Q & A

I started using my new Silhouette Cameo 5 Alpha the other day. My first job was creating Danish roundels for the 1/48 Scale Hawker Hunter I am working on. These are pretty small - around 9 mm (~1/4") - with the side ones being smaller at 7 mm. My first attempt was terrible - see the first picture. The following day I started doing a lot of testing, and the first culprit I found was the "Intelligent Path Technology". Turning that off definitely helped. Down below you see some of my new results. The new ones uses 1 or 2 passes, 5-6 for force, and blade depth of 2 to 3. All produce mostly similar results, with the nod going to 2 passes. Using Artool Ultra Mask. Also did a c…

For those of you wondering if it's really worth the bother to ditch the convenience of decals and paint your markings on, here's a model I built in 2008... In case you're curious, the decals were from Eagle Strike. The rest of the paint work is fine, other than being a little dusty. Kev

Hi there, Novice builder but like the idea of creating my own masks and I've just picked up a Silhouette Portrait 4 and learning how to use it From what I've read the oracal 810 or tamiya masking sheets seem to work best, I'm picking up the tamiya sheets but finding an economical source of 810 around Calgary or in Canada is tough. Amazon has 631 which is flexible but not transparent, and 813 which is transparent but more rigid seems the 810 is the goldie locks but I can't seem to find an economical source - best I can find is $35/10yd + $20 shipping ps - think the site is great, strange it's not more popular but I guess this…

Hello all, I am creating this post as I may need some guidance and help with a slight issue I am facing. I recently purchased at Cameo 5 to create paint masks for my builds using OraMask810, I have been doing quite a few test cuts to fine-tune the settings and I arrived at; Depth: 1 Force: 5 Speed: 1 Acceleration: 1 Passes: 1 No OVERCUT My issue is no matter how much I try to fine-tune the settings and get it dialled in I always seem to encounter my cuts not being totally accurate, such as my RAF 1/48 Roundals having a clear “step” showing the blade entry/exit point, and the smaller circles not being perfectly round. Also, my Luftwaffe Balkenkreuze even th…

Hey folks, I was wondering if anyone could help me transpose these markings into a mask for a 1/72nd Merlin. specifically the campo patterns, I'm guessing the easier bet would be to trace the extra dark gull grey bits and then continually test them out to see if I have the right scale/placement? ZH860 | Agusta-Westland Merlin HM.1 | United Kingdom - Royal Navy | Brian Matthews | JetPhotos ZH860 | Agusta-Westland Merlin HM.1 | United Kingdom - Royal Navy | Turnandslip Photography | JetPhotos

This problem is driving me insane. I've made my masks, cut with a Siser Juliet, with the blade as shallow as I can possibly make it while still making the cut through the vinyl. Now for the life of me I can't get the cut stencil to cleanly come off of the backing with the transfer tape. Here I have weeded out the background, and the pattern is sitting on the backing. The background material I pulled off separated just fine, after I carefully separated a corner with a knife blade. I have already laid down my white paint, and want to apply this marking as a mask, so that when I'm done painting the aircraft I just remove the tape revealing the pat…

Hey All, Having trouble finding Oramask 810 (or 810S) in the U.S. Apparently, Craft Cutter Supply no longer carries it. I can find it but only in 15 inch width which is too large for my Cameo 4. Are there any suitable alternatives for Oramask 810/810S? UPDATE: Found a U.S. reseller - H&H Sign Company.

I'm currently building a panther tank and trying to figure out if it's possible to make a re-usable mask with the silhouette cutter, something along the lines of the Quick Wheel accessory tool I'm toying with the idea of creating a similar mask with 2 or more right sized circles and increasing the cut force to cut the vinyl and it's backing to create a re-usable card like mask, rather than printing sets for each build Realize a 3d printer is probably better suited for this, but not looking to start down that path So thought I'd see what some of you may have done Cheers

Hi I tried my first mask today on a practice piece. Far from a disaster but the registartion is 'out' because I found it difficult to line up the mask when returning the central parts to the cross. I was using clear vinyl as a transfer medium but its not that clear, pretty grainy which made things difficult. The bleeding I can handle as I would normally seal edges with a clear varnish but didnt bother for a practice run. I used portrait 4, oramask 810. [url=https://postimg.cc/XrrVTBHW][img]https://i.postimg.cc/QdbHKpcF/IMG-5120.jpg[/img][/url] Many thanks in advance :)

I've been using some to be clear transfer medium (not oracal) that came with some masking vinyl that I bought on amazon but it's actually fairly grainy and glossy, as such difficult to see though to line up the mask any recommendations on transfer medium that works well? thanks

Hello, Beginning a journey to painting my rc body and have been doing some research on cutting my own vinyl masks. I have found a local supplier for 810s which seems to be more flexible than 810, to adhere to the inside of lexan rc bodies. Thinking of purchasing a Silhouette Portrait 4. The 810s is 3mm thick but the Silhouette Portrait 4 says it can only cut 2mm. Will this be ok?

Anyone come across a source for sheets of the material like Tamiya tape? Other than buying the small sheets from Tamiya and others? Eduard and others are selling masks made from the same or similar stuff.

Some of you will be aware of my 3D-printed BOMARC build happening on LSP. I'm at the point where I need to create some paint masks for its various markings, but have hit a bit of a wall with regard to creating the required US Air Force text. Creating the text itself was easy enough: just download the required Amarillo font and get the sizing close enough. The problem started when I tried to create the thin border that needs to go around most of the text. I used Silhouette Studio's 'offset' function to create the narrow border to produce what you see in the image below: The problem is that only the offset border gets cut! The internal lines are ign…

Good morning gents, John from Greece, (a.k.a zaxos345 as an LSP member) I found a real deal on a used cameo portrait 3 machine, here in Greece and i want your opinion...is it enough power for custom masks on vinyl??? You see its dimentions are perfect for my available room in my cave!!! Thanks, John

Hello to you all i have problems with the settings to cut this mask. Already have tried difrent setting but it whont work for me. The mask is comming off the paper when i cut other atemt it whas not deep enough Any sugestion i work with the cameo 4 Thanks MDB

Hey there, I have a Cameo 4. I've made some masks to, what I believe to be, the correct size for the lower wing balkenkreuz on a Fw190. The process I'm using is green goes down first, spray white, then put the blue mask over the top of that. I am having difficulty getting the outer border. To scale, the slits end up being 0.593mm wide. I have made them in the fashion one of the manufacturers sell them. The questions I am left with are: a) Is 0.593mm too much of an ask for the machine, or even my own placement ability? b) Is there a better process? For instance- black first, then white? c) Should I restrict the white t…

Has anyone used their Cameo to cut 0.032" styrene plastic sheet? I've seen where some folks have cut 0.010" sheet. I'll probably try using a manual blade set to depth 4.

Hi all, I am looking for some-one (located in Europe) who can make a simple mask for me. I am making a diorama of a Blacksmith shop and need to airbrush "Blacksmith and name" onto the building. anyone who is interested and we can discuss thew simple lay out and costs. Thanks for looking, Rob from Holland

Hi guys, The topic title says it all really. The reason I'm asking is the suitability for instrument glass. A guy called Gazzas is building the new Kotare 1/32nd scale Spitfire on LSP and has just completed his instrument panel. He's used clear resin and it looks good but the resin has set in a domed fashion, like a drop of water. My thoughts are whether it would be possible to pre-cut a range of circles out of clear masking material to use as the instrument glazing. What are the opinions of those in the know please? Cheers, Guy

So as the title says, basically... I have successfully traced a few old and yellowed decal sheets and made pretty decent masks out of them, but that was scanning and auto-tracing (or manual for the tricky bits). But I always have something to trace. Of course you can't really stick your canopy in the scanner and do it that way. (I guess you could do it once but it wouldn't be that useful...) Sooo then how do you guys (and the masking companies) do it?

Hi All! I've ordered some Oramask 810 and looking forward to playing with it with my Silhouette cutter. I'm curious about using transfer tape to move complex designs (Enterprise Aztec masks, anyone?) from backing paper onto a model. My understanding is that the 810 is pretty low-tack, and the only transfer tape I've used up til now has been pretty strong. I've no idea how that combo would work well together. Is there a better choice than the transfer tape I've been using with Oracal 651? Thanks in advance! Chris

I've tried Amazon and Craft Cutter Supply. Perhaps I'm not using the correct search terms but I thought "Kabuki tape" would at least bring up some results but nope, nothing more than Tamiya tape and the like. I have Oramask 810 but for some projects, I just want the Kabuki masks. I think they perform a bit better.

Hello to you all im tryng to make my own masks from decals. I have a sheet in 1/48 but i whant to enlarge it to 1/32 Do i just scan the origenal sheet enlarge 150 and go? But i have problems to get the outlining good I use the free software. Or is it beter to upgrade the software? Any sugestions are welcome Mark

Hi there Does anybody have an inkling of the type of font used for German WW2 aircraft as far as aircraft codes go? I was wondering if there is a specific (or close enough) font in the Silhouette Designer edition that can be used?

For instance, I have scanned the gear bay of the Eduard Mustang. I am in the process of making a mask set so I don't have to go through the process of a lot of masking this go around. How do I keep my base image from moving when I am drawing my cut lines?