Basics for Ghost Flames?

[Scott Gardner]

I'm still in the "practicing on spare panels" stage of my painting education, but wanted to know if I had all the supplies I need to practice some ghost flames. I have several different basecoat colours, as well as the overall clearcoat I've been practicing with. I understand that ghost flames are made with a tinted clearcoat, but I don't know how to make the tinted clear. Can I just mix one of my basecoats with some clearcoat? I'm not sure how much basecoat to use to tint the clear, or what to reduce it with to get it to the proper consistency, since the diluting agents seem to be different for base and clear coats.</cr>
Enough questions from the clueless newbie. Any hints?</cr>
Scott

 

[rex]

Heres a quick breakdown.There's 2stage bc/cc which is a base color of solid,metalic or pearl that gets cleared-the majority of what's on vehicles now.Then there's 3stage.You still lay down a base like 2stage,but there's another base on top of the first before the clear.This second base is what usually was done in the topcoat clear 30 years ago.It's basically a candy like candy apple red.Putting a little color or peal in clear lets you see through it to the color below it.Candy apple whatever was about 10-20% color in the clear,or use pearl.The amount depends on the base tint strength and the strength you want.Using it in base form keeps the thickness down,but you will lose some depth.Doing the second candy or pearl in topcoat clear can get thick enough to crack and fail early after you get pure clear over it.Looks beautiful but it's high maintenance and you can't just drive it around like normal transportation.

 

[Mitchb71]

use an intercoat clear or a base clear.... its the same thing. Its a base coat with no pigment. Its also used to cover graphics before clearing. You really really don't want to do ghost flames with top coat clear. You will end up having way way to much build, and possibly a mess when you topcoat clear over everything