Hi guys. I hear a lot of modellers stating that they use Tamiya Xf-57 Buff to add an old and faded look to some of their armor. Is this true? And if so what ratio of paint to thinner should I be using in my airbrush. Does anybody have any examples? Thanks!

Steve Zaloga uses buff a lot for dusting his vehicles. It is thinned quite a lot and takes several passes to build up any visible difference. Its a nice effect, but add carefully, because if overdone, it can hide all the previous painting.
Normally all his articles have the "using my usual method " approach to describing this effect. It can be done after dull coteing, as tamiyas colours are flat after airbrushing, especially when thinned with isopropynol. I usually fix the model to its base and then overspray a little buff or a mix of buff and light grey to give a uniform dust appearance and it also ties the vehicle to the scene nicely. below is my Academy hellcat/base and tamiya JSIII, using this method.


The same method again, but used on a figure and base. It gives a natural dusting to marching boots!

Thanks Frank, thats perfect!

thanks Frank, for the advise!

Frank..................................you da man!

Polly S makes a color that serves the same purpose, called DUST.... basicly a lightly tinted flatcoat, but a little whiter.

I have used this method myself on my kits as you can see on my Leopard 2 and GRAD, I actually used 2 different colors, one is Gunze Mud paint and then Tamiya Buff over top....you could use any color really that is mud or dust like.

The usual thinning is 10 parts thinner to 1 part paint, least thats what I used, if you want to err on the side of caution, you can up your thinner to 13-15parts per part of paint, if it doesn't look like much, then just do a second or third coat....the key is a slow steady build up....like PlasticBattle said, too much and you end up covering the detail and paint underneath.

Have a look.

So from a dropper, say 10 drops of thinner to 1 drop of paint?

I find it useful to add about 20% Tamiya Clear to the thinners before adding the paint. I also go a bit lighter than 10:1 (somewhere around 15-20:1) to build up the color a bit more gradually. So, from a dropper, about 15 drops of thinner and 3 drops of clear and 1 drop of paint.

The clear helps with the adheasion of the pigment in that single drop of paint and makes for a smoother appliction. With airbrushed glazes, if the thinner to paint ratio gets too high, there's not enough binder left in the mix to hold the pigment.

The very slight sheen from the clear gets taken care of with the clear flat coats later.