Miniatures Paints and Brushes?

[Mark]

There seem to be a lot of miniatures threads right now but here is yet another related post. What types of miniatures paints and brushes do/have you used? Please, compare and contrast the various types as per your experience, and stories you might have heard online or in person.

Also, if I may, I recall several people suggesting the best way to strip old paint from second hand minis, or those you wish to do over. Can I get some advice on that again, please?

Thanks!

 

[Aeris Winterood]

Paints...

I use mainly Reaper paints and inks now. I have a few of the War Hammer paints but Reaper IMO are just as good and are priced better. DO NOT by the Ral Partha paints, I hate them, they just are not the best paints to use.

Also, go to Wal-Mart or a local craft store, Delta-Ceram coats are pretty decent paints. You get a HUGE bottle for half the price of a Reaper or War Hammer paint.

 

[rounser]

If you believe Games Workshop, the smallest brush you need is a 000. I think this is some sort of trick, because in my experience, to get the thin blacklining you see in White Dwarf requires a 10/0 or 20/0. My painting improved drastically with the right size brushes. I don't know why Games Workshop tries to fool painters like this.

I prefer synthetic to sable for the really small brushes because sable brushes lose their tip more quickly. I've read that synthetic brushes are more likely to leave brush marks than sable ones, but I don't really get this problem. For your bigger brushes (0s and up) sable is probably the way to go.

 

[Gizzard]

I have a big assortment of brushes, but a Windsor Newton #1 is my favorite. After several years, its clearly better than a lot of lesser brushes I bought. Just like everyone says, buy a really good brush and then take really good care of it.

Mini-wise, I have a lot of GW, Reaper and a couple Chainmail. Chainmail is doing interesting things; their main scupltor was ex-GW (I thought) and their quality is decent. I had to do more putty work on the Owlbear than I would like; so it looks like they might still be working on getting their casting process down. Reaper has a huge line, but I dont think their quality is quite up to GW standards. Its still very good though; I just did the Bugbear pair. While GW is the leader of the field, their prices are higher. I just finished a WHFB Ogre who was amazing in terms of detail and personality. (It probably helps that he's about twice as big as a regular 28mm mini. Hehe.)

For paints, I have Tamiya, Polly S and Citadel acrylics. Each color from each manufacturer seems to have its own personality, if I find something I like I just stick with it.

 

[Scarab]

Stay away from Citadel paints. They, to put it bluntly, suck -- at least the "new" paints in the round bottles with screw-on cap. I have some Citadel paints I bought two months ago that have the consistency of whipped cream -- I can turn the bottles upside down for five minutes and the paint won't move. And this after two bloody months?

Not to mention that the paint tends to stick to the grooves in the cap, gluing it to the bottle when you leave it for a few days causing you raw hands and several new, improvised swear words when you try to open them again.

As a contrast, I have bottles of their old paint in the hexagonal bottles I bought 1997 that's still fresh.

 

[rounser]

As a contrast, I have bottles of their old paint in the hexagonal bottles I bought 1997 that's still fresh.

I opened an even older bottle than that last week - still fine. I wonder if GW is building redundancy into their paints on purpose. Wouldn't put it past them. Hope it bites them in the proverbial if it's on purpose.

 

[Ziggy]

I have some Citadel paints I bought two months ago that have the consistency of whipped cream -- I can turn the bottles upside down for five minutes and the paint won't move. And this after two bloody months?

????? Just add a few drops of water and mix, it *is* waterbased after all.

Not to mention that the paint tends to stick to the grooves in the cap, gluing it to the bottle when you leave it for a few days causing you raw hands and several new, improvised swear words when you try to open them again.

This is a serious problem, but I have found that if you don't lug around on your paint (keep it horizontal), and try to keep the rim clean of paint this is not a big problem. YMMV..

.Ziggy

 

[madriel]

Stay away from Citadel paints. They, to put it bluntly, suck -- at least the "new" paints in the round bottles with screw-on cap. I have some Citadel paints I bought two months ago that have the consistency of whipped cream -- I can turn the bottles upside down for five minutes and the paint won't move.

That is surprising. I have some of their paints that came in the round flip-top lid style around 1992 and they are still fine (except for this gunmetal colour but adding a little water to it fix the problem you are describing). I have nothing but Citadel paints (all hex or old-style round bottles though) right now because the only other choices in town are Ral Partha and Armoury. Both of which have a terrible 'sandy' consistancy that is actually rough to the touch wet or dry. Blech.


As far as brushes go I don't favour any one type of brand but the synthetic sable does work better for me. the smallest brush I have is 0000 and I find I only use it for eyes. Everything else I use my 000 or 0 sized brushes. I also tend to have brushes seperated into metallic/non-metallic use. Metallic paints are very hard to clean out of your brushes completely and can pollute other paints quite easily. Having a few brushes (and sperate water jars) really helps keep those metallic flecks out of easily polluted colours like yellow or orange.

FYI: Holy Bovine was logged in as me again. Cut it out already, Jeff!

 

[Black Omega]

Most of my paints are GW and I'm pretty happy with the results, though I've heard nothing but good things about Reaper as well. For less gaming based paints, Aleene's is quite good, Americana less so, it's a little thin.

I use artificial sable flat brushes for dry brushing, but my standard, use for mosts things are 0 and a 10/0 red sable brushes. I cheat a little for eyes though and use .05 or .005 Micron pens. Much easier to control.

 

[maddman75]

I'm a fan of the sable hair. They do need replaced more often, but I think they put the paint on much smoother.

For paint, I just use the wal-mart craft paint mostly. For metallics, I have silver and gold testors enamel paint. That stuff is a lot harder to use, it tends to run, but I really like how the metals look.