UPDATE: DAY 38
Back on the attack!
Got home from my trip to San Diego yesterday, so I have a weekend to dedicate
to my favorite Mando!
A little while back, Furious asked me how I do the "fade" under the killstripes. Since this is what I started
with today, I guess this is a good time to post some pics of that process.
This is another one of those unique ESB features. My belief is that when the original helmet was painted,
the tape used to mask off the killstripes pulled up some of the paint around the bottom edge of the dome, revealing
some of the base silver. This appears to have been touched up with some of the base green. However, the touch
up is thinner in some places. It's a little translucent, letting a hint of the silver show through.
I attempt to approximate this tone by mixing a little bit of Polly Scale Concrete with some of my dome weathering
blend, which is a lightened mixture of my dome base color. If you do a lot of paint work, a supply of small mixing
jars comes in really handy. I also keep a stack of paper bowls around for mixing, too.
I mix the two colors until I have something that sort of looks like Concrete, but with a greener cast to it.
I pour the mixture into one of the paper bowls. I don't need a lot of this color, so I mix a pretty small amount.
I add a couple/few drops of water until the mixture is very thin. Almost like a wash.
I use one of my size 5/0 brushes to apply the mixture. When looking at reference pics of the helmet, there
is some structure within the "fade." Little jigs and jags, which points more strongly to paint being pulled
up by tape. I begin by sort of outlining the shapes as best I can, and laying in the parts that I want to be slightly
more opaque. The paint is so thin that I almost can't see it immediately. It kind of "develops" as the water
evaporates. By laying in the more opaque parts first, I can go back and fill in the more translucent parts.
I work my way around, adding the fade below the stripes. There's also a bit just below the left turn signal
on the front of the dome. I also add some within both turn signals. It makes it look like there's a build up
of dust inside them.
There's not quite as much structure below the rear half of the killstripes, but it's still there.
There's also some of this effect behind the killstripes. It's pretty subtle, and it almost appears that the helmet
was masked for a 15th killstripe that was never added. I kind of like this theory, as the Pre-Pro 3 helmet does
have 15 killstripes on it.
As a final note, I also use this thinned down mixture to do a wash on the
Borden connector. Gives it an oxidized appearance.