Since we now have a sub-forum for painting and conversion I figured it would be a good idea to share some of our experiences with everyone else. My contribution will be a data base of acrylic paints. Now I ask for your help with this. I myself has experience with five ranges, which hardly cover them all. Any and all info is appreciated and will later be edited into the main article, though try to keep it objective. For instance, I myself despise Games Workshop and their business practices but I will do my best not to let that bias colour these articles.

Games Workshop Citadel Paints

Pros

• Easy to find, can be bought just about everywhere!
• Easy to use as they are specifically designed for beginners.
• The metallic paints are often considered to be amongst the best available.
• Sratch and bumb resistant, stands up quite well to the rigours of the battlefield.

Cons

• Expensive, about double the price to most other brands.
• Doesn’t seem to work very well with an airbrush.
• Usually quite thick, helps beginners but experts can find this annoying.
• Often has a rather glossy appearance.
• Perhaps not the best pot design.
• Designed specifically to promote GWs way of painting, GW would rather not that you know of anything outside of their little bubble.

Vallejo

Pros

• Well priced.
• Several large ranges with differing properties. If you can't find a colour here, chances are you will never find it.
• Good for use with an airbrush, even has specific ranges designed for airbrush use.
• Nice and precise dropper bottles (provided they are kept clean) that will never dry out.
• Usually gives a matte finish.
• Normally very nice and small pigments, the Air ranges on the other hand is just phenomenal!

Cons

• The paints has a tendency to separate when not used in a while.
• Is not very resistant to prolonged use, especially not the Model Colour range. Must be varnished if you intend to do more than just look at the model.

Army Painter

Pros

• Probably the cheapest brand out there!
• Beginner friendly.
• Has several spray primers in a multitude of colours to simplify basecoating.
• Many of the colours are very close or even a 100% match to their corresponding spray primer.

Cons

• The amount of colours is not very large and the available colours are fairly basic.
• *Need more experience with the range before more can be added*

Privateer Press P3

Pros

• Liquid pigments that just about never separates!
• High amount of pigments so coverage is usually quite good, even with yellow colours.
• Due to the high amount of pigments, the paint stays vivid even when heavily diluted.
• Works well with plain water as a thinner. Mediums are usually not needed.

Cons

• While not as hideously overpriced as the Citadel line, it is one of the more expensive ranges available.
• Many stores, especially in Europe, don't stock the range.
• Has little to no washes, mainly inks.

Coat D'arms

Pros

• Most of the advantages of GWs paints, without the cost!

Cons

• Seems to be hard to find outside of the UK.

Tamiya

Pros

• Comes in both matte and gloss versions.
• Well priced.
• Works well with airbrushing.
• Usually fairly easy to get a hold of, most model stores have the range.

Cons

• Alcohol based thinner
• Horrible pot design!
• Can be tricky to use with normal brushes

Foundry System Paints

Pros:

• Good thick well pigmented paints, most colours will go over a black undercoat without losing definition
• Large pots -almost twice the size of citadel pots
• The paints are made by the same factory who made citadel paints in the 80s when they were great
• Huge range of colours
• No shade mixing required

Cons:

• Slightly pricey
• Individual pots are available but you really need to buy the pallette of three tones which can bump up the price.
• Very limited pool of inks and washes (generally black and brown, thats about it)
• Metallic shades are not the greatest

Edit 150103: Added Privateer Press and Army Painter

Edit 150104: Fixed a lot of small spelling errors

Edit 150111: Added Tamiya and Coat D'arms

Edit 150116: Added Gadge's summary of Foundry System Paint

Games Workshop’s Citadel paint Range is a juggernaut in the miniature painting business. Chances are that if you ever held a paintbrush, you have used GW’s products. The impact and influence of GW cannot be overstated and the Citadel range has such a long and varied history that it needs to be told before anything else, starting with the pots.

The mk.1 and 2

The mk.1 was a round pot with a flip lid that sealed up the pot nice and tightly. The mk.2 was quite similar but shaped like a hexagon instead. I suspect that the mk.1 was an off the shelf pot while the mk.2 was specifically designed for GW. While the available colours varied quite a bit between the two marks, some were abandoned and others were added, the paint itself was usually quite easy to use. The seal of the lid is legendary, and I STILL have pots of these two types that can be used as if they were new. Also of note is that some other manufacturers use the mk.1 pot to this day. One word of caution however. I have disovered that the paint in some of these old pots can change its properties quite radically, especially how glossy they are. If you have some of these lying around, try the paint first before committing to using them.

Mk.3

An unmitigated failure. The mk.3 had a screw top (a pain in the butt to deal with) which made the paints dry out within weeks of opening them. If proper care was taken, mostly by making sure the threads for the lid was clean, and making sure the lid closed properly, the life of a pot could be extended several monts. However no matter what you did, they would dry to a solid unusable mass eventually. Even brand new unopened pots dried out! It also seems that when this bottle was introduced, GW changed a lot formulas and some colours were not the same as before. They also lowered the amount of paint in the bottle and raised the price.

Mk.4

These were hurridly introduced a few years after the mk.3 and it was back to a flip lid. It did a far better job of sealing the pot than the previous one but not even close to the mk.1 and 2. Paint in a Mk.4 would eventually dry out but it could take years before it did so. The lid was also made of a fairly hard plastic which was perhaps not made to the highest of standards but when opened it remained standing up by itself quite nicely. No major changes to the paints however, they seemed to remain fairly untouched though the low amount of paint and high price also remained.

Mk.5

Complete overhaul of the design, this time to mimic the shape of a ‘bolt’ from a ‘Boltgun’. Flip lid with a similar design (a softer plastic) to the mk.1 and 2 that provided a better seal than the mk.3 and 4. Still no major changes to the formulas, price or amount of paint. During the reign of the mk.5 two more parts of the range, Foundation paints and Citadel washes, was introduced. Foundation paints had more pigments and was extra opaque to provide better coverage (they also smelled quite badly), while the washes were just that, paints specifically formulated to be used as washes. Many people still swear that Badab Black and Devlan Mud are amongst the best inventions since sliced bread.

Mk.6 and mk.7

The lines start to blur here on when the marks end and/or begin. They are very similar however and seems to have been used simultaneously for some time. Mostly the same as the mk.5 i.e shaped like a ‘bolt’, some had a peg at the back to stop the lids from opening too much and some others had factory seals that had to be broken before they could be used. It was around this time that GW completely changed their paint range. While they added lots of new colours, they also changed almost all of the old ones, and also changed the names which led to some confusion, especially amongst older painters.

Vallejo is another big brand when it comes to miniature painting though they didn’t start out that way. At the beginning they seem to have been more focused at providing paints specifically for painting military vehicles. That is no longer true however, and they have several ranges that provide just about every possible colour that one could think of. Vallejo paints has a tendency to seperate so do beware that vigorous shaking is often needed before use.

Vallejo Model Colour

Abbreviated VMC , this is an extensive range with 218 colours, many of these colours seem to be focused to provide natural and earthy, browns, greens and greys to better cater to military model painters. Of course this is certainly not the only colours available and chances are you will find something that fits your purpose. They work well with an airbrush but are rather fragile. While this is most noticeable on metal and resin models, even plastic miniatures need to varnished properly to protect the paint.

Vallejo Panzer Aces

Never used it myself but it seems to be specifically designed for use with tanks, vehicles and uniforms from WW2

Vallejo Model Air

Designed for use with airbrushes, these colours has finer pigments than normal, but doesn’t seem to be quite as extensive as the Model Colour range, at least for now. Are generally quite thin but still works well with a normal brush. You might have to paint in several layers however.

Vallejo Game Colour

Was made to mimic the old Citadel Range in just about every possible way without stepping on any trademarks and/or patents. Even the names of the paints are similar, for instance Bestial Brown became Beasty Brown, Codex Grey became Cold Grey and so on. Is generally quite good for wargaming models, and have far better durability then the other ranges, though perhaps not as good as GW’s paints. Is often abbreviated as VGC.

Vallejo Game Air

A rather new range similar to Model Air but using the Game Colour range as the base instead. I have not tried this range yet so I know very little about it.

Army Painter

Army Painter is a range I don't have a lot of experience with, with the exception of their washes. I do know that is a cheap, albeit limited, range that primarily cater to people who want to paint large amounts of models in the shortest time possible. Despite the low price, this is no low quality product, and I find their primers and inks to be very good.

Ironically their inks are not inks at all but acrylic washes. The Dark Tone and Strong Tone inks are very close (some say identical) to GWs old Badab Black and Devlan Mud so check them out if you really miss those two washes.

The spray primers in particular are interesting as there are a lot of them in many different colours. Army Painter often brags that the paint bottles that corresponds to the colour of each primer matches by 100%. While this might be a slight exaggeration, it is still usually a very close match.

Privateer Press Formula P3

P3 is a range specifically designed for Warmachine and Hordes, very much like the Citadel range is designed for Warhammer, though to be fair Privateer doesn't quite seem to try to keep the painters as unaware of other lines as GW does. The perhaps biggest problem with P3 is that it can be hard to find outside of specialist stores and even then you might not find anything else but paintsets. Funnily enough P3 use a pot the same, or at the very least very similar, to the mark 1 GW pot.

The range is fairly small but will most certainly cover the basic needs of any painter. It is a very high quality product however and the paint has several noteworthy quirks. To start with, the paint has liquid pigments which means that it is very unusual to the see the paint separate, no matter what mediums you might mix into it, not even if you leave it unused for long periods of time.

The pigments are also quite fine and rich, which means you will get a smooth coverage, even over darker colours. For instance, bright yellow is one of the worst colours to paint due to the properties of the pigments. However P3's yellow is a bit easier to work with than most other brands. Another quirk of the paint is that it dries a bit slower than normal. This is supposedly to help with mixing and blending as well as reducing the need for retarders.

Coat D'arms

Coat D'arms is a paint range I have never used, and yet I have used it a lot. Sounds strange? Well it should until you know the history of this range. The thing is that this paint is basically the same as Games Workshop's old mark 1 range and they come in the same pots as the mark 1 as well. From what I've been told, a british company picked up these paints when GW switched to producing their Citadel line on their own.

Now the range has been expanded considerably since then but most of those old colours and shades that many painters learned to paint with during the late 80s and early 90s are intact. More importantly, you get GW style paint for far less money! However, it seems that this range isn't terribly common outside of the UK.

Tamiya Acrylics

While Tamiya have a fairly extensive range of acrylic colours, they have one peculiarity that sets them way apart from most other acylic paints. They contain alcohol as a thinner. Due to this strange choice, it is not as easy to mix Tamiya's acrylics with other acrylic paints and you potentially run the risk of having a somewhat flammable model . Joking aside, the Tamiya range is more suited to airbrushing than normal brush painting.

Another quirk is that most, if not all colours comes in two types, matte and gloss. I haven't tried any of the gloss versions, but I do know that the matte colours dry to a very matte finish. Of course this usually doesn't matter in the end as most models are varnished before used, but it can have an impact on your choice of colour.

The pot is possibly the worst part of Tamiya's paints. The pot is made of glass and it has a screw lid that, should you get paint on the threads (trust me it will happen sooner or later), it can more or less seal the pot shut. In some cases you might need tools to get them open!

What's wrong with testors? . Been using it for years. They make enamel as well which is what I prefer as it tends to stick better and doesn't come off with the masking ****. Also works good in an airbrush. Only drawback is cleanup

Nothing is wrong with Testors at least nothing I know of. And thats the point of this thread, if you feel comfortable adding your experience about that range then please do so.

Nice postings Mac.

This is so helpful. Good to know my GW paints are good paints!

Great thread.

Updated with Army Painter and P3.

Thanks very much for this thread.

Nice thread. Do you have any thought on Reaper paints? I used a set of their Master Series Paints (MSP) on my X-wing minis and thought they were really good, but very matte, and needed a varnish.

Gw paints though expensive are decent, but stay away from their brushes they are just garbage.

Tips bend quickly the bristles desperate and and refurbishing sees the bristles left behind on the model.

Use the paints but buy some decent brushes off eBay it's worth the money.

Foundry System Paints.

Foundry System is my personal preference for painting after almost 30 years of miniature painting.

Foundry use a novel (perhaps unique) system where each named colour (for example 'moss' which is light khaki) comes in three sequential shades as a pallete pack.

Moss A is the base coat or shade

Moss B is the the standard colour

Moss C is the highlight tone

Not only does this mean that you can consitantly paint armies or units quickly and always have the same colour gradiations but you can also sometimes use each seperate gradiation with a wash to have a figure with a very consitant 'feel' to it.

Pros:

Good thick well pigmented paints, most colours will go over a black undercoat without losing definition

Large pots -almost twice the size of citadel pots

The paints are made by the same factory who made citadel paints in the 80s when they were great

Huge range of colours

No shade mixing required

Cons:

Slightly pricey

Individual pots are available but you really need to buy the pallette of three tones which can bump up the price.

Very limited pool of inks and washes (generally black and brown, thats about it)

Metallic shades are not the greatest

You can find out more here:

http://www.wargamesfoundry.com/paints/foundry-painting-system/big-paint-list/

I also like Army painters shading varnishes. I use the medium and dark tones. Not tried them on an x wing mini but when I got sick of painting many many Orks I used it and the results were good for a quarter the work I usually did. I found that for more detailed minis a base colour and 1 highlight colour was sufficient and the varnish then shaded the mini beautifully.

I dont dip the minis but paint on using a brush and remove some with an empty brush if I put too much on. The medium tone works well with reds and browns and other warm colours the dark tone with metallics and blues. Using a brush means that I can use the correct varnish for the colour.

Only issue is that it dries gloss so a good matt varnish is then required to kill that.

Thanks Gadge, that's exactly the type of contributions I want to see! Now I remember a company named Andrea that makes a range with a similar approach, that is, sets of colours that corresponds to each other. However in this case the sets contain 6 colours. Never tried them myself, but I've heard that they are perhaps not the best for wargaming miniatures as they are extremely fragile and, if not varnished, can be rubbed off with just a finger.

Nice thread. Do you have any thought on Reaper paints? I used a set of their Master Series Paints (MSP) on my X-wing minis and thought they were really good, but very matte, and needed a varnish.

Oh, there are many brands I haven't tried and Reaper is one of them. From what I've heard Reaper's MSP should be quite good, at a similar level to Vallejo at the very least. Sadly, MSP seems to be more or less impossible to find in Europe.

Gw paints though expensive are decent, but stay away from their brushes they are just garbage.

Tips bend quickly the bristles desperate and and refurbishing sees the bristles left behind on the model.

Use the paints but buy some decent brushes off eBay it's worth the money.

I cannot agree more. The brushes are expensive and rubbish, like many things produced by GW these days. Now I personally have no true preference when it comes to brushes, just that it needs to be Kolinsky sable of at least decent quality. Best bang for the buck, at least for a beginner, would be Army Painter's brushes. They are far better than GW's, fairly easy to find, and while not as long lasting as I would have liked, quite decent for most painting, especially considering the price.

I also like Army painters shading varnishes. I use the medium and dark tones. Not tried them on an x wing mini but when I got sick of painting many many Orks I used it and the results were good for a quarter the work I usually did. I found that for more detailed minis a base colour and 1 highlight colour was sufficient and the varnish then shaded the mini beautifully.

I dont dip the minis but paint on using a brush and remove some with an empty brush if I put too much on. The medium tone works well with reds and browns and other warm colours the dark tone with metallics and blues. Using a brush means that I can use the correct varnish for the colour.

Only issue is that it dries gloss so a good matt varnish is then required to kill that.

The dips are what made Army Painter famous in the first place. Now the dips are intended for quick painting of huge armies, like Warhammer or similar scales, not tiny ships at 1/285 scale. That said, creative minds can most likely find a use for them anyway.

Updated with Tamiya and Coat D'arms

I recently used flat green from vmc and I've noticed that it is, like the post suggests, it is weak and looks like its gonna chip and rub away. What matte varnish should I use that I can brush with? Also, what advice should I follow when using it? Thanks.

Unfortunately I do not know which brush on varnish is better or worse than any other when it comes to durability but there has to be at least some difference. I've heard that Vallejo supposedly makes good varnish so you might want to start there. Personally I use spray can varnish. First a good coat of GW Purity Seal (Satin varnish) followed by another coat of Army Painter's Matte Varnish.

To minimise the problem of paint chipping and/or rubbing off, it is prudent to mount the model you are painting on something. This can be just about anything, lids from old bottles, corks, sticks, anything that is easy to hold and turn around. Below is an example of how I mounted an HWK when I repainted it.

Awesome thread, glad to see so many people using this as more or less a general hobby section amid all the great repaint posts too. I've been painting minis for 11 or 12 years, scale models for like 16, and Im still learning something every couple visits. Thanks for posting!

I can attest to the Reaper range. I use the MSP almost exclusively for the display-quality miniature painting I do. It's a little thicker than the Vallejo, but thins nicely. I just got an airbrush recently, and in general I find the thinness that it takes to go through an airbrush for small scale painting kind of hard to get right without watering it down to nothing. I've gotten decent results, but again, I'm just a beginner with the airbrush. The colours are well organised into "triads" that help you get the shade, midrange, and highlights for a tone really easily. There are lots of colours. They come in dropper bottles, which I like a lot more than the pots from GW. If you like shiny paint (I don't), these might not be for you....they are pleasingly matte. I use their online ordering; it's great. Comes quickly and the paint is fresher than what I can find on the shelves of my local game store, where they might have sat for years. I would say that the black and white of GW are brighter (and darker) than the corresponding Reaper versions, so I keep pots of GW handy for really dark blacks or bright whites. I often use the Gryphonne Sepia wash from GW as well; it's awesome.

Add this to your Comparison:

Citadel 12ml $4.55

Vallejo 17ml $2.50

Army Painter 18ml $2.50

P3 18ml $3.50

Coat of Arms 18ml $2.45

Tamiya 23ml $3.50

Reaper 18ml $3.30

Just to add Amount and Cost to your Great Guide