Using Hi Liter

[thecapgunkid]

Anybody got any suggestions on how to apply and use the hi liter product once carving is done?

Up to now all the gunbelts I have carved on I painted the background in the way they did in the 30's and 40's

Now I am bored and would like to try something different without streaking or clumsiness.

Thanks

The Capgun KId

[Suicide]

Anybody got any suggestions on how to apply and use the hi liter product once carving is done?

Up to now all the gunbelts I have carved on I painted the background in the way they did in the 30's and 40's

Now I am bored and would like to try something different without streaking or clumsiness.

I'm not an expert in there, but you can try resisting technique (search forum for these words).

Briefly: tool your belt, put either deluted or full strength super shene, satin shene or blockout in 1 or 2 coats for areas you'd like to keep ALMOST untouched by hilighter, give it to dry, then apply hilighter as prescribed (with removing excesses right after you put VERY libaral amount on belt and sponged it into cuts and curves). Finally put desired number of coats of the shene as usually you do.

Different finishes/resists (super shene, satin shene or blockout) and different number of layers of them gives you different final look as they allow different amount of dye penetrate into leather (roughly you can consider hilighter as a mixture of diluted dye + stain in one). Such 2 coats of supershene as resist let you have the original leather in coated area color almost untouched - if leather had natural color, it still natural, if you dyed it before by let say red - it still red, etc. Satin shene as it has much less acrylics lets hilighter a bit penetrate (read tone color) into leather and you can control this penetration by applying additional satin shene coats - more coats - less penetration.

So far to me it looks like 2 layers of full strength Super Shene or 3 full str layers of Satin Shene completely block any highlighter penetration in protected areas. Having less coats of dilute these finishes you can adjust final look of your item.

If I'm not sure , I always try on scrap making few cuts and stamps on it, then dividing scrap area in to sections and applying different resists + highlighter, then letting it dry and choosing the best combination to apply on my project.