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I hate waiting 12-24 hrs after priming for my minis to cure (I use Duplicolor priming) after priming, especially for my regular troops. I was wondering, am I able to just airbrush on an undercoat without priming? For example: I prime my Necrons black. Would I be able to airbrush Abaddon Black or any other brand's black and get the same results as priming? Same question for white or grey. I don't like the Imperial Primer, and I found the airbrush makes these coats go on so much easier, and I don't have to wait too long for the paint to dry and be ready for the main color.

Primer is mainly used for giving the paint something to adhere to as it will tend to chip off more easily if painted onto bare plastic. It also alters the shade of the later colors depending on what color of primer you use. I see no reason why you couldn't just use normal black paint but you may want to add hard coat or some varnish to make the paint job more durable when handling.

Also, I'm not sure why you have to wait 12-24 hours for your primer unless it's something special with duplicolor (not familiar with it). I use Citadel Black spray primer and it dries in 5-10 minutes.

 Greenizbest wrote:
Primer is mainly used for giving the paint something to adhere to as it will tend to chip off more easily if painted onto bare plastic. It also alters the shade of the later colors depending on what color of primer you use. I see no reason why you couldn't just use normal black paint but you may want to add hard coat or some varnish to make the paint job more durable when handling.

Also, I'm not sure why you have to wait 12-24 hours for your primer unless it's something special with duplicolor (not familiar with it). I use Citadel Black spray primer and it dries in 5-10 minutes.

Best answer was the first. Nice.

I would also add that because most airbrushes are (internal mix brushes) they atomize the paint and this helps it adhere much better. It doing so you typically have a base that is much stronger to chip resistance than a brush on prime coat.

So yes you can just spray on the base coat rather than priming then base coating. But as he stated, most of your more experience air brushers use primer coats to give the model natural highlights. Its truly an individual choice in this matter, i prefer to get a lot of my highlights in the priming stage because i struggle to get the same results with a brush.

I hope this helped.
Best of luck!

It shouldn't take any longer for and acrylic rattle can sprays to cure unless you buy something that is specifically slow curing, in which case, get something less slow curing

FYI there is a difference between drying and curing when it comes to undercoats.

Touch dry is what it sounds like - looses it's wet looking gloss and is dry to the touch

Curing is when the paint has chemically bonded to the thing it is sprayed onto.


With a lot of brands, you should wait between 6-12 hours after they have dried, so that they cure fully - otherwise it goes a bit odd, can crinkle, loose adhesion and so on.

GW's Chaos Black is a bit of a funny one, because in all my years spraying models (tens of thousands perhaps?) I have never had an issue with Chaos Black going funny because I've painted on top of it before it's fully cured.

Here's something that I discovered that may be right up your alley. It's called Multipurpose Sealer by DecoArt/Americana:



Basically this is just uncolored acrylic primer in a bottle. You can mix it into your desired color and basically make your own primer from any basecolor you wish. I've used it with my airbrush with interesting results. The directions say mix 1:1 with your desired paint but I found for airbrushing it needs to be thinned a little afterwards. I actually primed my Cultists using this stuff and some model air colors. It's fairly cheap. I got a small 2 oz bottle for $3 at Michael's Arts and Crafts. I also picked up the Super large bottle with the idea of mixing up a custom colored primer from craft paint ( which I tested on a bare unprimed jet-pack torso and damn is it tough to scratch off and looks good too).

Pick up a bottle and experiment with it. I haven't tried it as a varnish but it might work for that too.