Great looking A-body at SEMA

Hmmm, You are the first person that I heard that disliked the blackout. Even on AAR and T/A cars?
I love the contrast, especially on yellow and B-5 blue cars.

That’s not what I said at all. I like the blackouts and hood treatments that the factory did. But that’s not the same as a two tone paint job. All the factory blackouts were matte too, which makes a big difference.

Even with this car it would look better if they’d kept or installed the vinyl top trim for the 3/4 style vinyl tops and used that to break the colors, there’d be that extra contrast and definition. But instead they just threw that line across the roof out in space- no body line to follow, no trim, no real rhyme or reason to its shape or placement. It doesn’t follow the factory trim line, or even really the shape of the over-the-roof stripe on some of the later cars. And since it’s gloss on gloss, it just becomes another two tone paint job with weird lines. Heck I don’t even see a pinstripe on there, but it’s hard to tell.

That’s were I think a lot of the “modern” look resto’s fail. They shave all the trim and you get an overly smooth look that doesn’t fit the original lines of the car. That’s why some of that trim was there, to highlight the body lines/shape. Same with the bumpers, it was part of the overall design to have that contrasting color there. New cars use different tricks to highlight features. Not saying you can’t make it work, just that you have to consider how removing or painting trim will change the overall lines and look of the car. In this case I think they missed it, especially on the roof.

But that’s just my opinion. I paint everything black, so, what do I know.