Printed textures versus 3D textures

[roverdriver]

I am returning to model building after a long layoff doing other things. I was very pleased to discover downloadable paper materials, as the 'ready-made' seems to have got so expensive these days. Because I am endeavoring to model an actual location, none of the available kits are of use for me, but I will be using lots of brick papers. So far my experiments have shown that printing on 110 gsm cartridge paper works well. The cartridge paper glues onto the surface of picture-framer's mat board quite well and is quite effective.

 

Regarding the actual printing, for many years my wife and I have used what is called Continuous Ink Systems. We have found them very economical and generally they work well. A CIS has external reservoirs of ink with a ribbon of fine plastic tubes to take the ink to specially designed cartridges within the printer. When our last printer was showing signs of its likely demise, we discovered that both Epson and Canon are now making printers with an in-built system, similar to CIS. Naturally the printers are more expensive than the standard cartridge ones, but they really are cost effective. Our new machine is a Canon Pixma G3600. My wife prints off lots of photographs and the quality is very good. For the brick paper, I find that I get very good results by putting in the settings of 'matt photo paper' and 'best quality print', even though I am printing onto plain cartridge paper. It is worth experimenting with the computer's settings for your printer because they do create quite different effects.

[Marly51]

That’s very interesting roverdriver! I keep weighing up whether my printing needs can justify buying a more expensive printer with continuous ink system or whether to persevere with what I have. I am retired, after all, and my husband’s photography interest seems to have been superseded by painting in oils!

 

Marlyn

[Robin2]

I have an Epson L355 which has Ecotank ink tanks. As well as lasting a long time the genuine Epson ink is cheap.

 

...R

Edited July 11, 2018 by Robin2

[Dave John]

I have generated textures for buildings from photos taken by myself for things which are not commercially available. For the stairs shown below the white tiles, purple tiles and matchboard planking are all printed;

 

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/2091/entry-21069-looking-a-bit-more-like-a-stair-now/

 

I used an epson ET 2650 ( which uses liquid inks ) to print onto epson matte photo paper which is then sealed with Ghiant matte inkjet fix. So far ink useage is a lot cheaper than cartridges.

 

Since all the styrene layers are cut on the silhouette it is easy to generate and print out cutting templates for the printed textures. I find Glue and glaze good for sticking the printed to the styrene, it doesn't bond instantly and allows a bit of adjustment time. 

 

Hope that helps.

[monkeysarefun]

I've made quite a bit of use of the site https://www.textures.com/  

 

You register for free and you get 15 credits per day (essentially 15 free downloads). There is a vast library of images - doors, concrete, wooden siding, bricks, tiled floors  etc etc etc. Things like doors are easily resized in a graphics package, and the  surfaces like bricks can be tiled if you download the 'seamless' versions to create a sheet and again resized in a graphics package prior to printing. 

[Marly51]

I registered for textures.com a while ago, ‘monkeysarefun’. Just got to find some time to experiment now!

Edited July 13, 2018 by Marly51