i was wondering if you could just prime your whole car paint the base color. paint graphics (by masking), then paint a clear coat on and be good to go?

if not how do you put graphics on a car that is already painted and has the clear coat on? do you have to take off the clear off the whole part to be painted on or just paint on top of the clear and clear over the whole car with graphics again??? if anyone knows where i could look this would help out a lot. thanks in advance