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.

So I finally got fed up with how Citadel Paint Pots are in terms of what I'm needing in things. No, I'm not ready to go to P3 or Vallejo (yet), but the whole paint pot part just got started on the road of my ole "Heave Ho!". So, what I did today, is I went to my local crafts & hobby store (not gaming hobby, but general arts & crafts store) & bought up 2 baggies of 6 dropper bottles similar to P3 & Vallejo's bottles (tips are different, but essentially the same). While I have a mix of pre-change Citadel paints & post-change Citadel paint pots, I had to spend the time research what used to be what; what's 100% new; what's gone; what (seems to be) a mix of multiple colors; what is just flying rodent gak crazy of Citadel to say X Paint = Y Paint. So, after I did that, I picked out my bottles, sticker labels (one for name of paint & possible description of mix ratio & 2nd for a quick paint swath to show what it looks like dry & not me guessing from the outside inside). What I came up with (in the short time I did it) was this:



I plan on doing this for everything I've got, unless I decide to completely orphan an old paint pot & just finish it out (for whatever reason). I can fit 3 new paint pots into 1 single of these, so it's great for paints I use a bunch of (Skaven, Ork & Goblin, Space Wolves say HI THERE!).

Anyone else do something similar to this?

found this posted on dakka somewhere. I wasted some money buying reaper empties, but I think this will be cheaper.

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=25040&catid=530

Did you lose much paint transferring to the dropper bottles? How did you do it?

I didn't lose too horribly much paint as almost everything I transferred over was either a full pot or near full pot. (anything under 1/2 a pot I just left in there to finish off that way). But all in all, it's so nice to have a proper dropper bottle for mixing paints & getting a better tip of paint.

Thanks

Okay. So with my original "test run" was with a dozen dropper bottles. As I mentioned before, I wanted to make sure the functionality was of the same caliber/quality as P3/Vallejo styled bottles. As you can see in the below pics, they aren't the same physically, but in the end, they'll do the same (if not hold far more paint than the others). Also, as I could, I combined the multiple old pots that were renamed into the new line (wherein they actually were the same color or close enough) and I also made up bottles just from the new pots themselves. In the end, this is what I came up with:







And the tip involved isn't the snub nose you've seen in the other 2 major ones, but a longer, distended one:

JWMarines wrote:
found this posted on dakka somewhere. I wasted some money buying reaper empties, but I think this will be cheaper.

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=25040&catid=530

Not sure if it was me that posted that or if it was someone else - but I use them to get most my empty bottles (and my basic flat sheets of plastic - i.e. Plasticard).

In relation to this thread though, they also have other bottles if you are looking for something different. For example, I use the larger bottles to keep things like premixed varnishes and thinners in. For the terrain paints which I use (normally mixed by the pint or quart at the home store), I use the big 32 ounce bottles which look a little like the ones the OP linked to. Keeps from having to deal with paint getting stuck in the lip of the can they mix it in. They have the cheap disposable Tri-Pours for mixing resins. They also sell the shaker bottles for basing and terrain finishing materials.

$20 or $30 worth of miscellaneous bottles will get you a good selection for different things and save you money over buying empties through a hobby company. If you go in with a friend or three, you can cut the costs even lower because of the bulk discounts.

It helps to make bulk purchases a lot easier to work with. Buying a 50 lb bag of sand or a quart of brown paint is a heck a lot cheaper in the long run (and sometimes short run for the markup some companies put on stuff). However, no one wants to try and fill an airbrush from a quart can of paint or keep a sand bag on their paint desk. Proper packaging makes it more useable and attractive in the long run.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Diatribe wrote:

And the tip involved isn't the snub nose you've seen in the other 2 major ones, but a longer, distended one

Like these:

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.aspx?itemid=23604&catid=530

Well, since it was just me, I paid roughly 42.5 cents per bottle as they came in a pack of 6 for 2.49$ for what will essentially hold 3 Citadel Paint Pots worth of paint. So, with that being said, that's what? 36mL worth?

Ha, nice to see someone else swapping out their paint pots! I absolutely loathe the new citadel ones, I've been transferring them to pots I bought in bulk from ebay. In my case I've been going for P3 style pots, haven't tried dropper bottles yyet - probably will for my washes/shades though.

 A Kvlt Ghost wrote:
Ha, nice to see someone else swapping out their paint pots! I absolutely loathe the new citadel ones, I've been transferring them to pots I bought in bulk from ebay. In my case I've been going for P3 style pots, haven't tried dropper bottles yyet - probably will for my washes/shades though.

Well, I did some painting here today (after taking a couple days off since finishing my first bunch of Slayers) and in conjunction with my new brushes I got, these things work like a champ! I get just enough paint on my palette to get the brush loaded down but not too much to stop me from having a super sharp tip. Next paycheck is going to be brutal for me though as I can see me getting about 2 new pots of paint for each of my commonly used paints. So we're looking about about 30 pots in all with about 3 bags (18 dropper bottles) picked up. Ah well. It's got to be done and the results are exactly what I'm looking for!

*Small Update*

I'm almost done with the whole conversion process. I've about 13 more pots to switch over (not doing the Glaze/Wash/Shades), but here's where I'm essentially at:



With a look at my work area:

2 suggestions. First, get a bottle of glaze medium (from the same arts-n-crafts place) and add it either 1-1 or 2-1 (2 parts paint 1 part medium). This will smooth out the paint for a better quality finish and give you twice the paint.
Second, get some heavy nuts from from a hardware store (Home Depot, Lowes, etc) and drop a nut in each container. This will help you mix the paint better when you shake the bottle pre-use.

I prefer small glass beads as nuts will rust over time (staining the paint.
I am speaking from experience here. Even materials promoted as "rustproof" or "anti-corrosive" WILL rust eventually.