weapon wear help?

FFQOTSA

hey guys,
im texturing my first ever weapon model, and i have no idea how i would go about adding wear and damage to my gun. If you guys can set me up with a link to a tut, or just some general tips when it comes to texturing, id appreciate it.
thanks

Fridock

Quick and cheap way to do it is to get a scratched metal texture ( for example from cgtextures) and overlay it onto your existing texture (using Multiply mode, not sure which one, just try all of them and see which does the best). Play with filters and erase some areas and you will have it.

FFQOTSA

i should say, i already tried the method mentioned above, and just using the paint brush. i guess its a case of i kind of know what to do, but dont know how do it/do it well.

EarthQuake

A. Decide what sort of look/effect/material you want. Rusty metal? Powder coated metal? Simple painted metal? Plastic? Rubber? What type of material is underneath? What level of wear, light from normal use, heavy wear, post apocalyptic?
B. Find reference similar to what you wish to achieve
C. Analyze reference, break down the various elements into different surface types, ie: rusted metal, greasy metal, clean gunmetal, chiped paint showing raw metal underneath. Analyze the diffuse, specular and gloss components of each of these material types
D. Build your materials in photshop, once you understand what your materials are made up of, and understand how the wear actually happens, creating the textures should be fairly straight forward. Experiment until you get it right.

If you fail, post your progress here and ask some more specific questions.