Samurai helmet: Help with weathering

[TChiu]

Hi everyone.
I hope this the right place to post my question.
Ive just finished this samurai helmet and I would like to whether it's not so that it appears to be battle damage but just like it has been used and worn out a little bit. I am aware of some washes that people do to whether their helmets I'm curious as to what colors would be used as this is a black helmet and most washes that i have seen are black so i dont think it would do much . What could you recommend to make this look more like a genuine samurai helmet. Any help would be awesome! Thanks in advanced!

 

[Funky]

First off, great helmet!
as far as the weathering, this helmet is bare metal under the paint. Scratches, abrasions and raised edge rubs should reflect that.

 

[cheeser359]

Awesome job!
Do you have a build thread or instructions to share?

Agree that if it is metal, it would lookworn on the raised bits first.
If it is leather, I think it would just look a little dull after time.
Unless it was used a lot, then dull with shiny-er bits where the wear is..

 

[nogga_nootch]

Here's some shots of my dads real ones, may help give you some ideas, these are all edo period 17th - 19th century.

 

[Broilermaker]

Try brown shoe polish first, if it doesn't work use a wood stain

 

[Broilermaker]

I think alot of those helmets were not metal, but rather lacquered leather or multilayered paper even so the weathering would be different than a metal one which is why I recomended the way I did earlier