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Hey everyone,

I was thinking about doing some Primer this afternoon, since it's a Rare day of 50 F+ in Ohio.

A few questions...

1. What's the best temps/Safe temps for Priming?
2. Are there any indoor alternatives to priming for colder Months? I have Gesso, not sure what it's supposed to be used for
3. Is it better to prime the models before or after assembly? I was under the impression that the plastic glue wouldn't adhere as well with Primer, but on the other hand some models like Battlewagons might have interior areas that need priming.
4. I usually prime in Black, but I'm thinking of trying White or Gray/Biege. I have an Ork army, not sure of what color theme I'm going with. What are the pros and cons of each?

1. I though it was the humidity that can mess it up. but from what i understood. if it is too cold you could put the cans in warm water for a bit, shake and prime.
2. You could airbrush. valljeo makes some nice spray primer.
Also i think that GW technical primer paint isnt bad.
3. It depends on the model. you should file/sand/scrape the joints if you are using plastic glue. or mask it first.
4. black gives you richer colors, while whites make it brighter
grey be the middle ground obviously

you could always use both. prime black then do a zenith of white at a 45 degree angle.

I'm still a bit of a noob but I went through my priming failures. All the aforementioned tips are 100% on the mark. Some addenda:

1. Coming from South Florida, humidity can definitely screw up priming models, but in Ohio in 50 degrees, you have very little to worry about here, but if you do prime in humidity, the paint tends to dry faster while the medium it sits in tends to stay wet, which causes this sort of "fuzzy" model situation which sucks (unless of course you're primimg concrete terrain or asphalt bases, in which case humidity can really help). Still, what Desubot mentioned about running the cans under warm water for a few minutes or until room temp or slightly warmer definitely helps. I do this all the time regardless.

2. If you're indoors in a climate-controlled environment (i.e. somewhat near room temp) you don't have much to worry about here. Vallejo makes great primer. I also did like GW when I still used rattlecans, but the best model priming in my opinion comes from an airbrush, if you have the means or the access to one.

3. Depends on the model. The general rule for me is that if assembling the model is going to obstruct detail or make it very difficult to reach, then I will keep from assembling those items. For space marines (making Imperial Fists right now), I only assemble the the head/torso/legs/base and then move to priming and painting and then I move to the arms/weapons/backpacks separately.

4. Again, Desubot offers fine advice. It depends on how you plan on painting the model. If you want the model to be very bright and vibrant, definitely use a white or grey base (white would be brighter, of course). I generally use black on the more rich and battle-worn models. Also keep in mind what color you plan on basing your models. For me, Imperial Fists which are generally a bright, canary yellow generally aren't primed with black (that's not to say you CANT, but prepare for many, many layers of paint thereafter if you do so). For orks, though, black may suit you well.

A few other things that have not been mentioned:

1. SHAKE THE CAN WELL!!! If you shook it well enough, shake it more. When you're done, shake it again. And again, and maybe one more time for good luck. And another for good measure. One for the queen. One for the country. Is your arm hurting yet??? If not, keep it going. You can never shake too much in my experience.

2. Spray 8 to 10 inches (20 cm) away from your models. Go light, in a crossing fashion (do not aim at the model and hold down the trigger). I find the criss-cross painting minimizes spatter (large clumps of paint, or spray bombs as I call them) from taking out your fine detail. This generally happens RIGHT when you press the trigger, so if you start spraying off the model and cross over it while spraying, you'll get a nice thin coat that is spray bomb free. If you spray too far away, the paint will dry before hitting the model which will create this fuzzy sort of effect. Good for concrete/asphalt terrain, bad for space marine armor (unless you're making your space marine into a cool concrete statue looking thing)

3. Don't kill yourself attempting to cover each and every spot the first run. I prime front, back, left, right, top, bottom. If you notice an area that is missed, wait until the model is dry and add another prime coat if necessary. If it's just a small spot, I tidy up with a black base coat. This is key to maintaining the integrity of the model detail. Too many layers of paint will obstruct these details and muddy up your model.

Hope this helps! Good luck!

 hybridmoments82 wrote:
Still, what Darkzephyr mentioned

D:

Desubot!!! So sorry!! Still horribly jetlagged here in the UK!!!!!!! My sincerest and deepest apologies!!!!!! Edited!!

Darkzephyr wrote:
Hey everyone,

I was thinking about doing some Primer this afternoon, since it's a Rare day of 50 F+ in Ohio.

A few questions...

1. What's the best temps/Safe temps for Priming?

Temperature is largely irrelevant. I have primed in 100+ temperatures in Texas and just a hair above freezing - no issues (though you will want to bring them in from outside to cure - which can have a lingering odor...).

For best results, most paints are formulated for applying in the room temperature range (60-80 or so). Too hot, and the solvents evaporate too fast which can lead to various surface imperfections...too cold, and the solvents can take too long to evaporate - generally leading to a very long time waiting for paint to dry.

Darkzephyr wrote:
2. Are there any indoor alternatives to priming for colder Months? I have Gesso, not sure what it's supposed to be used for

Airbrushes with low/no VOC primers works well enough. Gesso is pretty simple stuff. Blob it on, let it dry. Plenty of google-able articles on the fine art...some people actually just dip their figures in it. Biggest benefit is no fumes or airbrush particles to deal with. Pretty cheap too - as a big bottle of gesso will prime a lot of figures.

Darkzephyr wrote:
3. Is it better to prime the models before or after assembly? I was under the impression that the plastic glue wouldn't adhere as well with Primer, but on the other hand some models like Battlewagons might have interior areas that need priming.

Depends. I generally start painting pretty early in the process...sort of a throw back to models where you will have finished interiors on a lot of stuff. Prime and paint...when you get ready to assemble the painted stuff, use a knife to scrape the joint clean of any paint. You can mask as well (prefer to use something like blu tac for masking parts like this) and just peal it off nubs and sockets for parts that have those sorts of things.

Darkzephyr wrote:
4. I usually prime in Black, but I'm thinking of trying White or Gray/Biege. I have an Ork army, not sure of what color theme I'm going with. What are the pros and cons of each?

Black lets you paint sloppy. If you miss a spot, you won't notice it as much (the biggest reason GW were advocates of black primer...makes it easier on the kids). White gives you true colors with less effort. The black undertone shows through most colors which will make them look dull without 1) thick paints or 2) lots of coats to build up to thick paints.

You can paint well either way. If you paint poorly, you will be happier with black primer. If you come from an art background, you may be frustrated by it.

Thanks again for the answers everyone.

1. So it doesn't matter if it's below freezing? Why/How does heating up the primer help? I guess I was more concerned about the cold temps (like 20's) affecting how the Primer was applied to the model after it left the can.

2. Vallejo Spray primer? Is this different than the other Spray primers? I'm not sure how you could spray indoors without getting primer all over surrounding carpet/furniture, etc. I live in a small apartment with nice carpet. I certainly don't want to mess it up.
Also, is there any disadvantage to using Gesso as primer? Sounds like this might be a good alternative during the winter months.

Also, I don't have any Airbrush, but I'm thinking about investing in one.

3. Partial Assembly sounds like a good idea. How do you typically protect the areas you want to glue together?

I went out to a couple of local hobby stores yesterday and found some interesting options for Primer.

1. Colored primers? what's the deal with these? Can you use them to save painting time or would you just completely paint over it? Should I use them for regular ork boyz or maybe vehicles?
2. I found 4-5 Primer brands, which do you reccomend?
A. P3/Privateer Press. $10
B Army painter $15ish for colored primers, maybe $10 for the black?
c. Citadel $16ish
D. Armoury

No luck finding Vallejo.

Heating the primer reduces the viscosity of the paint and improves the pressure from the can, this will provide for a smoother coat compared to a cold can.

The temperature in the air stream outside of an aerosol can is quite often well below freezing anyway - Gas Law and all that.

1) You can use it to speed up your work for sure.

If you take the time to do it right. it can look nice.
I think nerdfest uses it on his reds and they look nice.
but i have found them to be hit or miss. (there whites and browns where ok, but there yellow ate my mini :( )

2) I use autozone quick tone primers. (i think that is what they are called. 2-3 dollars and comes in black and grey)

Valljeo is going to be a bottle paint. not a spray paint. its used with airbrushing.

Thanks!

So, basically I can get primer from Autozone or a hardware store and it will work just as good as Army Painter, Citadel, etc.

Guess I'll try that, and I think I'm gonna heat the primer as well. maybe experiment on a few expendable Ork Boyz before moving on to more expensive models.

Army painter im not 100% sure

but citadel was basicly rebranded duplicolor.
I hear good things about krylon too though.
just look up alternative primers here and there should be more options.

Darkzephyr wrote:
1. So it doesn't matter if it's below freezing? Why/How does heating up the primer help? I guess I was more concerned about the cold temps (like 20's) affecting how the Primer was applied to the model after it left the can.

See Sean_OBrien's answer above. 100% spot-on.

Darkzephyr wrote:
2. Vallejo Spray primer? Is this different than the other Spray primers? I'm not sure how you could spray indoors without getting primer all over surrounding carpet/furniture, etc. I live in a small apartment with nice carpet. I certainly don't want to mess it up.
Also, is there any disadvantage to using Gesso as primer? Sounds like this might be a good alternative during the winter months.

Also, I don't have any Airbrush, but I'm thinking about investing in one.

Not sure about the chemical composition being much different although its very likely. You can spray indoors so long as you have good ventilation (near a window or at least a vent fan, etc.) and to keep the paint from ruining your carpet/furniture, fashion yourself a spray box either out of an old shoebox, bread box, etc (I'm on the road right now and am using the box to a Stormraven I just recently bought). Might be a good idea to either get a tarp or fashion one out of a few cut-open trash bags and cover your work area. I'm also a bit of a safety nut especially with the rattlecans, so I personally would recommend protective eyewear and a surgical mask to cover your nose/mouth.

I never used Gesso so I can't comment on how well/badly it works unfortunately.

I am brand spankin' new to the airbrush arena. Just bought one myself. Very easy to use, clean and maintain. It comes highly recommended to beginners like me and now that I'm using it, I highly recommend it to other beginners -- the HP-CS (Iwata Eclipse grav-fed). Semi-cheap (super cheap as far as other airbrushes go from what I've seen) and very effective.

Darkzephyr wrote:
3. Partial Assembly sounds like a good idea. How do you typically protect the areas you want to glue together?

You don't have to worry about protecting your glue areas. Go ahead and paint the bejeezus out of them if you want. When you're done, just take a modeling knife or some coarse sand paper and just rough up the area you want to glue a bit so you have some crevices for the glue to settle into. Could be the most glossy, shiny and smooth paint you've ever used, doesn't matter. Just rough up the bits where you're gluing and you'll be fine.

Darkzephyr wrote:
I went out to a couple of local hobby stores yesterday and found some interesting options for Primer.

1. Colored primers? what's the deal with these? Can you use them to save painting time or would you just completely paint over it? Should I use them for regular ork boyz or maybe vehicles?

If you're a beginner I would recommend you opt out of the colored primers for now. Colored primers are a blend of primer and basecoat so they tend to go on thicker than your average primer. I jumped into colored primers myself starting out thinking I'd save time but realized quickly that until you master standard primers, you're going to lose lots of detail. If you're feeling adventurous, go for it and play around -- you might do a lot better than me. You can always strip your models if you mess up, but probably a good idea to go with your standard primer first and master that before you move to the thicker more complicated stuff in my personal opinion.

Darkzephyr wrote:
2. I found 4-5 Primer brands, which do you reccomend?

This really depends on YOUR preference, so feel free to play and experiment beyond this. In fact, I encourage it. I have had much success with the super-expensive GW brands, only problem is.....they're super-expensive. I hear very good things about Army Painter primer (not to be confused with their line of color primers). Personally, I use Vallejo surface primer for airbrush which is just eons above and beyond any rattlecan I've ever used. Vallejo used to make a rattlecan primer but I don't think they do anymore (I may be incorrect, but Googling it only turned up out-of-stock websites, and ridiculously high prices on eBay/Amazon which leads me to believe they're discontinued).

Darkzephyr wrote:
A. P3/Privateer Press. $10
B Army painter $15ish for colored primers, maybe $10 for the black?
c. Citadel $16ish
D. Armoury

Citadel (GW) is the only one on the list I've used and can say works very well despite the price tag, although I've seen some incredible work done with P3 and a lot of pros on here swear by it. May be worth a try. I never tried it because as I was experimenting with rattlecans, I bought an airbrush rig which put a dead-stop to the question of primers as mentioned earlier. As a beginner, if you have the means, go buy yourself at least one of GW and then one can of something else and test them side-by-side on both models, take pictures, post them on the Dakka board and let us review and point you in the right direction.

Wow, Airbrush sounds really nice.
I'm guessing you can use it on other painting projects too, so it's more than just a expensive way to do extreme priming, right?

How much did you spend on yours? I've heard it's better to invest in a higher end Airbrush, but I'm thinking of maybe getting a decent midrange one and see how it does/how much I like airbrushing, then maybe go for a high end model.

Darkzephyr wrote:
Wow, Airbrush sounds really nice.
I'm guessing you can use it on other painting projects too, so it's more than just a expensive way to do extreme priming, right?

How much did you spend on yours? I've heard it's better to invest in a higher end Airbrush, but I'm thinking of maybe getting a decent midrange one and see how it does/how much I like airbrushing, then maybe go for a high end model.

Airbrushing is a godsend at least for me model-wise. I was going crazy reviewing various rattlecans as you are now, and I made the plunge into airbrushing and couldn't be happier.

Yes, there's a wide range of uses for airbrush painting, and if you ever get into terrain building, again, you will find that the airbrush really, really helps in situations like that, as well as large-scale modeling, even those heavy support/fast attack units.

My first dive into the airbrushing market, I bought a Iwata Eclipse HP-CS, which I noticed comes highly recommended for beginners, and even some pros seem to still have and actively use their Eclipse while foraying into more pro-grade airbrushes. Amazon retails it at $122, but I got it on sale at Hobby Lobby for $100. As for my compressor, I was going to go with a rather expensive Iwata Smart Jet but my wife beat me to it and bought me a Badger Cyclone AS180-12 (its a diaphragm as opposed to a piston) as an early Christmas present. It doesn't have an air tank or a pressure gauge but so far I've had zero problems with it at all. It actually works incredibly well. At the time she bought this for me, I was eyeing the Master Airbrush Compressor (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001738DXU/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_dp_ss_1?pf_rd_p=1944687762&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B0038D38AA&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1H7CBA6DBC4EVMX4F8Z6) which is way cheaper and came highly recommended by a pro painter here on Dakka, but my wife beat me to the punch!

Those two items should run you a good $200, and really has everything you need to get going aside from a HIGHLY RECOMMENDED airbrush cleaning pot (http://www.amazon.com/Airbrush-Cleaning-Clean-Paint-Holder/dp/B005H46T0O/ref=sr_1_2?s=arts-crafts&ie=UTF8&qid=1418763093&sr=1-2&keywords=airbrush+cleaning), of course, you could just build your own out of a Tupperware container.

Darkzephyr wrote:
Wow, Airbrush sounds really nice. I'm guessing you can use it on other painting projects too, so it's more than just a expensive way to do extreme priming, right?

Definitely - you can also use it for mundane priming.

More seriously, airbrushes open up a whole range of varnishes, as well as primers, that give better control and, quite often, a finer finish than anything you're likely to get out of an aerosol can. How much you use it beyond those basic jobs, though, really depends on you. Lots of folks use airbrushes to spray basecoats and stop there, while others spray 90% of the paint that ends up on a model, only breaking out the "hairy stick" brushes for final, tiny details.

There's a learning curve involved, though, that includes not just operation but also thinning, cleaning, maintenance, etc. The most basic level of competance won't magically improve your models - that takes practice. Also, thanks to all the cleaning involved, you'll only see a savings in time if you paint in batches. If you put in the practice and use it for suitable tasks, though, an airbrush can be an amazing tool for the miniature painter. I mostly just use it for priming and varnishing, but find myself breaking it out more and more as time goes on and my comfort level with it increases. I don't ever see it becoming my primary paint application tool, but YMMV.

 oadie wrote:

Darkzephyr wrote:
Wow, Airbrush sounds really nice. I'm guessing you can use it on other painting projects too, so it's more than just a expensive way to do extreme priming, right?

Definitely - you can also use it for mundane priming.

I had a mental image of painting a miniature while diving out of an airplane when the OP said "exreme airbrushing".

 oadie wrote:
There's a learning curve involved, though, that includes not just operation but also thinning, cleaning, maintenance, etc. The most basic level of competance won't magically improve your models - that takes practice. .

To be honest, the moment I primed/basecoated my models using an airbrush, it almost was like a magical improvement! That's what's keeping on using this tool! The second I noticed the results from rattlecan to airbrush I was totally sold. My models looked a million times better, and they're always improving.

 oadie wrote:

Darkzephyr wrote:
Wow, Airbrush sounds really nice. I'm guessing you can use it on other painting projects too, so it's more than just a expensive way to do extreme priming, right?

Definitely - you can also use it for mundane priming.

More seriously, airbrushes open up a whole range of varnishes, as well as primers, that give better control and, quite often, a finer finish than anything you're likely to get out of an aerosol can. How much you use it beyond those basic jobs, though, really depends on you. Lots of folks use airbrushes to spray basecoats and stop there, while others spray 90% of the paint that ends up on a model, only breaking out the "hairy stick" brushes for final, tiny details.

There's a learning curve involved, though, that includes not just operation but also thinning, cleaning, maintenance, etc. The most basic level of competance won't magically improve your models - that takes practice. Also, thanks to all the cleaning involved, you'll only see a savings in time if you paint in batches. If you put in the practice and use it for suitable tasks, though, an airbrush can be an amazing tool for the miniature painter. I mostly just use it for priming and varnishing, but find myself breaking it out more and more as time goes on and my comfort level with it increases. I don't ever see it becoming my primary paint application tool, but YMMV.

Thanks again for the info, it sounds really sweet!

What do you mean by a wider range of Varnishes? I'm not familiar with using a Varnish in mini-painting. And what is a 'Finer finish", does that mean the primer coat is less gritty/more smooth?

Anyways, for now, to save Money, I decided to get some Krylon primer from a Michael's Art/Craft store. It was $5-6, so it was probably one of the cheaper primers I've encountered so far. if I remember correctly, I've heard good things about Krylon, and I'm certain I've used it before.Unless there's a significant difference between Krylon and other primers, I'm gonna try priming some models tonight! I also bought a beige/tan can of Primer to experiment with a more neutral color.


Once I decide I'm really serious about painting, I'm probably going to try out some Airbrushes as well.