My ESB helmet progress

Can't sleep? Paint!
I decided to take a break from the mandibles and finish up one of the earpieces over the last couple days. These are Marrow Sun's cold-cast ears, they come to you a flat grey but after some wetsanding and Mothers Mag & Aluminum polish they have a pretty nice aluminum finish. Here are the right ones, before the final weathering with all the specks of brown and grey and such:
P1000424.JPG
Airbrushed the main colour on, and did all the grey by hand. Great thing about the cold-cast ears is you can just scrape the silver with a thumbtack and there's no ugly white resin underneath! I cut out the black "U" and white "J" on some electrical tape and did that with spraypaint, since the real thing isn't a decal. I did the same for the triangle shape and bars. The "OT" symbol I just did by hand. I'm pretty happy with how it all turned out.

Just a reminder, if you go by RS' colour list and use Earth for this ear, make sure you get the enamel version. I picked up the acrylic first and it turned out too reddish. The enamel looks much better.

I should have the left one done sometime this week, it's final exam time so unfortunately I have other things cutting into my important painting time :rolleyes
 
That is coming along great. The weathering looks phenomenal. Did you use a masking agent and id so, how fine of a paint brush did you use to apply it? Very nice work indeed.

Wes
 
Nope, everyone always used to paint it gold or yellow or some variation of that. Earth is basically a tan colour, and once you see it next to the rest of the helmet looks perfect. Again, kudos to Lee for getting that colour.

Wes, I used a liquid mask on the bottom piece, but I realized I didn't need to since the ears are aluminum colour so I could just scratch it off. I painted the SP Lark Dark Grey on top using the smallest brush I could find...it says "10/0" on the side, if that means anything.

Thanks for the compliments dudes :)
 
That's painted, since the real thing definitely looks painted. I lined some strips of overlapping electrical tape on top of a piece of styrene, then on top of that I printed out and taped this stencil I made:
earMS.gif
That should be sized just right for one MS' slim earcaps.
Printed it out 3 times; the U, the J, and the stripes. Cut it out with an exacto-knife, instant stencil. Nothing too tricky. this is how I did the stripes too, just did the weathering with a thumbtack when the paint was still drying. I can take some pics when I do the left earpiece.
 
Jango_Fett_Jr said:
That's painted, since the real thing definitely looks painted. I lined some strips of overlapping electrical tape on top of a piece of styrene, then on top of that I printed out and taped this stencil I made:
View attachment 9975
That should be sized just right for one MS' slim earcaps.
Printed it out 3 times; the U, the J, and the stripes. Cut it out with an exacto-knife, instant stencil. Nothing too tricky. this is how I did the stripes too, just did the weathering with a thumbtack when the paint was still drying. I can take some pics when I do the left earpiece.
THAT'S GENIUS!!....
Can't wait to see the finished product!!!(y)
 
Took a study break and threw the killstripes on there:
P1000433.jpg
Here's the template I made and used. I had to cut it up in a few spots to get it to match the curve, but I didn't do it on the drawing. I just cut it up every 3 or 4 stripes.
md-killstripes.gif

(click the image for the full-size)

I had some troubles with paint peeling, so to not risk any more I just printed this out on paper, cut it out, taped it on the two outer edges, and coated the underside of the stencil with liquid latex. That helped my stencil stick flat so there was no underspray, and it didn't peel my paint ;) Give it a shot if you are having that problem. Otherwise, trace it out on electrical tape and it should work nicely. I'm kind of annoyed that I layered it on so thick, since I noticed on the real helmet the killstripes are pretty thin so you can sorta see the green underneath, but I'll probably be the only one complaining :p

P1000433.jpg
 
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What else is there to say that hasn't been said. Simply incredible paint job thus far! I am really loving the fact that you painted the details on the ears! That has got to be some of the most dedicated and precision painting I have seen ever!

It just looks awesome!
 
Wow G, this keeps gettin better and better. My stripes are thick also and I am planning on taking the highest grade of wetsand paper I can find to take them down a notch.

Your stencils rock by the way.
 
I have to agree with everyone else on here, it looks amazing. Once done I think it will be worth all the hard work and time.
 
I really am lost for words.

G - that really is totally awsome. (y) (y)

Give yourself a big pat on the back, you deserve it.

once again man well done

(y) (y) (y)
 
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