I see a lot of modification/paint threads but not a lot of talk about what materials you use.
Coming from WH40k, I'm still using my Citadel paints. That said, I've had a fair share of problems with them and was curious what others are using, specifically primers.
I've got a bunch of stormtroopers from IA I primed in Citadel's white primer that is largely ruined due to orange peeling across the entire model. Might have been a humidty issue but I live in Florida and can't spray anywhere inside (kids) other than the garage.
Thoughts, products, etc?
Merry Happy Holidays Christmas New Year!
What paints do you use?
I'm technically a "Professional" Painter.
I primarily use Games Workshop Paints. I have the odd Vallejo for colours and Tints that don't exist in the GW range.
But I'm also a very Old school Painter / Wargamer, with close to 25 odd years of experience. If I get a GW paint I'm not happy with, I know how to either fix it, or head into town to get a replacement.
- "Orange Peeling" of Primer/Paint on a Model is, 90% of the time, due to an unprepared surface. Humidity generally has more of an effect on how the paint looks on the surface (dusty vs powdery vs runny)... Whereas the paints adherance to the surface is based on the surface.
In an Ideal World, ALL models would be appropriately washed and cleaned before Priming .
Doesn't matter if they're made of Plastic, Resin, Metal, or almost anything else... At the VERY least, you're cleaning off the finger oils from handling. Because even THAT can have a difference in how things adhere.
Ive even had situations where I've finger-transferred mold release agent unknowningly from a Metal Model I freshly handled, to a Plastic one.
I tend to wash and scrub everything then use a minitaire base coat as a primer. But because it's airbrush applied, it seems to be surprisingly effective without the usual spraycan primer that irritate me so much. I double and sometimes triple varnish everything so in 5 years I've never had an issue with paint chips where as I did before, primer or not.
As for individual paints, I moved from GW over to Minitaire, Vallejo, and Reaper for primary acrylics. Minitaire blends and thins nicer, Vallejo tends to be a bit more vivid, but Citadel is pretty nice to work with honestly. Citadel washes are still one of my favourite things to use as a targeted shadow, while Minitaire Ghost Tints and some candy coats work with whole-model filters. But I also use a few other things: P3 armour wash mixed with black for some glossy canopies, and it's fantastic for black lining models, and Windsor and Newton water-solutable oil paints for effects. The effects that it gets are incredible, and when mixed with a high pigment Reaper wash (flesh wash for me) creates some effective rust stain effects. GW, well, I use some of their older inks and guard them as they're long out of production.
Tamiya acrylic
I'm technically a "Professional" Painter.
I primarily use Games Workshop Paints. I have the odd Vallejo for colours and Tints that don't exist in the GW range.
But I'm also a very Old school Painter / Wargamer, with close to 25 odd years of experience. If I get a GW paint I'm not happy with, I know how to either fix it, or head into town to get a replacement.
- "Orange Peeling" of Primer/Paint on a Model is, 90% of the time, due to an unprepared surface. Humidity generally has more of an effect on how the paint looks on the surface (dusty vs powdery vs runny)... Whereas the paints adherance to the surface is based on the surface.
In an Ideal World, ALL models would be appropriately washed and cleaned before Priming .
Doesn't matter if they're made of Plastic, Resin, Metal, or almost anything else... At the VERY least, you're cleaning off the finger oils from handling. Because even THAT can have a difference in how things adhere.
Ive even had situations where I've finger-transferred mold release agent unknowningly from a Metal Model I freshly handled, to a Plastic one.
I thought the same thing but I also go back a good long ways and always prime a spur with a couple drops of Dawn + warm water in a cooking pan. I scrub lightly with a soft toothbrush, then rinse and let air dry. No idea what caused it unless it was bad paint. If it weren't for bad luck, I wouldn't believe in the construct.
I mean, it could be.
The other point is that - especially in Humidity - a Prime, especially a Rattlecan prime - is a dusting of the model... If you're changing the models colour dramatically, you're using too much primer .
I mean, I live in Calgary Now. There is 0 humidity here.
But I come from Melbourne, where we can have positively Floridine-esque Humidities during Summer. So I know what you're dealing with...
I consider humidity a boon to painting... It makes the initial application of a prime from a rattlecan take longer, but you're using less to compensate.
Then applying a base coat, either through an Airbrush, or, if you're like me, by hand...
It is possible you got a bad batch of paint - but paint is made so ubiquitously, especially in rattlecans, that 'bad batches' are stupidly rare.
It is possible you got a bad batch of paint - but paint is made so ubiquitously, especially in rattlecans, that 'bad batches' are stupidly rare.
If it were not for bad luck, I would not subscribe to the belief xD
A few GW pots (washes, celestra grey), and a bunch of vallejo model and game colours. Some artists inks as well for variety in 'washes', have turqoise, purple, burnt umber, etc.
I use almost exclusively Minitaire's airbrush line with GW washes.
Boy i should really paint more often (or at least get back to taking photos!)
I like GW for metallics, vallejo for primers, basecoats, and details, testors camoflage gray for star wars imp gray accuracy, tamiya acrylics for rebel hodgepodge grays, and FW artist inks for tints, washes, and filters. Oh, and a very cheap watercolor pencil to go with my windsor newton watercolors for weathering!
but if i were to narrow it down to just my necessities, it would be testors camoflage gray, vallejo gray primer, fw black ink, and some golden matte medium. Add that cheapo watercolor pencil for good meassure!
That sounds very odd, the orange peeling that is. Im somewhat new at the "serious" side of miniature painting so temper my advice. However, my learning curve of late has been near vertical thanks to Vykes, Dras, et.al.
It's caustic so minimize contact and keep away from kids but it's safe enough for the plastic. I accidentally left some Gozantis in for ~3 days with no ill effect.
For primer, I use Testors but I think I'm going to try Tamiya when I run out. It's all rattlecans for me since I don't airbrush. With some of the squadrons, a Raider and the flotillas, I have skipped priming and went straight to base colors. So far, no issues.
I have a hodgepodge of paints; Vallejo primarily but have recently discovered MSP (Reaper minis), and a few GW. They are all great but I'd like GW better if they were priced better, came in a dropper bottle instead of a pot and had names that made a bit more "conventional" sense. I've also dabbled with "hobby store" acrylics that come in "huge" dropper bottles but use those primarily for engine glow, weapons, and windows because of their neon coloring. They tend to be lacking in pigment compared to the mini specific paints so it requires several coats to get what you want.
Let us know what you figured out (if anything) regarding the orange peeling issue.
Let us know what you figured out (if anything) regarding the orange peeling issue.
It actually led me to stop considering IA (other than cardboard tokens for units in the core set) and they have remained in the starter box. They were just my last attempt at miniature painting. I'm regearing to repaint most of my fleet because FFG's mix-matched greys are making my OCD (and inner Imperial) bat crap crazy.
Theres a bit of a losing paint/lack of adhesion issue with my Vallejo model colour black-grey. Always seems to lose corners / wear very easily / adhere poorly. Shame I like how matte it is otherwise, can just be a pain used as a major colour. Tried different paints?
The primer I tend to use are the vallejo surface primer (nice big bottles). Believe it is supposed to be for air brushes, but that just means it is nice and thin as I brush it on. Haven't had an issue... yet.
Citadel paints. Every time i try to go away from them i end up coming back. Since i dont shoot for showmanship quality i generally dont need to mix paints together, so Citadel having all the shades under the sun helps me not need to do it at all.
I just go to my local Dollarama and spend a $1.50 for basic acrylics. Nothing fancy at all.
Humbrol enamels. My Dad's before he passed away. I am carrying on the tradition of mediocre model painting with poor quality gear
Humbrol enamels
"From a more Civilised Time." Indeed.
Bought a pack of 24 acrylic paints for $10 at Michaels and mix them to get the color I want.
I have a couple of "michaels" acrylics that I do use...
But again, in my long career, I have found that a majority of "I find painting really hard" and "I suck at this" and "I can never be as good as you" complaints are solved by a proper miniature paint.
Essentially, the main difference between a basic acrylic and a Miniature acrylic, is pigment size and density.
Crash course for anyone who doesn't know:
Essentially, paint is two things... Its a Medium whose entire job is to make things liquid, and then evaporate... And Pigment which are the actual little chunks of colour.
And they are just that. Chunks.
They are suspended in the medium, so when you slater it on, and the medium evaporates, the pigment remains, giving you the colour...
The difference bwetween a Basic Acrylic and a Hobby/Miniature Acrylic, is how much care is put towards the pigment itself.
Basic acrylics have big, disorganised, clumpy, chunky pieces of pigment. Simply because its cheaper. Either the pigment itself is not ground enough, or its still wet when its ground so it joins - whatever... Essentially, you have these big pieces all free-floating in the acrylic medium, so when it evaporates, you get little clumps and chunks of pigment on your target area.
Now, I say they are big, but theyre still tiny - but what you end up with a colour that is inconsistent, transparent and often, difficult to control....
In Miniature paints, you get two things... In 90% of them, you get a much, much finer pigment. This pigment doesn't clump anywhere near as much... This means that the colour is smoother and easier to apply...
The second you get in miniature paints, is a higher pigment density in PPM... This is even more apparent in high-density lines such as Games Workshop "Base" paint categories, which have 3x the base pigment of even their layer paints...
This means you can have a much lesser amount of paint cover a much greater area, and still be very opaque ...
Now, I don't want to say "you'll paint better with a model acrylic than you will a basic acrylic".... Its not the case at all. its more along the lines of "If you learn to drive a stick-shift Manual Car, when you finally get that Automatic Transmission, you'll find things so much easier..."
In the very least, if you want to make a basic acrylic better for model work (as its not designed for tiny surfaces, its designed to be fairly thick and applied to canvas, after all).... Then strain it through an old set of pantyhose... This will trap the largest clumps of pigment - very much like sifting flour to make sure you just have the powder...
But if you're having success with Basic acrylics - awesome. Fantastic. I'm glad to hear it.
But you'll find Hobby acrylics an actual dream when you step up to them.
The unfortunate part of it, is of course, the cost... But you are getting what you pay for. In most cases, its 3-10x the pigment density, and a vast reduction in pigment size and clumping.
Theres a bit of a losing paint/lack of adhesion issue with my Vallejo model colour black-grey. Always seems to lose corners / wear very easily / adhere poorly. Shame I like how matte it is otherwise, can just be a pain used as a major colour. Tried different paints?
The primer I tend to use are the vallejo surface primer (nice big bottles). Believe it is supposed to be for air brushes, but that just means it is nice and thin as I brush it on. Haven't had an issue... yet.
IMO, Vallejo is great in terms of behavior and opacity, terrible at durability: topcoat using Testor's dullcoat (or better yet, future floor polish, then dullcoat) and this will ameliorate the issue.
Theres a bit of a losing paint/lack of adhesion issue with my Vallejo model colour black-grey. Always seems to lose corners / wear very easily / adhere poorly. Shame I like how matte it is otherwise, can just be a pain used as a major colour. Tried different paints?
The primer I tend to use are the vallejo surface primer (nice big bottles). Believe it is supposed to be for air brushes, but that just means it is nice and thin as I brush it on. Haven't had an issue... yet.
IMO, Vallejo is great in terms of behavior and opacity, terrible at durability: topcoat using Testor's dullcoat (or better yet, future floor polish, then dullcoat) and this will ameliorate the issue.
Fortunately I've found it to be a non-issue when varnished with the 'satin' varnish (matte was sold out, but I've never found it to be an issue). Aerosol and Canada don't mix 1/2 the year unfortunately, so everything I do is brush on. It is either monstrously humid in the summer, or below zero. I cannot really win.
"Monstrously Humid" and "Canada"...
I am in Calgary, and Giggling uncontrollably right now... But that could be the 6 hours of sleep I've gotten this week...
But seriously - coming from Temperate-Humid Melbourne to Calgary, I can understand the spraying concerns..
Most Rattlecans want between 15 and 25, and no humidity above 60 (or below 30).
But there are many ways to adapt... In some ways, its adapting spray length, spray distance, overspray duration, etc...
Again, I am sure Vykes can add some meaning to what to do when its freezing cold but not humid (living near E-Cloud City north of me), and with me being here in Hothgary, we can come up with some solutions.
Edited by Drasnighta"Monstrously Humid" and "Canada"...
I am in Calgary, and Giggling uncontrollably right now... But that could be the 6 hours of sleep I've gotten this week...
But seriously - coming from Temperate-Humid Melbourne to Calgary, I can understand the spraying concerns..
Most Rattlecans want between 15 and 25, and no humidity above 60 (or below 30).
But there are many ways to adapt... In some ways, its adapting spray length, spray distance, overspray duration, etc...
Again, I am sure Vykes can add some meaning to what to do when its freezing cold but not humid (living near E-Cloud City north of me), and with me being here in Hothgary, we can come up with some solutions.
Grew up in Northern Ontario, live in the capital of the world now. (Toronto) We don't really get winter here, but the dry air makes painting a pain, even in the relatively high winter humidity and mild winters southern Ontario gets. Not nearly so temperate as my time in Northern BC (south of 60, 100km from the boast, +25- -10 was about the general span for the ream). In the summer we are usually 80-100% humidity, ambient temperatures over 30, occasionally hitting 40. Never below 25. Winter -10 or so I'd say is pretty normal, occasionally -20 (still nice weather in other words). Cure takes a very long time in either weather, but I feel winter is preferable.
Alberta isn't really part of Canada though, more like 'Murica junior
.
What you're telling me, though, is that you have
plenty
of windows of opportunity to paint, and spray. They're just quick windows that you need to plan to hit, to get things done.
I'll be the ball buster...
Ultra Fine Sharpies.
Actually I've found a ton of utility in not only Nuln Oil, but also aerosol flat white/black/matte clearcoat. Oh and a ultra fine paint marker.
You paint people are awesome. I'm just not committed to anything past Armada squads so buying in to paints is...overkill. But I respect the work.