ThePandaDirector Posted February 5, 2014 Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 I'm trying to get back to painting, but one thing that always gets me is mixing paints. It's the thing that ruins my pace and causes me to lose my patience, and I find myself wasting paint just to get the right ratio. So I thought of a rather ambitious way to get around the issue. I'd buy a ton of empty paint pots, then take a pair of colours and mix them across a number of pots, doing this for every major blend I plan to use. It'd be easy enough to organise them, but a fair bit of work nevertheless. The problem I have is trying to work out A) how many pots I'd need for a smooth blend (I can be a lot more patient if I don't have to mix), and the best way to measure out the paint (along with added water). Oh, and I guess any tips on the best paint/paint pots to use, I'm still undecided on that. Advice appreciated =] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MunkyMuddFace Posted February 5, 2014 Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 This is an excellent (and ambitious) idea, and the Reaper paints immediately come to mind for a couple reasons. 1. Reaper uses paint pots that have the eye dropper type tops. So when you are making custom colors, you can count the number of drops you use for each color. 2. Reaper has Color Triads (or something like that) - sets of three colors of paints. One for the base, one slightly darker for shadow, and one slightly lighter for the highlights. These could make great baselines for making your custom colors. Sorry, no help on quantity.. As an aside, I tried making my own custom colors once, and it turned out to be a huge failure. I bought a set of empty paint pots. Mixed up my first color in the new pot, and thought I was good to go. And then I noticed the custom pot was sitting in pool of paint. Initially, I thought I had spilled, though thought it odd that I had not noticed that I spilled THAT much. I moved the pot, cleaned the mess. Then noticed that the pot was in a puddle again. Upon closer inspection, all of the pots had little holes in the bottom of them. Paint pots. With holes in them. WTF. Anyway, the related advice here is to inspect the paint pots that you plan to use. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mako Posted February 5, 2014 Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 Reaper can be tricky to get hold of in the UK though, as a little note (and if memory serves, that's where Panda is). Vallejo sell empty dropper bottles which are good for this kind of thing. For measuring out this kind of paint volume, I suggest some 5 ml syringes, your choice on whether you buy dozens or clean them out thoroughly between uses. I would say don't go too crazy on premixing each colour, having them in droppers would give you the option of having colour 1, mix 1, mix 2, colour 2 and being able to use 1 drop of each on a palette to get an intermediate colour without using a lot of paint. After that it comes down to the specific paints (adding white to mid colours needs to be done more slowly than adding a mid to a dark, for example) and how many layers you want to use. Will be a huge amount of mixing though, unless you restrict yourself to a limited number of standard blends! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePandaDirector Posted February 5, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 I don't mind putting in extra work to safe me grief later. Also I'll be mixing before each project separately, steadily increasing my library of mixes. Now the question I've heard a million times, but never remember the answer to - Vallejo model or game? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SpiralngCadavr Posted February 5, 2014 Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 I think Game is better if going for bright colors/over a light under coat; otherwise they're roughly equivalent in my book Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rover1013 Posted February 5, 2014 Report Share Posted February 5, 2014 Vellejo Game Color is supposedly formulated to take more abuse regarding the expectation that painted models will be handled and played with. The colors, if I'm not mistaken, are based primarily on the first couple of citadel range colors. They also contain more "popping" colors that are often found on fantasy models and the like. The Model Color range is wider and contains more realistic colors. Aimed more at the scale model type. I've used and like both just fine. Maybe some others know more differences than those. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nagash13 Posted February 6, 2014 Report Share Posted February 6, 2014 my solution was buy all the paints. then build a giant rack to hold them all. thats where i sit right now. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThePandaDirector Posted February 6, 2014 Author Report Share Posted February 6, 2014 Nice rack Nagash13 :-) I'm going to buy the PHR starter for Dropzone Commander. The models are not only simple to paint, but require a limited palette giving me an ideal opportunity to try this out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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