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Hello. I was wondering if testors paint would be acceptable for 40k? I already had some laying around and i cant afford citidel paint. So if someone had painted their army with testors paint would it bother you?

They're your models. People use whatever paints they think will give them decent results.

It's fine enough paint (so far as I remember), just usually you don't want to mix acrylics and enamels.

Anything with a gloss would also probably look weird too.

Thanks


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thanks

If you don't like how it ends up looking, there are many cheaper alternatives to GW paints. GW paints are good, but overpriced. Vallejo, Reaper, P3, etc. are all great quality too and about 1/2 or 1/3 the price of GW.

Coming from someone where the Testors enamel paint was my first model paint: no, back away, acrylics are so much more humane to use.

No matter how hard I tried, the only way the darn stuff looks any good is by airbrush.
Even then, cleanup is brutal!

Anyway, good luck, but friends do not let friends paint minis with enamel.

I did alot of my early stuff with enamels, now that i have a nice large collection of GW paint... I dont think I would go back. Cleanup on enamels are a real pain.

Testors make acrylics too...he might have those. When Hobby Lobby has them for sale...you can get them for as low as 50 cents a bottle. Their acrylics are as good as any hobby paint.

Enamels are an aquired taste. I use them a lot, you can do a lot with enamels and other oil based paints that you cant easily do with acrylics. The solvent is the only downside, takes me less time to clean my brushes of enamel paint than it does with acrylics.

I use testors all the time. Have no problem painting good models

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Testors make acrylics too...he might have those. When Hobby Lobby has them for sale...you can get them for as low as 50 cents a bottle. Their acrylics are as good as any hobby paint.

Enamels are an aquired taste. I use them a lot, you can do a lot with enamels and other oil based paints that you cant easily do with acrylics. The solvent is the only downside, takes me less time to clean my brushes of enamel paint than it does with acrylics.

I agree. If it's Testors Acrylics, you'll be fine. If it's Testors enamel, you can still work with it, but it will be different. Acrylics are easier to slop on with their faster drying times, easier cleanup and no harsh solvents. But you can definitely get good results with enamels. I was painting with enamels before I touched miniatures as I painted model aircraft before I got in to miniatures. My first few models I just painted with enamels and they came out fine... when I swapped to acrylics my painting actually got worse initially because I found it harder to get nice smooth coats of paint with good coverage. These days I favour acrylics mainly because of the drying time and the lack of harsh solvents. Enamels can be good for painting vehicles you intend to weather, though, as enamels tend to hold up better to the solvents you'll be using when you weather vehicles.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Testors make acrylics too...he might have those. When Hobby Lobby has them for sale...you can get them for as low as 50 cents a bottle. Their acrylics are as good as any hobby paint.

Enamels are an aquired taste. I use them a lot, you can do a lot with enamels and other oil based paints that you cant easily do with acrylics. The solvent is the only downside, takes me less time to clean my brushes of enamel paint than it does with acrylics.

Really curious to hear what you can accomplish with enamels that you can't do easily with acrylics. I've never worked with enamels, but I'm always open to new ideas.

Ya, if they are flat it is all good. I used them once upon a time. If they are the enamels the solvent is annoying though, I am so glad I am using water based paints now.

The Testors Dullcoat spray is great BTW, I use it to this day.

 Evertras wrote:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Testors make acrylics too...he might have those. When Hobby Lobby has them for sale...you can get them for as low as 50 cents a bottle. Their acrylics are as good as any hobby paint.

Enamels are an aquired taste. I use them a lot, you can do a lot with enamels and other oil based paints that you cant easily do with acrylics. The solvent is the only downside, takes me less time to clean my brushes of enamel paint than it does with acrylics.

Really curious to hear what you can accomplish with enamels that you can't do easily with acrylics. I've never worked with enamels, but I'm always open to new ideas.

I can’t speak for others, but I kept using a few of my old testors enamels even when I switched over to acrylics.

I used a bright, glossy red for blood effects, and spot color when I wanted something to really pop (on a banner)
I used gold and silver for the same reason. The enamels were just naturally shiny, the acrylics were flat.

At some point, the solvent I used to clean my brushes ran out, so I just stopped using them. I think If I looked, I might have the old paints in a box somewhere.

Testors is soooo late '80's.

Ok, you want opinions, so here's mine. Is it OK? Well they're your models...

However, Testors is meant for car models. It's hard on your brushes, hard to mix, hard to stipple, hard to blend, hard to drybrush....hard to clean up after.

And on plastic models, impossible to remove without hosing the model.

It's up to you, of course. But if it was me (and it was me back in the late 80's) I'd hold off painting game minis with them and recommend switching to acrylic when the wallet permits.

Again - before broad generalizations...you need to know what kind of Testors paints he has. They make excellent acrylics which work just like acrylics from any other company. Not a Testors fan boy - but if he has a collection of Testors acrylics already, it would be silly to tell him to toss them to go out and buy the exact same thing in a different bottle (especially when it comes to realistic colors like VMC/VAC).

 Nevelon wrote:

 Evertras wrote:

 Sean_OBrien wrote:
Testors make acrylics too...he might have those. When Hobby Lobby has them for sale...you can get them for as low as 50 cents a bottle. Their acrylics are as good as any hobby paint.

Enamels are an aquired taste. I use them a lot, you can do a lot with enamels and other oil based paints that you cant easily do with acrylics. The solvent is the only downside, takes me less time to clean my brushes of enamel paint than it does with acrylics.

Really curious to hear what you can accomplish with enamels that you can't do easily with acrylics. I've never worked with enamels, but I'm always open to new ideas.

I can’t speak for others, but I kept using a few of my old testors enamels even when I switched over to acrylics.

I used a bright, glossy red for blood effects, and spot color when I wanted something to really pop (on a banner)
I used gold and silver for the same reason. The enamels were just naturally shiny, the acrylics were flat.

At some point, the solvent I used to clean my brushes ran out, so I just stopped using them. I think If I looked, I might have the old paints in a box somewhere.

As mentioned, things like reds are brighter and if you like colors like Tamiya Clear Red for doing blood - something like Turn Signal Red will make it look like you are dealing with a nice arterial bleed. Where enamels really shine though is for blending. Skin tones are smooth, layers are seamless, transitions are silky. Even when doing two brush wet blends with acrylics or airbrushed fade effects - they look rough in comparison. Since the solvent will actually work with the underlying paints - you can blend the two together perfectly. All but the most pain stakingly applied blends with acrylics will have a visible line between the transitions (some people actually prefer that look for whatever reason...I don't though). Having to use four or five different shades applied one at a time...nope. Base coat followed by your shade and highlight blending as needed...real wet blending which is what all the different acrylic work arounds are attempting to achieve.

They are also imminently more useful for weathering than acrylics. All the same techniques used with oils apply to enamels, so rust streaks, grease smears and oil puddles - not to mention the dirt, mud and grime. You can stipple things on, use a clean brush with some solvent and streak it to make it look like it is moving fast or for dealing with fur or other directional textures. Same goes for if you want to do veining for stone (or even skin veins for that matter...). Want to do a sheer? Wet clothes clinging? Membranous skin?

Washes are easier to control and fine tune. You can thin it to nearly nothing - and cleaning up excess is simple Simon. Pulling paint into and out of crevices for deep skin creases. Until it is fully cured, you can go back and use a wet brush to adjust things.

I tend to use acrylics for blocking in colors and finish my detailing with enamels or oils for figures and organic miniatures. Almost everything that you hear being done to acrylics for those final stages is generally to get them to behave more like enamel/oil paints (from wet palettes, to additives like flow improver and drying retarder and the different techniques). Sure...they don't dry brush, but then again - I don't normally dry brush either. Oddly enough - I am generally more likely to use only acrylics when painting vehicles or cars as opposed to an enamel. Unless I need a solid metallic or some other special finish (Candies or flipping colors) acrylics are great for painting the things all in solid blocks and having them dry super fast.

They do make flat enamels too - and they tend to be dead flat representations of the real paints they are mimicking (especially in their military color lines). If you want them flat and they are not - that is what they make Dullcote for. Heck, the sheen of paints never even enters my mind since almost everything gets a coat of gloss varnish at one point for me (before and after decals, before washes, slimmy bits...). It is much easier not to worry about those sorts of things and focus on color and quality of the paints first and then sort out the sheen when I am sealing the figures.

 Sean_OBrien wrote:

As mentioned, things like reds are brighter and if you like colors like Tamiya Clear Red for doing blood - something like Turn Signal Red will make it look like you are dealing with a nice arterial bleed. Where enamels really shine though is for blending. Skin tones are smooth, layers are seamless, transitions are silky. Even when doing two brush wet blends with acrylics or airbrushed fade effects - they look rough in comparison. Since the solvent will actually work with the underlying paints - you can blend the two together perfectly. All but the most pain stakingly applied blends with acrylics will have a visible line between the transitions (some people actually prefer that look for whatever reason...I don't though). Having to use four or five different shades applied one at a time...nope. Base coat followed by your shade and highlight blending as needed...real wet blending which is what all the different acrylic work arounds are attempting to achieve.

They are also imminently more useful for weathering than acrylics. All the same techniques used with oils apply to enamels, so rust streaks, grease smears and oil puddles - not to mention the dirt, mud and grime. You can stipple things on, use a clean brush with some solvent and streak it to make it look like it is moving fast or for dealing with fur or other directional textures. Same goes for if you want to do veining for stone (or even skin veins for that matter...). Want to do a sheer? Wet clothes clinging? Membranous skin?

Washes are easier to control and fine tune. You can thin it to nearly nothing - and cleaning up excess is simple Simon. Pulling paint into and out of crevices for deep skin creases. Until it is fully cured, you can go back and use a wet brush to adjust things.

I tend to use acrylics for blocking in colors and finish my detailing with enamels or oils for figures and organic miniatures. Almost everything that you hear being done to acrylics for those final stages is generally to get them to behave more like enamel/oil paints (from wet palettes, to additives like flow improver and drying retarder and the different techniques). Sure...they don't dry brush, but then again - I don't normally dry brush either. Oddly enough - I am generally more likely to use only acrylics when painting vehicles or cars as opposed to an enamel. Unless I need a solid metallic or some other special finish (Candies or flipping colors) acrylics are great for painting the things all in solid blocks and having them dry super fast.

They do make flat enamels too - and they tend to be dead flat representations of the real paints they are mimicking (especially in their military color lines). If you want them flat and they are not - that is what they make Dullcote for. Heck, the sheen of paints never even enters my mind since almost everything gets a coat of gloss varnish at one point for me (before and after decals, before washes, slimmy bits...). It is much easier not to worry about those sorts of things and focus on color and quality of the paints first and then sort out the sheen when I am sealing the figures.

Nice write up on enamels. Very informative, thanks.

Testors Acrylics are brilliant. I think if they were more widely available at a local level, people would find them superior to most other hobby acrylics. The enamels have their merits, but a beginner to the hobby might be better served steering clear of them until their skills improve.

BTW, Sean_OBrien's paint-fu is strong. You would be wise to heed his words