peteski Posted December 13, 2020 Share Posted December 13, 2020 Well David, I'm not into race cars either, but this is not about the type of a model being built - its' about the craftsmanship. I'm not into a lot of stuff, but that doesn't mean I am not going to look at them or appreciate the work that goes into them. Mark is doing a lot of scratchbuilding, and his attention to literally the last bolt and nut is absolutely amazing. But since you are not interested in race cars, just forget about it. Whatever . . . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Plumcrazy Preston Posted December 13, 2020 Author Share Posted December 13, 2020 (edited) I wish I could find a static (or R/C) model kit of a Toyota Tundra TRD-Pro or even a Tacoma TRD-Pro as a basis for my plum paint. I want a double cab and a model shell to go on the back too. All stock looking tires and ride height. Complete with the TOYOTA front grille. I need a kitted scale Boston Whaler cuddy cabin boat on a trailer for the truck to "pull". Definitely not something kitted and off the shelf. I had to settle for an Atlantis Boeing 727-100 as 727-200 Advanced model kits don't exist. The 200 jetliner has a longer fuselage and rear side doors. I don't know what determines what specific model kits model kit commercial manufacturers offer. AMT makes the Kenworth W-925 kit I have. Did they have to pay PACCAR money to use that brand name? How can model kit makers read the market? How will they know what sells and what would be a flop? Would a 1:25 Boston Whaler fishing boat kit be a flop? Would a Tundra or Tacoma TRD-Pro kit be a flop? Edited December 13, 2020 by Plumcrazy Preston Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scale-Master Posted December 14, 2020 Share Posted December 14, 2020 (edited) Thank you for the kind words Pete! And David, FWIW, the Lola I'm building is not a race/competition car, it is a street car, (as explained in the thread)... In fact much of the engine is a copy of my daily driver. Edited December 14, 2020 by Scale-Master Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big John Posted February 3, 2021 Share Posted February 3, 2021 On 12/8/2020 at 2:44 PM, Dave Van said: As a decal manufacture for 40 years I will say decals will only be as good as the artwork AND the print can create. Artwork MUST be vector art and the printer must be able to print 600 dpi minimum. 'Home' decals can be as good or better than screen printed 'factory' decals in some ways. Screen decals need a screen for each color....13 colors 13 screens......each sheet will be costly. Digital print decals done right can have 3 colors or 100 colors....same cost to print. And at 800 dpi as fine a print as screened decals. What you showed looks like art that was not vector and a printer not up to very fine printing. I have 300 decals in my line and as of last month I have gone 100% digital print. The decal custom printers out there charge $10-20 a INCH so a 11 inch page of decals can cost $200. But they will be very nice. I do not do custom work but if you need info on those that do contact me. This is what they should look like...... Hi Guys, You may have already answered this but... What if I want to have a color blend or gradation printed, or photo of a calendar girl for the garage wall. I have illustrator and can place the image in with my other vector color blocks, will it work if I rasterize the image and save as an illustrator file or eps? I am also looking for a source for waterslide decals. One source I found won't print an image if it is a sponsor that I don't have permission from the corporate or rights holder, which I haven't been able to obtain let alone get a reply from. Thanks for the great info! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big John Posted February 4, 2021 Share Posted February 4, 2021 (edited) This is in particular is the decal I would like printed, the word Shell is a vector on a separate layer from the image. the image would be a rasterized profiled layer. this is for a restoration of an old We Mac Spirit of America. This is a pretty specific image I haven't found another like on the web. Edited February 5, 2021 by Big John Additional info Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteski Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Whether the source file is vector or raster, a printer itself is a raster-type of device (since it prints dots, just like pixels are on the screen or in a PNG file). Even vectors get converted to raster for printing within the printer driver, and raster is sent to the printer, it is just that vector format provides the sharpest possible image to the printer driver. But since this image consists of color gradients (the yellow shell), using a raster format at the same resolution as what the printer uses should yield good results. Just remember that those colors will be represented not by solid spot colors, but halftones (which are composed of small dots of the CYMK inks). While likely those dots will not be visible to the naked eye (if the printer's resolution is high enough), those dots will be likely visible in close-up photos. You might also have to play with the colors/contrast/saturation of the yellow shell for optimal results of the printout. That image to me looks like a a photo of a 3-dimensional logo that was photographed, then carefully masked. The shadows in the lower seem to indicate that. Those darker areas will also be visible in the printout. You could totally rasterize the logo. The vector version of the shell would then be up of multiple shapes of slightly different shades of yellow. Think of paint-by-numbers type of picture. Both Corel Draw and AI are capable of "auto tracing" (at least that is what Corel call is) which would trace the color variations into individual vector objects that in the end will approximate the shades in the raster image. But unless you are thinking of doing some additional cleanup, there won't be any advantage to doing that instead of sending high enough resolution raster version of the shell to the printer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big John Posted February 5, 2021 Share Posted February 5, 2021 Thanks for the info Pete. The thing with the Spirit of America shell logo on the 1:1 car is that it appears to be rendered as a 3d image. below photo. The graphic images I was able to find were all much more stylized versions. The only way I could get the correct look was to use a photo of a 3D sign and clean it up in photoshop and add the vector text layer. the above image is a bit misleading because it is a jpg at 4"x4 x 200 dpi. I always set up my print files at a minimum of 600 dpi so I don't think the resolution would be a problem. I may go back and take out the drop shadow per your suggestion, thanks. Thanks again for the valuable info. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteski Posted February 6, 2021 Share Posted February 6, 2021 Sounds like a plan John. Be sure to let us all know how the decal comes out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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