Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hello Dakka, I am currently stuck.

I have several pieces of scratch built terrain ready to paint but I am thinking that GW paints would be wasted on them what with their high price / low quantity and all.

I was also thinking of Vallejo but again.....a paint known for its quality on miniatures....is terrain really as demanding of its paint as miniatures are?

I thought Tamiya paints being an option; cheap price and made for models
on the complete other hand my wife has 200 ml bottles of this very thick acrylic paint in primary colors that i would have to mix for each color, I would have to use a great amount of water to thin them down though.

what are your opinions knowing this paint choice is going towards terrain projects?.

PS I have also heard somewhere that Tamiya acrylic paints dissolve GW paints....is this true? if so that might be a major deterrent for tamiya.

I'm on the fence between Tamiya and Vallejo


Thanks for reading, I hope you can help me with my little dilemma

What kind of terrain piece are you painting?

For clunky scratch built stuff there's always acrylic craft paint. They come in a variety of colors and are normally extremely cheap for the volume you get.

Detailed premade terrain my vote with be with whatever miniatures paint you are comfortable using.

Well. It is scratch built,
Nothing. I would describe as clunky really. But it isn't premade like what gw puts out

Can those kind of acrylics really do a good job too?

House paint sample pots from a hardware store, colour-matched to a swab of the tone you want.

Really.......

I was under the impression that the house paints and craft quality acrylic paints were not up to par with the quality that modeling/miniature paints have to offer and that perhaps the final result may end up lacking realism.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If the cheaper alternatives infact produce the same quality results then this is a game changer for me hehe
.

House paint is thicker and will stand up to more handling than craft paints. That being said, each have their place. For game boards and bases of terrain, I'd use house paint. For buildings and structures I'd use craft paint.

And never use Aerosol(spray can) based paints on foam as it will melt the foam.

It really depends on what you're painting. "terrain" is a pretty wide brush. Even structures and buildings might be fine with acrylic house paint, but it depends on the specific building, etc.

Yep, listen to Aerethan. Aerosols RUINS foam. I learned this to my expense.

Thanks for the heads up on the foam.....I will be sure to put a light coat of watered down PVA on it prior to spraying.....

I have standard acrylic craft paint in my home already (black ,white,blue,yellow and red) so using that will be alright? assuming i water it down a lot because it is probably a little thinner than peanut butter XD

and assuming that will be alright then Tamiya paint will be fine for doing details? or will that standard acrylic paint suffice?

getting house paint made to certain specifications here is not as easy as back in the west hehe

EDIT: mistakes and clarifications

Automatically Appended Next Post:
just a followup; will i have any trouble using a dry brushing technique with any of the mentioned paints above?

Latex paints (house paint) are generally thicker than your typical craft/model acrylics, but you can still drybrush with them. Personally, I'd use the craft paints and varnish the terrain afterward - that should be enough to survive the rigors of gaming for a while and you can always add another coat before it wears down to paint. Honestly, craft paints are a mixed bag when it comes to consistency and pigment density, but I've managed to make do well enough on the terrain I've built, thus far, and I haven't gone broke doing so, as I would have, even using Vallejo.

Go with the craft paints. Cheaper and for hills swamps etc, bulk is more important. If necessary you can use the more expensive GW paints to pick out small details and make them stand out, but for basic ground cover quantity is better than quality.

Hans_Einberg wrote:Thanks for the heads up on the foam.....I will be sure to put a light coat of watered down PVA on it prior to spraying.....

I have standard acrylic craft paint in my home already (black ,white,blue,yellow and red) so using that will be alright? assuming i water it down a lot because it is probably a little thinner than peanut butter XD

Sometimes thick is good. Depends on what you are going over. When working with foam, I like to mix plaster into the paint. Not only does it rough up the service a bit, but it blocks out the pink of the foam.

really....I actually have never used pink foam before.....

most of my foam is polystyrene or Styrofoam all of the white variant...they usually end up getting covered in
watered down glue, plaster or a pva + sand mix prior to painting depending on what kind of texture im going for ^^

I am glad to hear i can use the same paint my wife uses.....large pots of 200ml.....watered down could last me a long time i think hehe

Ancestral Hamster wrote:Go with the craft paints. Cheaper and for hills swamps etc, bulk is more important. If necessary you can use the more expensive GW paints to pick out small details and make them stand out, but for basic ground cover quantity is better than quality.

Yeah this is exactly what I do. The only issues I've had is when I attempt to airbrush. These cheaper paints just don't thin very well (not worth trying to airbrush imo)... but for large batch painting and dry brushing they are perfect. For example the 'bases' for nearly all of my terrain is a mix of FolkArt Mushroom and FolkArt Acorn Brown.

I am beginning to understand now, craft paints being good for laying the terrain base coat.....
then would using a semi-dedicated paint like Tamiya work for dry brushing that?

I think i would need to thin the paint some (or at least try).....as mentioned before....this paint has the consistency of peanut butter hehe.