I'm trying to figure out the best way to paint the spiral pattern on the cannons for Luke Skywalker's X-Wing. I had no problem getting some detail color on the R2 unit, but I can't figure out a good method to apply the paint for the cannon. I tried freehanding it last night with very lightly diluted paint, but the results were not what I had hoped for.

Any ideas? I know there are people out there who have done a gorgeous job of this detail. How?

I freehanded with thick paint so that I only needed to go in one pass

Did the tops first.

Nice work!

After further consideration, I'm think I could just cut some high-quality masking tape and spiraled it around the barrel, then dry brush the blue over the masked area. I may try that tonight. I don' trust my freehanding that much yet.

It's certainly possible to do it freehand, but it's a tedious and irritating process. Masking might be the way to go though the masking tape needs to be very thin.

Here is my X-Wing painting progress.

I painted the laser cannons with a lighter base coat, masked the barrel with very thinly cut tape, then dry brushed blue over the masking. I'm fairly pleased with how it turned out.

This is my first repaint, so I'm taking it slow and trying to engage each element one at a time. Apologies for the poor quality image.

I think the stripe turned out really well.

- H8

After finishing the laser cannons, it didn't seem right to leave the base paint job. Progress on Red 5:

Very nice.

May I suggest a coat of ink over the white. It will seap into the gaps and make it 'pop' a little.

I can't see enough repainted Xwings. This is one is great!

Very nice.

May I suggest a coat of ink over the white. It will seap into the gaps and make it 'pop' a little.

I can't see enough repainted Xwings. This is one is great!

Thank you. I'm pretty encouraged by its progress so far.

If you can't see enough X-Wing repaints, you'll be happy to know I'm also working on Red 2. Unfortunately, it's not in a viewable state yet.

In the same vein as Conan suggested, a very light brushing of watered down black oil paint over the model will leave uneven black streaks, giving it a worn, battle-scarred look. If you want it to go extra light, just paint high-stress areas, like engines, or the nose. In combat the first thing to catch blast damage and re-entry burns is the nose, so that's a safe bet to give some burn effects.