How to Design Flames on Model Cars

One of the best things about building your own model car is all of the customization that you can do with it. Most model cars now come with a wide variety of rims, decals and other accessories. However, one of the best ways to customize your model cars is with your own personal paint job. Painting flames on your model car can transform a regular car into a work of art. When you are designing flames for your model car, it is best to design and paint each set of flames for a specific car model. This way you can take into account the unique aspects of the car. For the example in this article, you will learn how to design and paint flames on a model of a Nissan Skyline.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Painted model car Enamel model paint (red, orange, yellow, white) Turpentine Pencil

1. 
    

   Draw the flame design out on the hood of the model car. When designing flames on model cars, it's best to design each flame for the specific model car you are working on. Start your pencil line at the left base of the hood near the headlight. The basic shape of the flame design should resemble a triangle.

2. 
    

   Bring your pencil up the hood diagonally toward the top center of the hood. Dip the line in and out with sharp curves. Some of these curves that dip out should come to an angular point before curving back in. This will create the appearance of tongues of flame. Once you reach the top middle of the hood, continue down diagonally on the other side in the same manner. A larger picture of a flame design is provided for reference.

3. Paint the base color for the flames with red enamel paint. Keep your grip a little loose so that the flames can have a natural shape. Let the paint dry for an hour.

4. 
    

   Apply orange highlights to the flames. Do this by painting orange enamel inside the red. Be sure to leave plenty of red on the bottom and sides of the flames. Let the paint dry for an hour.

5. 
    

   Add yellow highlights with the same technique that you used for the orange. However, add even smaller highlights for the yellow. Make sure that the yellow stays inside the orange highlights.

6. 
    

   Add tiny spots of white to the yellow highlights at the highest concentrations points of yellow. Do this while the yellow paint is still wet so that you can blend the tiny spots of white in the yellow.

Tips & Warnings

• Don't paint directly from the bottle. Spread a small amount of paint on a plastic dish or paint tray. You can thin the paint slightly with a small amount of paint thinner or turpentine.
• Be sure to clean your brush with turpentine or paint thinner after you are done with each color. Enamel paint dries quickly and becomes very hard.

Resources

• How to Draw Pimped-out Cars.
• How to Draw Exotic Cars.
• How to Draw Police Cars.
• How to Paint Realistic Flames.