final result depends on the exact shade of the base colors that you're starting with. If you've adjusted your base colors for scale lighting, and are starting with pretty light values of the base colors, then your modulation efforts to make those colors darker might be working with complementary colors or simply a mix of the original base color and white might be your best option to make them lighter without altering their hue and making them too bright.

Conversely, if you're starting with base colors that are very pure, then you might not have any option but to use their complements or a very dark gray or black to make the darker. However, with these darker colors, you might be able to make them brighter by altering their hue and achieve some nice effects.

Also, whether the base coat has a matt, semi-gloss, of gloss barrier coat will effect how the oil paints can be spread to create the "filters" (transparent top layers).

The "flatter" (more matt) the finish, the more the oil paint pigments tend to stick to the surface and the more intense the effect. The glossier the the finish, the more the oil paint pigments tend to wash off making the effect less intense.

In the end, there are no hard and fast rules about what colors should be used in all situations for modulation or filters. What you're starting with and what you want to do should determine which colors you use (and how you use them) to achieve your desired results.

HTH,

Wow.

Thanks for the reply. There's not a lot left to say, that was pretty comprehensive.

Many thanks (and I'll get a colour wheel tomorrow!)

:-)