Like the title states i am thinking about trying an armor model using color modulation on the paint job.

Supposing i attempt the most basic form with a german three colored camouflage, i imagine myself spraying the dunkelgelb in stages... darker for the suspension and wheel area, normal for lower hull and lighter for the upper hull.

How to go about spraying the subsequent layers of olive green and red brown? Same idea of darker blotches lower down and lightening as i go up or do the individual blotches get modulation?

Also i am wondering about my paint mix... Theoretically i would add a few drops of flat black to darken and add a few drops of white for the lighter shades?

A few more in depth details about the technique and/ or how you guys go about in a similar scenario would be much appreciated!

Richard

Besides doing this to the base coat which will give you the depth... it seems like the camo colors would be a pain to do this with and get it right... often adding white doesn't just lighten it, but greys it in some colors, thus changing the color.

I might suggest a short cut... do the base coat as planned and then just use washes of varying degrees to taper the darkening. Then a light drybrushing on highlights in the lighter areas?

I've done this with some success on camo and it beats mixing and testing paint colors for every level when you're trying to do a complicated camo pattern.

I've done some US vehicles in MASSTER camo, it has a lot of light sand as a base and the lighter color lends it's self to this shading better. Then the overlaying Brown and Green are applies with same colors. Then a dark wash matches them to the lower, darker portions.

I'll be interested in how you decide to tackle this!

There's a nice tutorial on Missing-Lynx done my Mike Rinaldi that you might take a look at. He doesn't use the three-color camo, but he has an interesting solution to how he achieves a modulation of the one color camo color sprayed over the base color.

http://www.missing-lynx.com/articles/other/modulationmr_1.html

Also, Mig Jimenez did a Panther in three-color that has color modulation, but the colors are in the U.S. Army palette so it won't be a straight tutorial. However, you can get an idea of how the modulation is handled on the subsequent layers of color.

http://migjimenez.blogspot.com/2010/06/what-if-panther-ii-under-us-army.html

Hope this helps and good luck.

Thank you for your reply!

You have given me that one extra option that sounds very doable.. I could just modulate the base yellow and use localised washes to darken the camouflage colors. Intriguing idea.

Wether or not it is sensible to use a color modulation technique as opposed to your (easier?) method of washes for darkening i do not know. I am just eager to make the technique itself my own just for the sake of knowing how to utilise it

I could always go and buy a dedicated modulation color set from AK interactive or some other brand but i do think it can be done without such expenses

Richard

ProfessorP, Thank you for those links! I am going to check those links out for sure. I love Mig's work!

Richard

Hi Richard, I do seem to recall that Mig states that colour modulation is not always suitable, or is much harder, for multi-colour schemes, and there's no doubt that for the first attempt it might be best to go for a single colour scheme. However, I think it also depends on what type of 3 colour camo scheme you are thinking of - if it is one in which the colours are almost equal in the areas they cover, then I think that you will be giving yourself a very tough assignment. On the other hand if the scheme is predominantly dark yellow with just wispy feathered patches of green and brown, then I think it will be much easier, but I would suggest that you don't try to do the modulation on those wispy camouflage patches, but just keep them relatively subtle and a little bit transparent so they don't obliterate the dark yellow modulation.

I have recently been working on a small scale Panther, and did a little modulation on the dark yellow, and then applied the other colours fairly sparingly, especially the brown. To do that I just used two shades, the original Tamiya dark yellow then lightened it with some white. On another example I primed with grey primer then oversprayed with just two other premixed shades, Tamiya NATO black and German Grey - dark on the bottom and lighter towards the top. It's the sprayed edge that gives the subtlety to the shading, so there should not be any need to mix many different shades, and I would avoid adding black to darken down. Instead I would start off with your premixed dark colour and just add white to lighten it once or twice as you move up.

Try doing the thing that Mig suggests, of using a paper mask to protect some of the edges so that for example you can shade the sides and the top of the hull separately.

Thank you for your reply Matthew.

After thoroughly reading and re reading the links that were provided to me (thanks again! Such a good article at missing lynx) i am forced to admit i did not overthink the camo part enough and feel i need to learn to walk before i can run i believe the correct expression is.

In that respect maybe a fully dunkelgelb AFV or a Afrikacorps sand or maybe even a uniform russian green KV would be a much more suitable subject to experiment with this technique...

Fun project for my first log on armorama too!