"Decal Info (Dom please read)" Topic

Decals seem to be a commonly discussed theme on these boards – who has what, can't find what I'm looking for, how to etc.

In searching for what I want, I often run into the same problems as everyone else and I'd like to know if there is a comprehensive writeup somewhere on how to print Dom like decals (I consider his some of the best I've used).

What I want to know is the details – what type of printer does he use, what are the specifications to get good results or what to look for in a new printer? What software does he use, again – what are the important settings – DPI, printing settings, etc. Lastly what paper does Dom use – it's quite thin, goes on great with some micro-sol product.

My general request is – if I want to print Dom like decals for stuff I can't already get from him, how do I do it? Hopefully Dom will be willing to spill his secrets, as really this is to fill the gaps for some stuff I need – mainly customer WWI symbols for specific pilots I'd like to do and I'd like to reiterate – I'll still buy most every decal I can from Dom – I just want to be able to fill in the holes of my specific needs and want to do it with a very high quality product.

Can you help us all out Dom?

Thanks in advance.

I hope you're willing to pay decent consultancy rates.

IIRC Dom uses a special type of printer, an Alps, that's no longer in production

There's an alpsdecal Yahoo Group at link

Discussion of techniques and tips for producing waterslide decals from the ALPS, Oki and Kodak ranges of printer.

If you want some "average joe" comments let me know and I'll share (ppost) my techniques. If you want professional comments then I'll defer to Dave, Dom, Don, etc. etc. etc. v/r Kevin

I've heard of ALPS printers, but I have to figure with the advancement of technology there has to be some good printers out there for printing decals? Heck my home inkjet prints photographs – if it's capable of that, you'd think I'd be able to print decals on it?

I know Dom mentioned in another thread (when discussing lozenge decals in 1/144) – that he'd have to buy a new laser printer to do it, I'm curious which one he or any of the other gentleman above would look at these days for this type work?

Bottom line is that for decals Alps is the biz, for one simple reason – it prints white. It doesn't matter how good your printer is, it prints with translucent inks, so when you print on clear decal paper, and stick it on a green aeroplane, you get a muddy brown mess…. To do better than Alps you need to step up to a proper screen printing set-up, with all the cost and mess associated with it. For lozenge I'd be printing on white paper, hence laser being suitable, but on white paper every decal needs cutting out perfectly, so for most things it's useless….

PS – Past thread on home-making decals; as you can see from the photo links, Kevin's pretty damned good at it for a self-proclaimed "average Joe"…. ;-)

TMP link

Here's the step-by-step process that I would go through if I really, really, really wanted to have some lozenge decals.

I would go to Bare Metal Foil and get some white decal paper for an ink jet printer. link It's compatible with micro sol & set…I've not had a problem with it.

I would use my three year old Hewlett Packard Ink Jet printer (the only printer I have).

I would get an aerosol can of Krylon Crystal Clear Gloss finish.

I would go into Microsoft Power Point and create the lozenge pattern (this would take me hours to do…that's why I would really have to need/want the lozenge pattern).

I would test print the pattern on regular white paper to see how it looked and I would go back and edit the .ppt file as needed until the test prints were coming out exactly as I wanted them.

I would then insert the white decal paper into the printer (making sure that the proper side would face the ink jets), set the printer on the highest quality, I would select "transfer" as the type of paper (that bit of info came on an instruction sheet provided with the decal paper), and I would hit "print".

Once the lozenge pattern decal sheet had printed I would let it dry and then coat it with the Krylon Crystal Clear.

I would let that dry and then cut out the shapes I wanted & apply them as a normal decal.

Here are some minis sporting decals that I've created using the technique above.

checker tail P-47 – Checker pattern made in Excel, printed with ink jet prnter on clear decal paper. picture

roundels & unit insignia on the side of the P-39 printed on white decal paper picture

shark mouth and 8-ball on the side of the P-39 printed on white decal paper picture

OK- so you need an Alps printer – I checked out the link above, lots of good info on that group – never knew it existed so thanks for that piece.

Once you have an Alps printer (just from what I've been able to gather reading online – the MD-5000 seems to be what everyone wants) – does it pretty much just come down to drawing our your decals in Illustrator, ensuring you have the right printer settings and printing?

I know I may sound like I don't know a lot on this front, but I really don't (absolute beginner would be a good description) – I've never even considered printing my own decals, but lately it's so frustrating to not be able to find what I want that I'm giving it serious consideration. Seems you can get a used printer for about $500 USD if you look around, not as expensive as I thought it would be.

Dom, you beat me at posting to my own post ;-) Thanks for compliment. kevin

Dom – I'd agree with you, he's damn good for an "average" Joe – more like an "expert" Joe to me.

It's not so much about lozenge, but about custom decals in general. I paint quite a bit, and am always looking for decals – can't tell you how many hours I've spent browsing the web of forums with the search string 1/72 decal or 1/144 decals in some fashion.

When it comes to drawing – is Illustrator the best bet? I'm fairly proficient in Photoshop, reaching into Illustrator shouldn't be a huge challenge for me.

No – Alps print quality is pretty terrible if you just put in a colour image and press print. To get decent results you need to print each colour as a separate layer, similar to "proper" offset printing, but usually with more passes – my nose art sheet is printed as 16 separate layers, for instance….

Then you have the fun of trying to get certain colours – light purples are impossible, deep yellows close to, grey out of the question, etc. (Hence lozenge being a no can do; I could get a vague approximation to it as a regular print, but the half-toning would be terrible, and the spot colours to do it properly don't exist….) Then we get onto the fun stuff; rebadging ribbons for other printers, the dreaded hair dryer trick (overheating the print head so it'll print ribbons not designed for it….) and suchlike. Yes the last one certainly does void the warranty, or would if you could get one still under warranty anyway…. Finally, Alps printers are inconsistent from one to another; I routinely print 2 colour "recipes" (the light blue on the French roundels is one) that other people can't get to come out on their machines, while I've come across a beautiful golden yellow shade another chap does that mine simply will not reproduce….

Seriously, if you're that mad keen on it, you might well find Alps what you're looking for, but be prepared to spend a *lot* of time getting results; they're not user-friendly machines, and have a very steep learning curve. I probably took 6 months to more or less master mine and get the kind of results that I'm happy with, but the limitations are still there even at the end of that. Oh, and consumables are a mare – a white ribbon lasts 11 US letter pages….

Dom, who loves his Alps, but wouldn't lightly recommend one….

Graphics package isn't terribly important; most people on the Alpsdecal group use Corel Draw, although I'm a Paint Shop Pro man myself….

Guys – I really appreciate all the info, it really will help me get my hands around what I want to do.

Another alternative I've considered is doing the artwork myself and having someone else print it the decals. Might be just as good an option, saves me the trouble of having to actually learn the printing side of it. I always tell people, you want to design a network, come to me – it's what I do professionally – you want your house painted really nicely go to someone who does that professionally (well, maybe a bad example – I've seem some pros that suck, but you get the idea).

Do the drawings myself and have someone else tackle the actual printing of them – I'll have to investigate that option as well.

Another alternative I've considered is doing the artwork myself and having someone else print it the decals. Might be just as good an option, saves me the trouble of having to actually learn the printing side of it.

Probably more viable; bear in mind that pretty much everyone who will custom print is an Alps user, so you're going to have a restricted palette available. Screen printers can do pretty much anything, but won't print a sheet of decals – most have a minimum run of 50 or more.

I'm coming up against this too. I have a nice set of decals drawn up for my 1/285 WW2 German stuff. I know Dom is bringing some out but there are a few more I need.

I've looked into getting somebody with an ALPS printer to do them for me and have contacted a company who does custom prints for the model railway lads. I'm waiting a response/quote.

I use CS3 professionally so its relatively easy for me to draw up designs as vector artwork.

I had a thought about the dreaded lozenge in 1/144 scale. Having looked into the technical aspects of ALPS I have a basic understanding of the limitations but wondered if I drew up lozenge camo and had them printed on a laser if I could then work out the best colour to paint the model to apply them to. Maybe not white but a light yellow or something may work.

Timmo –

I found a guy in the UK (not Dom) who might help me with my Jasta 5 decals. I've got a bunch of designs worked up in Photoshop CS2 – but I'm not an expert like you seem to be, so I'm not sure how well they're going to work. I'll let you know what headway I make on thhis – but it's rather slow going right now.

CS

This is the first time I've considered having custom decals done for me having really got into my planes.

I have been talking to a couple of companies one in UK who have given me an exact run-down of the artwork needed for ALPS.

As Dom explained ALPS requires separated artwork and a complex series of overprints to match to a colour which with normal litho printing on paper would come from just two plates or one if you used a PMS ink. ALPS needs four passes including a metallic to get even close to the warm yellow I want. ALPS is whole new print language to me and the colour range is ultimately limited which is why we'll never see lozenge fabric from an ALPS printer.

I've also made contact with a company overseas who seem to offer a very interesting service for model decals. I'm not sure of the technology they use ( I'm suspecting it must be screen printed) but having seen their work which is excellent I can't understand how they do it at the price. I think they may even be able to produce the lozenge fabric. The various versions can be drawn easily with reference. It won't be as cheap chips but it seems to be in the range of affordable/do able.

I would be very interested to hear how your Jasta 5 decals work out as its a favourite squadron of mine. I'm working in Illustrator rather than Photoshop as its vector based and is suitable for drawing letterforms and numbers.

I presume as long as you separate every colour onto a layer which can be done in either software package I think you should be ok but I guess the person you're talking to has advised you on set-up requirements.

I've drawn up the Red Hellhound for 9/JG26 and had to massively simplify it as its so small but nice to have on the model if it'll work. The decal people advise a 0.25mm letterform will print out ok so this should be alright.

MY BRAIN HURTS