Prons:
If you have an X-Acto knife, then just press the tip to the plastic and rotate it like a screwdriver.
One low tech way that has very good results is to hold a pin with tweezers or plyers (with rubber handles) over a candle. Hold it over the flame for some time until it starts glowing red-hot (20-30 secs would do), and then apply it on the plastic.
As someone said before, you've got a lot of control with it. But be sure to make a couple of test "shots" before.
One word of advice:
1. Be careful not to overdo it. You will have a lot of trouble "undoing" the harm.
2. Take in count WHERE the shots are most probably going to come.
Why? because not all shots will enter the metal straight (in a square angle or 90 degrees). Some may come from a side, and you can do this nicely with the hot pin, puncturing the model from a side. For example, if it's a plane that has been on a dogfight and some bullets might have hit from somewhere behind, though not directly behind.
You should have a "trail" (a small one) before the actual hole of the bullet.
3. I've seen a couple of actual cars with bullet holes. I noticed that the bullets almost never enter the metal in a square angle.
Also, the holes are basically inward, which is what you might be trying to get with the hot pin. It shouldn't look like a crater, in which the walls next to the hole are raised.
4. For best results, apply paint weathering, depending on the amount of damage that should have happened.
That is:
a) if you're using the pin to do small bullet holes, and you want to make believe the bullets didn't hit anything too important, you could apply a metal color paint around the bullet, to simulate the paint chipping. It's just a small dab of paint, which you could do with a q-tip or something.
If the bullet struck the metal almost in a square angle, then it should be a somewhat round paint chip, with a black hole. To paint the black hole you can just use the same pin, with paint on it.
If the bullet struck the metal sideways, apply meta paint over the "trail" you scored with the hot pin on the plastic.
Make sure you paint the hole black, and try not to use silver for the metal, because it's too shiny. Use aluminum or steel instead, depending on what you're dealing with (aluminum is good for planes, steel for tanks and ships).
b) if you're going for a little bit of more serious bullet damage, the holes may be larger, and because you have damage, you will want either oil or smoke to have poured out of the hole. This means that after applying the metal paing to simulate the paint chip, you could paint black over the area. Preferrably use a dry-brush technique or if you're really going low tech, use a paper napkin with very little paint. This is very easy to mess up, and you'll have to repaint if you overdo it.
c) if you're going for some serious damage, like shells, not bullets, then the hole will be big. Two things you should mind (and this regards Ranger too):
- You are talking blasts here. Explosions! So, you will have a large hole, but it will be scorched. That is, most probably the surrounging area will be black because of either the blast itself of the ensuing fire or explosion.
You can have also shell blast that doesn't perforate the armor plating. I don't know how to explain this, but the shell blast would only make an indentation on the surface, and it may have a pattern ressembling fireworks when they explode: with "rays" or trails going out
- This is more complicated, but you may want NOT to have the hole to see through the model. You may want to have some inner detail of the damage, like bended metal and cables. So, this means that you have to do the damage BEFORE completely assembling the model, because you will have to add bits and pieces of warped plastic and tubes and cables INSIDE, and glue them from the inside.
If there's an internal explosion, then you would have to add sheets of plastic on the outside, curving out, and then some detail inside. You can find plastic in yogurt bottles or other containers you can buy at any supermarket. You get thin plastic to add detail to your models, AND you get to eat the yogurt, isn't this just great?
You can be creative in more ways.
For example, in star wars, rebel starfighters are all patched up. Because the rebels don't have a lot to spend in new spare parts, they end up using parts from other ships. This means that the plates on the ships are of different color. Some are painted, some are not, some are painted differently.
Also, rebels would just replace a metal plate that had been damaged, but not paint anything. So, you would have a blackened area in a ship around the damaged plate, with a notoriously newer (but not completely brand new) plate replacing the damaged one.
Hope this helps you!!
Regarding your Destroid, Ranger, it looks good, but I think it could look better with some black scorches instead of silver, because of all the explosions and fires. Good thing is you only have to dab it on top of what you already have done.
Good work, man!
