Paint schemes
I’ve been doodling some potential paint schemes in Photoshop.
Doesn’t quite show what the finished bike would look like, given all the rust and corrosion and dirt that’s now gone, but close enough. The sketchy taillight is more or less what the new one I got looks like; it’ll replace the original, which broke when I backed it into the garage wall. Well, it was chunky and square anyway.
I like the look of orange and white together. If the bike were a little older model, I could call it a “dreamsicle“…but I’m not sure that the color combination totally works here. It certainly wouldn’t look any good with the rust, and while most of it is gone, this is never going to be a show bike. Pure white is hard to deal with.
White wheels in particular are a real pain; I’d have to be constantly washing them or they’d just look dirty all the time. Black is better, but it does make the whole thing look a little heavy, since the tires are also jet-black. Not sure about the white spokes, but they’re gonna have to be protected somehow, since they’re steel. I also removed the polished metal slice on top of the tank…I thought about the actual process I’d need to use to mask it and make it work properly without peeling from fuel exposure, and it just seemed excessive. This still isn’t quite right, though.
John Player Special version? This is a very ’70s color scheme, but I don’t think it’s what I want. Same problem with the white wheels and chrome tank. If I paint the wheels another color, my choices are either gold (no thanks) or black, and there’s already too much black. Besides, painting motorcycles black is kinda overdone, I think. Why not go another direction?
Well, this is getting somewhere now. I always liked the cream color that you see on a lot of old vehicles…something that more or less went away with metallic paints, I think, but it still looks really nice when you pair it with something intense. Like candy-apple red. A bit too much red here, though, and the stripes on the tank make it too busy, though I like the top two-tone effect…
Ah, now that’s pretty. I think that’s a good balance of bright colors and subdued tones, and that sort of tan/cream is a great color for things that get dusty (wheels). Not sure about painting all the little side pieces, but it does look kind of neat that way. I can keep the spokes clean by clearcoating them with same high-impact stuff I’m using for the wheels. Yes, I think this is the combination I’m going to use!