Flyboys:
I'm painting my Japaness "Ida" silver with green sploches, do I paint the silver and green then put on my future for my decals or do I wate and add my green after I put on the future & decals, and how do I seal my decals without dulling my silver or turning my green camo. glossy?

Hi Whiterook

To some extent the answer depends on how the original aircraft was painted - i.e. was the green mottle applied over the Hinomarus and other marking?

If you don't have specific references, I'd say paint the green splotches and then apply a coat or two of Future to make a nice smooth bed for the decals.

As regards dulling the silver - Future doesn't really dull it that much but, to be honest, if the aircraft is heavily weathered you probably want a rather dull metal finish, so a final flat coat would be a good idea.

Hope this helps

Rowan

I have been debating this, with myself and came up with basically the same answer as Merlin. It will also depend, somewhat on how you weather your models. I've included a pic of my Thunderbolt P47N which is finished in Allclad II with 2 coats of Kleer (Future) over the decals. The yellow and olive green areas were masked and matt coated.

As you can see the Kleer doesn't dull the Allclad, this model also recieved a wash of dark grey, which had the, desired, effect of taking just enough of the shine off the NMF areas.
Mal

Thanks for posting the photo since seeing is believing. I have to try using Future on the next natural metal project. I was reluctant before I saw your very helpful photo.
Rocketeer

Hi Rocketeer, I debated wether or not to apply Kleer, wondering if it would alter the look of the Alclad. The reasons I did apply it though are, 1, to level off the decals and 2, to protect them while I masked off to apply the matt coat on the yellow and olive green. I was pleased to discover that it seem to have little or no effect on the alclad, but it doesn't stop the decals being pulled up by tape, so be careful, on that score.
Mal