Friday, February 20, 2009

RGM-79C Powered GM - Painting Issues - C Surface?

No I haven't switched projects to the GM Powered, but Tonzo asked about more info on the C-Surface technique (check this post and comments section if you don't know what I'm talking about), and I thought it was the same issue that happened to my Powered GM, when I tried to paint it. Let's take a look.




Apparently I was mistaken. It isn't the same problem... It's the opposite. Inward right angle surface instead of outward facing ones. As you can see most of the places the paint missed are on the inside corners... actually NEAR to the inside corners. The corners have paint in the them. I'm not totally sure WHY it turned out like this.
I did this when I was working on my MG Impulse. Just decided to spray the Powered GM since I had the paint out. Less than desireable result as you can see. However, I primed the lower leg armour and sprayed those as well and they turned out much better. They could still do with another coat of paint but yeah... for an initial spray (this is before I learned a lot of stuff mind you) it doesn't look that bad. Acceptable by most standards... but by mine? No. Not really.
So... I'm actually not sure just how necessary creating the C-Surface is. Apparently it's never been an issue for me!
As for how I'm going to fix this paint problem... Might just take a short cut and use my Gundam paint markers on the trouble spots. If it looks horrible after, I'll just put on another coat of metallic black to even it out.

As for his question about "...more detail about scraping the primer on the edges back? In what instances would this be necessary and why? Is a second coat of primer required?"

Most modellers (well I've only seen Japanese modellers do it to be honest) do it for edges that come together at right angles, because at the point where those two angles meet there isn't really enough surface area to hold the paint! So they scrape it down or round it out a bit to create a large surface area for the paint to stick to.
Image you're painting a table. The top surface is A and the sides of it are B. The edge where A connects to be B is C. That's the C surface but... it's just an edge really so these Japanese modellers sand that edge down a bit so it becomes more of a surface. Paint will stick AND stay there much easier if you do it that way.
That's the theory behind it. The first coat of primer is for basic surface preparation and error detection. After scraping... a second coat isn't totally necessary (depends on you really and how serious you are about it) but it is recommended if you want a complete and uniform paint job.
That was probably the issue with my Powered GM. No hard right angles. As for when you it's necessary to do this... I'd say do it when you're concerned that the paint won't stick to the edges. It's probably unnecessary but I'm doing a modified version of this technique on my Mass Produced Guncannon. But in my own limited first hand experience I must say that I haven't had this problem at all.

1 comment:

  1. Ah. Thanks very much BB, that totally clears that up for me. I was thinking it was some kind of pre-shading technique ^^;

    I wonder if the paint refused to stick in those corners for you because of a small amount of left over mould release residue? Obviously washing the runners before you start a kit would negate the possibility of this. Possibly more likely is that spray cans can't provide a fine enough stream of mist at the right angle to hit those spots? I did read somewhere that when you are beginning the paint work, it's a good idea to make the first past just a really light mist, not even enough to cover the part, so that the following passes have something to grab onto and the paint doesn't just slide around on the surface. Halfway (or less than) depressing the nozzle will achieve this result, but your finger will get tired quickly. For good can control and finger stamina while using this technique, you can use a ¥5 coin. Pics of exactly what I mean can be found here:

    http://www.evilcow.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1088&PID=7187#7187

    (Sorry, I don't know how to make clickable links in my comments ^^;)

    Also, in a completely unrelated matter, there is a really good tutorial on photographing your Gunpla here:

    http://www.mechamodelcomp.com/index.php?page_id=34

    :)

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