Chalk washes

I am a big believer in simple techniques that result in superior results. If the technique can be undone if the results are poor, then it is the perfect technique for me....idiot proof. This technique uses chalk pastels.........NOT Oil pastels. The tools and ingredients needed are cheap and easy to find.

Warning!!! This chalk is the hard chalk like a teacher would use on the "chalkboard" in school....not a soft oil pastel that an artist would use to draw on paper.

This technique us done after decaling and can be done before or after the final clear coat. If you do it before the final clear coat, then the clear coat will seal the chalk powder to the model.

First you need to buy some chalk pastels.....NOT OIL pastels. These came in a variety of colours such as black, browns, greys and white and almost every colour in-between. You will also need an X-Acto knife, small container, old brush and dishwashing soap and a bit of water.

Begin by scraping some chalk powder from the side of the chalk pastel stick. You could also do this with a course grit sandpaper, but quite a bit of the chalk gets permanently stuck and wasted in the sand paper. Using the X-Acto knife produces no wasted chalk powder.

Carefully put this chalk powder into the small container.

Add a tiny amount of water and stir.

The chalk powder doesn't mix well with the water, so some dishwashing soap is needed to break the surface tension of the water. A few drops of dishwashing soap works well.

The dishwashing soap also acts as a "glue" to help the chalk powder stick to the model, so don't be shy about adding only one drop of soap....it's purpose is much more than just breaking the surface tension of the water.

Once the chalk is fully dissolved into the water/soap mixture it is time to "paint" this mixture onto the model. For the sake of making the pictures in this article nice and clear, I used black chalk for this article. In most situations, a careful checking of reference photos will revel the proper colour of chalk to use......shades of brown or grey would be the most common choices. It should also be possible to mix 2 or more colours to produce a custom colour, but this would be a very hard colour to match if you ever have to touch up an area with more of the chalk/soap/water mixture.

"Painting" the mixture is simple.... apply it anywhere you need to darken recessed detail....panel lines etc. You can apply it carelessly, because any mistakes can be completely removed and redone.

Before and after....the effect is quite good. Remember for this demo I used black wash so it would show well in these pictures...for a more subtle look, you could try tans, browns or greys.....experimentation is the key to this hobby. The chalk can always be cleaned completely off the model with warm water and a soft toothbrush......you might need to use a bit of dishwashing soap as well to remove the mixture.

Before	After

Final note: The Kleenex you used to wipe the excess chalk mixture off the plane will leave some lint particles. You must remove these lint particles before you do a final clear coat.

Disclaimer: This wash article was performed on a 1/48 Dragon Me 262 that was covered in primer. This wouldn't affect anything, but I figured you might want to know. :-)

The above photo is of the engines from my CF-18 Pod Racer here on ARC. The engines were painted with SNJ Bare Metal finish (darkened slightly with black enamel paint). Then the pastel chalk wash made with black chalk was applied liberally. Once the chalk wash dried I rubbed off the high spots with a dry Q-Tip cotton swab. The high spots were cleaned to the SNJ bare metal finish and the low spots were left black. I did the chalk wash on each engine in under 30 minutes (not counting the drying time of the chalk wash solution). Very quick and effective technique.

If you'd like to use this article in a monthly club newsletter etc....all I ask is you e-mail me for permission.

The same effect & technique (less the scrapping prep) can be simply done with a wash of "Tempra powder paint" - the same stuff your grade school teacher mixed up for you kindergarden 'art' class. Just mix a wash mixture (allot more H2O than powder).

If you wish an example of this, I refer you to my (ARC archives) articles on the Labrador & the Albatross. IMO, the Labrador turned out a bit better than the Albatross. It 'sticks' better to a flat finish, but using a drop of dishsoap to break the surface tension, allows one to work it to a gloss finish. I prefer flats anyways, then put it to the
desired finish with the use of clear.

You buy the powder in (454g)1lb. tins (does a lifetime!) in Blk, White & I assume the primary colours. However I find the blk & white, or a grey mix, cover 90%+ of all my needs. FYI, I paid $2.79Cdn for each tin, a few yrs ago (from a craft/teacher's supply store). The specific stuff I have is sold under the name "Funstuff Powder Tempra Paint" & made by Reeves &Poole Group, here in Toronto (buy Canadian, etc :-) ...).

In spite of sharing with the rest of the chapter (those zip-locks of the white tempra would look real good if pulled over...) I still have about 2/3 of each tin. Like your method, it's idiot proof (after all I mastered it on my first attempt!), but you don't always have to replenish thos pastel sticks & it saves the #11 blades for those other
things.. like 'surgery'....:) .

Like a home remedy being passed to subsequent generations, this 'originated' with Dave Askett. It was he who 'converted' our Club VP, Brian MacNamara & he then passed the 'word' onto me. Now I pass it onto the ARC readership..


A couple of examples of the results of this simple technique