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i see talk of the nightmare of using permanent marker to preshade panel lines with. i bought an italeri 1/48 F-4E a while back and when i popped the top on it i realized it had raised panel lines. at this point in my modeling career, i don't feel confident/patient enough to sand and rescribe. during the construction process, i have had to sand off quite a bit of the raised detail due to poor fit. what if i drew the panel lines back with a fine point marker and let dry, then futured over the marker to seal it in a prevent bleed through. have any of you tried this?

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hi chris, i build houses for a living and oneday on a final walkthrough the customer pointed out a defect in the drywall finish. all i had to mark it with was a sharpie. well, about 12 coats of paint later, the mark was still bleeding through. after about 5 coats of kilz, she finally gave it up. i see on this forum where the same happens on models. what kind of paint did you use on the mig?

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Not long ago, Sir, I had occassion to ask staff at an art supply store about inks in general, including Sharpies. They told me the things are essentially dye in a volatile carrier, rather than an ink with its own solids in suspension. They soak into anything porous, and dissolve into just about anything liquid when on a non-porous surface, and dilute into paler tones as well in the latter case. I have on a couple of instances used them successfully as a final touch, to indicate black cane battens over wing ribs on early Morane monoplanes, but it is a nerve-wracking final step. I seal them with dilute clear acrylic gloss, using a very light touch, moving the brush only in one non-stop stroke along the line, and cleaning the brush after each stroke (otherwise, it does pick up the dye, and leaves a discoloration on either side of the line). After this application has thoroughly dried, a light brushing of semi-gloss clear over the whole surface has not disturbed the things.

Have you considered simply marking in the lines with a very finely sharpened No. 2 pencil? They will take very well on a matte surface, and seal easily with a matte coat on top. After that, they read like a black-grey from all angles, and will show through, but not bleed through, paint. I use pencils to indicate the ribs that show through the bottom of clear-doped linen wings on early machines, drawing them on before painting with linen color, and it works pretty well. The principle is at least similar to what you seem to be trying to do.

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I tried using a sharpie to pre-shade on my escort tiltrotor kit-bash. The grey overcoat seemed to cover well, until it dried and I had a purple-ish bleed through in many places. It's a hit or miss thing, though. Some places it covered really well, and in others it's much more pronounced.

I don't think I'll ever do that again.

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For pre-shading to be even remotely effective it needs to be subtle, and I think airbrushing is the only way to achieve that effect. With a Sharpie you'll end up with a grid of black hard-edge lines which, even if the paint did cover, would look quite unrealistic.

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You can replace sanded off raised panel lines by scribing an engraved panel line to join either end of the remaining raised line. Once the model is finished, painted and treated with a panel wash it takes a magnifying glass and at least a small amount anal retentiveness to notice the difference. From shelf viewing distance the differences are not distinguishable...at least in my type B personality's opinon.

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You know, instead of running all the risks of using a Sharpie, I'd suggest dry-brushing an appropriate "pre-shade" color to highlight the raised lines. Then just spray extremely thin (ghosted) coats of your top coat. After that you can lightly dry-brush the raised lines again; the effect should be subtle and quite effective.

There are just too many variables, too many things that can get FUBAR when using a permanent marker.

:salute:

Old Blind Dog

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