Author Topic: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?  (Read 2605 times)

worktroll

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Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« on: 22 December 2019, 04:57:59 »
Saw a pot of this



at the local hobby store when I was stocking up on matt sealant, and decided to grab a pot.  It's meant to come out like this:



The only instruction words I could find on the internet were

Quote
Over an acrylic base, use a thin layer and let dry.

(I hate watching instructive youtube videos with a passion. My brain absorbs text more easily. Ears are for music. Like the Glen Miller on play right now.)

So I did a thin layer - like a layer of paint. An hour later - nothing. It's a nice brown, but no crackles. So I try a somewhat thicker layer - like white glue put down for adding flock. Then I go & try watching a youtube. Basically, you've got to layer it on thick to get big crackles, the layer I did had what looked like faint snake scales an hour later. Still, no problems, I can lay down a thicker layer on top.

Anyone else used this or similar products? Do you drybrush or otherwise colour it when dry? if I pinwashed orange into the cracks, would it look magmatic?

Advice, examples, bitches all welcome!
* No, FASA wasn't big on errata - ColBosch
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CranstonSnord

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #1 on: 22 December 2019, 10:49:54 »
I've used a similar product (Martha Stewart Crackle Paint, no longer available, in white, brown, and red-brown). I use a hobby knife or similar tool to trowel the stuff down, maybe 1/8" thick. One thing to note with thicker laydowns, as it dries and contracts bigger cracks will appear, sometimes all the way down to your base, so prepaint it in a useful color; In my photo, the white base has a layer of blue at the bottom, to work with icy shadows.

I usually let it dry overnight. After that, you can paint and drybrush it all you want. If you apply washes, be aware that the crackle will absorb water and soften up, then harden again as it dries. My jars of material are mostly dried out, but a little water and they're back in business.

The dried material can be a little crumbly, so try not to have it overhang the base, or anywhere else where it might get broken off. It takes sealer fine, but the underlying material is still weak.

NeonKnight

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #2 on: 22 December 2019, 12:21:41 »
AGENT #575, Vancouver Canada

Insaniac99

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #3 on: 23 December 2019, 12:42:02 »
Here's the basic for more severe cracks with those types of products:

Uneven drying is the key.  More goop, more cracks, uneven heating also means more cracks.

If you want big cracks, then you fill the IWM base with the stuff, then take a heat gun and dry the surface with it, then let it sit for 12-24 hours and there will be a lot of really nice cracks.

Daryk

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #4 on: 23 December 2019, 15:18:05 »
So you mean uneven heating in the vertical axis?  ???

Insaniac99

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #5 on: 23 December 2019, 15:24:26 »
So you mean uneven heating in the vertical axis?  ???

The top will naturally dry faster because it is exposed to air and all the heat is doing is evaporating the moisture in the "paint", if you want to focus the cracks more in one area than another you can focus one side (i.e. front, back, left or right) more, but the general technique is to just spray the top if you want random.

Daryk

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #6 on: 23 December 2019, 15:26:10 »
Cool, thanks for the clarification!  :thumbsup:

worktroll

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #7 on: 23 December 2019, 17:11:25 »
No picks yet, but progress. Basically I had been drying them in my mancave - ambient temp around 15C/60F - and found they crackled better when put out in the warm Australian summer sun (we're getting summer sun, but antarctic winds in Melbourne, hence the low temps under the house).

One mistake. I took CranstonSnord's advice, almost. Some of the minis had white base filler, so I painted a thin layer of crackle over them - figured this would provide a non-crackling dark base. Then when that was dry, applied the thick layer. Which pulled the thin layer completely off as it dried, showing white underneath. Some brown ink should suffice, and the remaining bases painted an earthy brown underneath.

Will see how a light drybrush works on the larger crackles.
* No, FASA wasn't big on errata - ColBosch
* The Housebook series is from the 80's and is the foundation of Btech, the 80's heart wrapped in heavy metal that beats to this day - Sigma
* To sum it up: FASAnomics: By Cthulhu, for Cthulhu - Moonsword
* Because Battletech is a conspiracy by Habsburg & Bourbon pretenders - MadCapellan
* The Hellbringer is cool, either way. It's not cool because it's bad, it's cool because it's bad with balls - Nightsky
* It was a glorious time for people who felt that we didn't have enough Marauder variants - HABeas2, re "Empires Aflame"

Asgo

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #8 on: 24 December 2019, 16:22:20 »
I can't speak on the product mentioned above but got nice effects out of citadels martian earth, probably a bit of the apothecary solution price wise compared to other hobby store products. ;)



as said before, in general the thickness is key, the thicker the bigger the cracks.
it's more shoveling the stuff on than painting. ;)

Nomad

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Re: Experiences with AK Crackle Effect?
« Reply #9 on: 26 December 2019, 14:05:12 »
I bought a pot of crackle paint by a company called “Ranger”. Supposedly it’s the best around. In my limited experience so far I’ve found that crackle needs to go on pretty thick (like Asgo points out). The stuff I use dries clear and can be washed and drybrushed. For desert effects I generally start with a smooth, flat surface. You can generate neat effects like dramatic ice shards rising from the ground by first painting your base with a gloss product (I used Liquitex gloss medium), and then applying the crackle layer. The crackle paint won’t adhere as readily to a gloss surface and will Rise and curl away from the surface. A wash of light gray after it dries creates a nice ice effect.
« Last Edit: 27 December 2019, 08:42:41 by Nomad »