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.

Yes, I've seen the article about priming with gesso here on Dakka.

I'm just looking for other people's experiences with it. Thanks in advance!

I primed my entire daemon army with liquitex acrylic gesso because I needed different models to be primed in different shades of white depending on the washes I wanted to do. It turned out good; I didn't have any that turned out chalky at all.

Brian P wrote:I primed my entire daemon army with liquitex acrylic gesso because I needed different models to be primed in different shades of white depending on the washes I wanted to do. It turned out good; I didn't have any that turned out chalky at all.

That, my friend, is one fine looking pizza.

I tried Liquitex gesso some time ago and was quite enthusiastic about the possibilities. I don't recall it being any better or worse than Krylon and Krylon is a hell of a lot quicker and easier.

For whatever reason, I went back to Krylon last year. I honestly don't remember why but when I give up on something that I want to work, it's generally for a good reason. I hate spending money on something and then not using it.

I use Liquitex gesso anytime I'm painting small batches of figures of less than 10 units. Much less hassle than setting up for spray paint, and you can do it in any temperature or humidity, something that can't be said for spray paint. I do still use spray paint (Krylon, Rustoleum, or hardware store brands) for large batches of figs or when I'm spraying a primer and basecoat in one step (Krylon Rustoleum camo sprays are great for this).

I've used both black and white gesso to good effect on plastic, metal and vinyl (clix type) miniatures. As I dip most of my figures, I mostly use white gesso now. My club has almost entirely turned to Gesso as our primer of choice. Cheap, fast drying, shrinks when dry and great "tooth" for painting. What more could you want?

Here's a reprint of an excellent article about priming with gesso that really helped widen it's appeal to wargamers some years back.
http://thescreamingalpha.com/?p=640

The figs in this gallery were all gessoed.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/images-24779-19012_Union%20Of%20The%20Green.html

I use Winsor and Newton Galleria white gesso, thinned with liquitex airbrush medium and some water(not too much water) and occasionally tinted with some paints.
I spray it through an airbrush, and apply 2-3 thin coats untill there is even coverage, using a hair dryer to speed the process sometimes (might want to avoid this on the finecast stuff!). Its a bit slow, but achieves a nice surface for painting.
Im very happy with the result, enough to not feel a need to get a spray can of something else, which might be quicker to apply.

Sorry for Off topic but everytime I see Gesso, i see...

I've tried gesso twice, with mixed results. I used white gesso to prime over some gap filling I had to do on a landspeeder and it ended up drying more rough then I'd expected. I had better luck with black gesso on a different part of the same speeder. in both cases I didn't have any issues with a chalky finish and it's got plenty of tooth; the white just dried a bit lumpy for me.

I'll definitely be trying it again, though. spraying is really hard for me (no good location), so I'm determined to make gesso work for me one way or the other :p

Edit: in both cases, the brand I used was Liquitex

I have used a 1:1 ratio of Golden gesso and Golden airbrush medium. It worked fantastic out of my airbrush, but I still question the cost difference and hassle between the bottles of gesso and airbrush medium and something like Vallejo's 200ml primer.

I found the Golden gesso far less gritty than Liquitex, which is why i used Golden for this.

Full disclosure here: I used what may be a suboptimal gesso and back when I was using it, I didn't airbrush. I also have a basement where I can spray whatever I like, whenever I like, so the fumes are not really an issue for me. That having been said, I never thought to try this stuff through an airbrush. As I'm finding that I prefer airbrushing my primer these days, I may give the gesso another shot.

I've had nothing but good experiences with Liquitex black gesso. Liquitex white gesso has been a lot more mixed, especially on plastic--sometimes it seems to gunk up and dry in clots, which the black never does. I use it because spraying is a huge pain for me, but it's definitely tedious if you're doing a lot of models at once.

Spraying gesso is fine just bear in mind that its going to be reduced rather a lot. if you cna find a brand of gesso thats already more fluid than paste, I suggest starting with that. The windsor and newton galleria that I use is pretty thick. In honesty I just tryed it out for mini's after already having it for canvases rather than purchase another product. It worked alright, so I stuck with it. Its quite cheap; I paid £9 for a litre which for mini's would last far longer than the shelf life of the product hehe.

One thing to remember when spraying; because its so thinned out do several thin patchy coats with full drying in between for the best coverage without gumming up details.

I tried it for a while and I can see how it would work for most folks but not for me. I found that even after letting it dry more than a day it was still very water reactive. I was trying to paint a mini with super-dilute paints and the water kept reacting with the gesso and giving me huge headaches.

Also when fingers inevitably rub off some paint, it doesn't just affect that little area like with other primers, it starts to peel off like skin... very frustrating.

But anyway I suppose for batch painting followed by some good varnish it would be fine.

Here is one of my very first test minis I did with priming with gesso and my airbrush. Yes, it looks textured, but it really isn't. It is fairly hi-res pic so you can zoom in the gallery. The more recent ones look better, but I do not have any shots of those.



This is a WIP that was primed with gesso and then painted with Vallejo Liquid gold series. The paint and everything has held up very well. I have unfortunately droped them too much and never a nick or chunk knocked off them. The details are still very sharp. I have primed with gesso on citadel finecast as well and that one too worked out very well and no detail lost.

I've tried brushing it on. The article I read stated you could use it without thinning, my experience was different (where's all the detail gone?)

I may try it again in the future. For now though my recommendation is that if you are going to use it then do the same thing you should do for all new techniques...apply to test model first!

on the topic of thinning gesso, just how much can you thin it before it stops covering well? 1:1 with water should be safe enough, yes?

For thinning, it kind of depends what you're going to do with it. To spray your looking at a lot of thinning, I like to use Liquitex Airbrush medium, untill it resembles softbody acrylics and then use water with flow aid added to it untill its sprayable. This will drastically reduce its coverage and will likely involve several coats to achieve a clean white. Depending on the paint your applying over the top this may matter more or less; some paints are quite transparent and the surface will show through no matter how many coats you put down. (yellow and red are common for this)
To brush the gesso on, you will not need to thin quite so much, I suspect that some water with flow aid mixed in will be sufficient, 1:1 probably would affect coverage, but several thiner coats will always be better than one thick coat

cheers. I'm brushing it on, so I'll try a 2:1 gesso to water/flow-aid mix as a start point and see how that goes.