What is the trick to acrylic paints?

[Callandor]

I have always tried to avoid using acrylic paints in the past because I have always had bad luck with them. They are either too thick and clump, or too thin and take multiple coats. Even using the multiple coat technique, it always comes out wavy and not nearly as smooth and even as enamels. Is there a trick to painting with acrylics that I don't know about?

[flyfort17]

What brand are you using?

[Kylwell]

And are you using a brush or airbrush?

[photoguy]

What are you thinnning it with? Acrylic does not mean Water Color! For some reason it took me a long time to learn that lesson.

Tamiya gets thinned with denatured alcohol; Createx has their Illustration Base; Liquitex sells an airbrush medium that works quite well with their acrylic INKS line. Buy good quality paints (Stay away from the 99 cent Apple Barrel) and thin them with the appropriate thinner, and you'll do just fine.

BTW: Createx's new line of AutoAir paint is really amazing stuff. Very fine pigments, metalics, color shifts, you name it. A few artist friends of mine have been experimenting with it, trying to see what you need to do to mess it up. When the water-based medium dries, the pigment shrinks down onto whatever surface you're painting on and holds tight. Dave tried making a paint puddle with his airbrush, and then threw some loose hair into it. Let it dry, and went to spray a clear coat over it... the hair blew off of the surface leaving no noticable mark or trace behind. Beautiful Stuff!

[macfrank]

Depending on the humidity and the paint, I thin acrylics with denatured alcohol (when the humidity is high) or generic, cheap windshield wiper fluid.

The windshield wiper fluid gives the smoothest, most consistent results. And it's cheaper even than denatured alcohol.

[Ziz]

It also depends what you're applying them to. I've had better luck with acrylics on vinyl figures than on styrene or resin. Surface oils, even something as simple as the natural oils on your fingertips from handling the model, on the various kinds of plastic will also affect how the paint adheres, regardless of acrylic, enamel, lacquer or whatever.

[Callandor]

I am using testor brand and brushing it on. I use it straight out of the bottle, but it seems to dry so fast that if I even think about rebrushing an area I painted 15 seconds earlier, it clumpss and leaves really bad brush strokes. I have tried thinning some oldder bottles with water in the past but the covereage was not very good. Do you guys thin it with blue tinted windshield washer fluid? Wouldn't that tint the paint or do they sell non-tinted fluid that I had never noticed before?

[tonyG2]

I thin with isopropyl alcohol but always undercoat with a can of matt white or grey acrylic auto primer.

[macfrank]

Do you guys thin it with blue tinted windshield washer fluid? Wouldn't that tint the paint or do they sell non-tinted fluid that I had never noticed before?

I use Testors Acryl acrylic paint for 60-705 of my models. I airbrush mostly, but small parts I hand paint.

The blue tint has no effect on the paint; I usually thin 1:1 paint to windshield wiper fluid for airbrushing. I've painted white (or light gray) and the tint just isn't visible.

Regular tap water is probably the worst thinner you can use, because it will affect the surface tension of the paint. If you have to us water, you need to add a tiny amount of soap to break the surface tension... or just get a bottle of windshield wiper fluid.

[TER-OR]

The Testors Acryl won't hand-brush as well as airbrush, or as well as the enamels. The enamel tends to bite into the previous layer, acrylic not quite as good.

[Lt. Z0mBe]

Also, strain, strain, strain!

http://www.ares-server.com/Ares/Ares.as ... t&ID=83119

I strain everything before I airbrush.

Mix colors, thin, strain, then airbrush. I don't care if I am shooting Tamiya or Sam's choice craft paints, I still strain the paints.

I hope this helps.

Kenny

[Antenociti]

this was from another forum and not all relevant but saves typing it out again:

"paint" = medium, pigment and binder:
pigment is the colour,
medium is the "glue"
binder ties the pigment to the medium.

Generally most artist 'acrylic mediums' are a binder-medium composite: a milky-white looking fluid that dries to a clear, flexible and tough finish. You can mix different types of medium together to vary the effect and you can also add "modifiers" to them. i.e. you can mix a gel medium with a liquid medium an impasto or iridescent medium. Some people call mediums "colourless paint" and it is a good way to think of it like that.... just bear in mind that not all mediums are the same and some can be physically textured or designed to bind to specific materials such as fabrics.


When you dilute paint with water you make it "weaker" as you are thinning down the amount of medium per ml of "paint". ( 1ml of paint = Xmedium per ml and X pigment per ml, thin with 1ml of water and you now get x/2 medium and x/2 pigment) However, If you dilute with a medium you increase the volume of paint but you dont lose any of its "sticky" properties i.e. you still have Xmedium per ml but x/2pigment per ml) Which means it will stick to the figure/model better than if you had diluted with water.

You can change your medium to change what your paint does - the most common are matte-mediums which (often) have silicates added to them so that they dry matte. Ultra-Matte-Mediums obviously dry even more matte and can change a gloss paint into a satin or even matte paint, and can produce ultra-matte finishes in standard or already matte paints.

You can then add Modifiers to your mediums - the most common are Ammonia, Matting agent, Retarder and Wetting (there others too).

Matting agent we've already talked about. Retarders slow down the rate at which your paint dries (liquid retarders being the best/easiest for us although artists use gel retarders a lot), "wetting" agents help the paint flow smoothly by reducing surface tension and help the pigment distribute itself evenly in the medium, Ammonia helps change the ph level; acrylic paint should ideally be between ph8 and 9 whereas water is ph7. the more water you add the more you shift the ph level and slowly, but steadily, affect how the paint acts. Adding tiny amounts of ammonia re-sets the ph level to where it needs to be (when you dilute with water) and helps maintian the way the paint acts.

(i'm going to blatantly steel somebody elses term of "juice" for these things as it helps distinguish them from other painting terms, but "juice" isnt a proper painting term really and call it whatever you like i actually just call my stuff "slow" and "smooth".)

I use 3 things: acrylic medium, liquid retarder and liquid "flow aid" (wetting agent) and I make 2 "juices" from these:

1)"smooth juice" - Ratios 1:1:8 1 part flow-aid, 1 part retarder, 8 parts medium
2) "slow juice" - Ratios 1:8:1 1 flow-aid, 8 parts retarder, 1 part medium

I make those up into 30ml dropper bottles and those are the only things i ever dilute paint with, as i use mostly vallejo paint with dropper bottles i can easily dilute by simply doing 1 part paint to one part "juice"... or a higher amount of 'juice' to

I use "smooth" for everything normal and then i use the "slow" if i want to do blending or keep paint liquid for a long time: combining slow and a wet palette you can keep a few drops of paint perfectly liquid for days and days (obviously depending on local humidity and temp - but in the uk quite literally days).

Specific "blending agents/mediums" are mediums plus retarder plus flow-aid that are simply pre-mixed for you, saving you having to measure stuff out for yourself.

You may see people talking aout a "glaze" - which is a very thin paint that is applied over the whole surface... which is different to a "wash" in that it doesn't (shouldn't) pool - to make a glaze you can just keep adding medium to your paint until it is "transparent" enough for you.... the medium keeps the very "thin" pigment spread throughout the liquid which allows you to subtly alter the tone of the underlying colour without getting patchy colour results.

and thats really about it...

you can get alternatives to some of the bits - you can use washing-up liquid as a wetting agent, also dishwasher rinse-aid - but you must be wary of any additional compounds in them that might produce weird results - to be totally sure, use a 'proper' retarder, but other than purity of the liquid and concentration, they do the same thing.

Matting agent you can make yourself from silica or even fench-chalk (aka talc) - adding talc to a varnish, f.ex~, can help it be extra-matte.. again though you need to experiment to get things "just so" and always run the risk of contamination and odd results, but french chalk and silicates are the traditional matting agents in most varnishes and mediums.

You may see the term "lean-medium" which is usually a medium thinned with water or even alcohol - isopropyl alcohol is very common, and very good, for thinning for airbrushing painting f.ex~. what a lean-medium does is produce more overall liquid bulk by adding the water (or alcohol)...whilst not thinning it so much that the paint no longer sticks to anything.


Don’t take any ratios for gospel, play with them and add water, alcohol or whatever you like really -there is no set way to do any painting stuff and its very common to see the same term used to describe something else - for me the biggest painting revolution consisted of 2 things: the above "theory" and W&N series 7 brushes. My paint now does what i want it to and goes where i want it to... which it never really used to do at all if I'm honest. :Smiley

I do an awful lot of airbrushing and large-area painting, both cases where thinning with water REALLY shows up the problems and where mediums are the only real solution for control - for much smaller areas and amounts of paint there is nothing wrong with using water at all, but the theory does still hold true - you just might not be able to actually see or feel any difference... although i think it is fair to say that most people do.

It is also well worth bearing in mind that many acrylic paints are DESIGNED to be thinned with water: so they are mixed bearing in mind that they will be thinned with water

the last line is one well worth bearing in mind, especially with the "thicker" acrylics which are, clearly, meant for thinning.

I use it straight out of the bottle, but it seems to dry so fast that if I even think about rebrushing an area I painted 15 seconds earlier, it clumpss and leaves really bad brush strokes.

Acrylics are designed to dry fast so you need a retarder to counter that - brush storkes are removed using a flow-aid, clumping is generally too much pigment to body, so add medium..... but can also sometimes occur due to a production error (and can be impossible to remedy even by adding new/extra medium: get a repalcment from the seller in that case)

I suggest you need "slow juice" - Ratios 1:8:1 1 flow-aid, 8 parts retarder, 1 part medium... bear in mind though that this will radically extend drying time - but you reduce the proportion of extender and increase medium to suit ( or hit it with some hot air to speed up drying time!)

Do you guys thin it with blue tinted windshield washer fluid?

People commonly suggest Windex and similar as a thinner for airbrushing - it contains iso~ alcohol which is a common thinner but also trace amounts of ammonia and other bits - generally this has little effect on the paint (if any) but it is possible to have detrimental effects in theory.

personally i wouldn't advise anything other than the liquitex liquids (fluidifiant, slo-dri etc) and mediums - they have great consitency and reliability and have no additives that "could" cause problems with acrylic.


most professional miniature figure painters will tell you that mastering the art of thinning acrylic paint is a huge part of becomming a good painter (or even a reasonable one).. and it's not always at all obvious where the problems might be.

[kitty]

I use only createx auto-air colors and base coats, and it's realy hard to mess it up.
As long as you use the auto-air reducer instead of alternatives you practicaly cannot make puddles, even if you want to
And the pearls and metalics have extremely fine pigments.
I like this line and it has all the colors i need and then some.

[Gouf]

Switch to tamiya. I use isopropyl (rubbing alcohol) for thinner. Also I found that Tamiya acrylic paint will bite into tamiya spray primer is allowed to cure (24 hours).

If you hand paint tamiya, it is self leveling.

JMHO

[Lord Darth Beavis]

I haven't had any problems with Apple Barrel, Delta Ceramcoat, or Aleene's, as far as clumping or streaking. Of course, YMMV...

[Cenebar]

I had the same problem with Testors. I switched to Vallejos (can buy them via mail-order) and for the same price, the Vallejos are vastly superior. The Vallejo eyedropper bottles allow for a shelf-life of several years compared to Testors which seemingly have a shelf life of a couple of years. Once opened and exposed to air, Testors paints just seem to dry in the bottle over time.

Tamiya acrylics also dry fast and skin off when you paint over them...at least in my experience.

I use water with blue-tint window cleaner to clean my brushes. The little ammonia in the window cleaner is what "eats" the paint so if you're using window cleaner to wash or thin, then yes, the ammonia's eating your paint. Use plain water or alcohol as fellow SSMers here stated.

The main issue with Vallejos is that they don't come in military FS-spec colors.

Also, acrylics are thinner than enamels. The best thing to do is paint one coat and let it dry for a few hours or overnight to allow it to develop a "shell." You'd be surprised how well acylics will cover if allowed to dry thoroughly.

I still spray-can my basecoats though, knowing that hand-painted acylics can't cover very well.

[Kylwell]

I had the same problem with Testors. I switched to Vallejos (can buy them via mail-order) and for the same price, the Vallejos are vastly superior. The Vallejo eyedropper bottles allow for a shelf-life of several years compared to Testors which seemingly have a shelf life of a couple of years. Once opened and exposed to air, Testors paints just seem to dry in the bottle over time.

Tamiya acrylics also dry fast and skin off when you paint over them...at least in my experience.

I use water with blue-tint window cleaner to clean my brushes. The little ammonia in the window cleaner is what "eats" the paint so if you're using window cleaner to wash or thin, then yes, the ammonia's eating your paint. Use plain water or alcohol as fellow SSMers here stated.

The main issue with Vallejos is that they don't come in military FS-spec colors.

Also, acrylics are thinner than enamels. The best thing to do is paint one coat and let it dry for a few hours or overnight to allow it to develop a "shell." You'd be surprised how well acylics will cover if allowed to dry thoroughly.

I still spray-can my basecoats though, knowing that hand-painted acylics can't cover very well.

Never had Tamiya's 'skin off' but then again I splurge on the Tamiya thinner.

Try Vallejo military colors.