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Can anyone advice their ways of painting canopy supports? I don't want to go down the route of just paint the whole thing.

In the past I've masked off the whole thing and then use a knife to cut the tape off where i want to paint, can anyone suggest a better way, or have a link to a tutorial?

What I often do is paint the whole structure, then glue in the canopy.

Yeah I do the same, was just wondering if there is a good way to do the bars that are actually on the canopy.

I cover the canopy with masking/painters tape and make sure it is REALLY pressed down hard. Then I use my exacto to cut around the frame, prime, paint, clear coat, then remove the tape. You should tape off the backside as well to Prevent overspray. So pretty much what you do already it sounds like.

I have heard of a liquid mask that you brush on, then paint and peel it off afterwards. I have never used it before so no clue if it works. I have also seen people use elmers white glue as a mask. It does peel easily, but I have never used it myself as the tape method works great for me.

Good luck.

I just paint the bars by hand and then carefully glue them into place on the glass. If you are doing a storm raven, you can set the canopy pieces in and paint it as a whole and as long as you did not glue down the whole cockpit area you can put the glass in after it is all painted.

Unless you have unnaturally steady hands and an impossibly sharp tipped brush, masking is the only way to get really crisp lines on canopy frames (assuming the frame is molded into the glass, otherwise there's no issue painting by hand - just do it in two pieces, as suggested).

Liquid masks are an option, but since you'll still need to trim with a knife to get nice, sharp edges, the benefits over masking tape are debatable. The aviation modelling crowd has a few more options available to them (die cut masks/decal sets, etc.), but they still mask to paint.

Just paint then glue. Make sure to use PVA as superglue will fog up the transparent plastic.

Cant you just stick pva on the part you dont want to get paint on and then peel it off?

I got some tape the other day that is, I kid you not, perfect for this. It's similar to the blue painting tape but it's better at edging: it's by 3M (I think); here are some google results. I found the edge lock thing is the real deal.

Also good: Tamiya makes 1/8th" tape that goes semi-transparent when it's good and secure, but I have had some seepage with it before.

I don't think there is a better way of doing the frames than with tape and a knife.

The most widely used method is to mask the canopy with tape. Aero modellers dip it in Future Klear first to make a good surface. Let it dry well, obviously.

There are loads of tutorials on this on You Tube and the internet (blogs, etc.)

Masking works best when you spray paint.

I've painted canopy supports with or without masking. Mostly depending on how hard I though the masking job would be compared to painting without masking. For my Vendetta's I painted the canopy supports that weren't attached to the canopy separately before gluing them on. The bars going across the canopy were masked before painting.



On the other hand, the supports on the Dark Eldar canopies looked like they would be a pain to mask around so I just painted them without masking. I kept a separate wet brush with stiff bristles on standby to clean up any mistakes, or if that didn't work, a pointed q-tip with some rubbing alcohol. The paintjob was a lot easier than I thought it would be! Once I finished the supports I gave them several coats of brush on varnish for protection before sticking the canopies on the models.



I'll have to do a search on Future Klear, sounds promising.

You can use liquid mask rather than masking tape, or even silly putty.

Liquid mask, can be bought at artists shops and is cheap and makes a thin laytex like layer. You can paint it on, then paint whatever, once you've finished painting and it's all dry, grab some tweezers and peal it off. It gives a much better coverage than masking tape and it controllable when you paint it on.



It means you get a nice neat line, and no slipping with a sharp knife or biting into the canopy. I use it on tanks with an airbrush to do soft edge camo as well, so it is a medium you can use to do Tank Camo etc. Costs about £5 and is worth the investment.

I have even used it to protect area's on a model I have already done, ensuring than no slip of the brush would result in destroying what I have already done. Great stuff.

Orinoco wrote:Just paint then glue. Make sure to use PVA as superglue will fog up the transparent plastic.

Or buy "plasti-ZAP" - a superglue formulated for clear plastics.

Maskol is a liquid masking compound that is painted onto the surface you wish to protect. Rather commonly available in any decent hobby/model store (the wider hobby aspect - not the "GW hobby" (which is simply molesting your wallet).)

PVA will offer ZERO grab between the canopy and model - any bump can dislodge it (unless you sand and roughen both sides and then it just takes a bigger bump) - and then there's the minor niggle that PVA never becomes waterproof. GW only advocate PVA because they were sick of kids coming in and going "you told me to do this, now it's ruined. I want a new one!".

Polystyrene cement applied with a fine brush to the edges of the contact surface (on the model - do not apply it to the clear plastic) will attach it fine and secure and is how aircraft modellers have done it for the last 40 years.