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I'm curious to hear how much you estimate you'd spend on paint in the course of a year, and whether that has a bearing on which paint brands you choose to purchase from.
If you happen to be a professional painter, how does paint compare with other business expenses?

How about things like varnishes, mediums and other additives, and do you find yourself spending more on paints for your brush or airbrush?


BONUS QUESTION: Is it normal to form emotional attachments to inanimate objects such as brushes?

To get to your Bonus Question First:

YES! Absolutely, it is normal to form emotional attachments to inanimate objects among persons and tools with which a detailed and intimate relationship is formed and where praise is often bestowed upon a person through the use of these tools.

You see this among artists, mechanics, professional and competitive drivers (especially F1 and NASCAR), and even Scientists and Doctors (my ex-girlfriend was an OB-Gyn, who had not only a pair of scrubs, but specific vaginal and anal speculums she [i]insisted[/] were "more friendly" and "liked her and her patients better" than all the others.

For artists, this can take the form of specific brushes for certain things, or a particularly special blend of paint (for me, it was a worn cat's tongue filbert brush that produced airbrush qualities in the blending with it, and a can of partially separated Ral Partha Harness Leather Red-Brown that I used for flesh washes).

Currently, since I lost both of those in May, 1999, it is a 10/0 liner brush I am using to do filigree and paint Runes on shields (which I used to be able to do with an 0 or 00 brush), and a combination of an old bottle of Vallejo Black mixed 50:50 with Vallejo Thinner, and 3:2 with Liquitex Thinner-Retarder that I use for black washes and glazes, and a similar (but without the Vallejo thinner) white that I used to mix with other colors to do highlights.

And.... Generally, I have always been partial to Cat's Tongue Filbert Brushes, for pretty much everything.

As for paints... I have recently concluded that buying paints specifically for miniatures is simply too expensive given how clumsily I appear to be acclimating to these paints, and that since they all seem to require me to use media extenders of all sorts with them, that I might as well go buy pure acrylic media, pigment, and bottles, and mix the paints myself with my preferred blend of media, pigment, thinner, and retarder to start with, so that I do not waste so much paint in the mixing process, or spend so much time (which is really more the point) in having to adjust all of my paints to get a wash, or dry-brush color balanced for the job.

The paints just don't seem to work like they used to right out of the jar (and that is entirely subjective, but I have noticed incredibly faster drying times for newer paints than for older - an objective measure I have made with some surviving Ral Partha, and Genesis Gaming Products colors).

I cannot imagine returning to Professional Status painting miniatures at the moment, due to my massive decline in talent, so I would not even begin to guess at what the costs for upkeep of materials would be these days compared to income.

I do know that the cost is substantially higher per quantity of paint than it would seem to be adjusted for mean rise in income and inflation.

MB

Oh golly....in a year?

Brushes - $20-30
Airbrush - $75 (I have bought several over many years, so maybe an average).
Paints - $100 - all kinds.
Varnishes, washes, additives,gels, etc. - $25

I would say unfortunately a lot of the paints I buy, I don't use - or rather after a few tests - they don't end up working out for the project I had in mind. (like trying to find a specific shade of green, or a few metallics that go well together).

As far as emotional attachments? Well, I can be disappointed when a good tool no longer works - or frustrated if I can't find a replacement.

Hmm.... here's my list -- prices in approx. USD

50-70 pots of paint a year that I finish: $200
Premium $15 brushes: $100
Crappy $3 brushes: $100
Brush Cleaners & Soap: $50
Mediums: $20

More paint that I don't really need: $100
More brushes I don't really need: $100

So, that makes it $470 of stuff I actually consume, and another $200 of stuff I don't need that just looked cool. Keep in mind that I paint probably more models than the average hobbyist or gamer.

Basically, I replace most of my premium brushes twice a year (W&N S7 and Raphael), and I go through about 40 cheap, synthetic flat every year (at least 3 a month) -- basically, I use them til the ends are horribly frayed.

I barely buy any mediums at all now. In the last 12 months, the only thing I got was a Liquitex Airbrush Medium to try, and beyond the first week, I never used it again. Mostly, I just use water; the only real medium I use on a regular basis is Flo-Aid (to paint large areas of whites, yellows, and near-whites), but since it's diluted 20:1 with water, a $15 bottle lasts... years? I also use Vallejo Airbrush thinner, mostly with Citadel paints, but that that just counts as paint, because it reduces the amount of paint I consume.

I don't know why a lot of people feel the "need" to use mediums. I think they can be helpful, and I've experimented with a huge chunk of the Liquitex and Vallejo products, but so often, plain tapwater works great to thin paint. I would really suggest trying a wet palette, if you struggle with paint consistency and paint being too thick. Try either a DIY (tupperware, napkins, and parchment paper) or the P3 one which is really inexpensive.

I am pretty sure that paints dry faster now than they did 20+ years ago, by design. But I don't see this as a negative; I'd rather have my paint dry quickly, so that I put on another layer. The model now for most acrylic painting is layers and glazes on top of each other, and in these cases, fast drying is a huge benefit.

For wet blending small areas, you don't really need to add anything, if you're relatively quick. If you're wet blending a large area... my advice is, try to avoid it, because consistency is hard, no matter what drying retarder and such that you use. You're better off feathering, glazing, being satisfied with another intermediate layer, or use an airbrush. I use a tiny bit of Lahmian medium when I do eyes, lettering, or really fine lines where I want a little softer paint, but it's a really, really small amount.

My paint collection is relatively small, although I do have a fair number of different mediums. I don't paint in sufficient volume to really drain bottles, so I don't need to restock often. I probably only spend $10-30 annually (really depends on the year) on painting supplies, as I usually tack a few onto whatever orders I place during the Black Friday/Cyber Monday web sales that usually cover my model purchases for the year.

Cost does factor in, which is why I don't generally buy GW - AP Warpaints and the various Vallejo lines have treated me well, thus far. GW is all I can get locally, though, so on the rare occasion I feel that I need a paint, and quickly, I'll just grab a pot from the FLGS. Price per volume isn't as big a concern as price per bottle, for me. As mentioned, I don't use them up quickly so I'm really paying per color, not per ml/oz.

As for the brush/airbrush split, both types cross over (I brush on VMA metallics, I thin and airbrush VGC), so I'd never really calculate it that way. My most recent order was split pretty evenly - 3 VMA metallics, 3 Panzer Aces flesh tones, and a spot of black PU primer to darken up their grey.

This is about a year old picture of my paint collection that is woefully outdated:



My Tamiya collection has more than doubled since this picture and I've added a bunch of other random stuff (lots of AK-Interactive and MiG enamels). I also have a drawer full of oil paints (mainly 502 Abteilung for weathering/filters/washes and cheap artists oils for everything else) and various pigments. I don't know how much I've spent on paint, but I know it's a pretty hefty amount. However, cost doesn't concern me too much.

Since I have such a large selection of paints, buying new ones doesn't often factor into a commission job. At most, I'll have to get a couple of new paints or restock what I have which doesn't cost a bunch.

Im down to less than $100 a year now.

I only need to buy replacement pots for those that have run dry, which is really only a few a year. Theres only a few base colors I use enough of to really run dry on-- Black, Balthasar Gold, Waaagh! Flesh, Army Painter Soft and Dark Tone...

After that, its just keeping a supply of primer and brushes.

For me it is much less than the others. Starting out, I spent a lot to amass my collection. Now that I have most everything I need I only need to replace a few pots here and there (maybe 20 per year) As far as brushes go since I have bought "The Masters Brush Cleaner and Preserver" I have not purchased another brush (really great, buy this)

At the end of the year if I spend MAYBE 50 dollars.

When I was painting, paint and supplies were minimal compared to the value of labor. Always been this way. You can get a lot of paint for $100 or so. Brushes and tools are not very expensive. I'd guess $100 to get started, another $100 in follow-on expenses, and $50 annually in consumables.

About the only thing that burns money is spray primer - that stuff goes fast and can be a little expensive if you're buying good primer. Even so, a rattle can covers a lot of models.

I'm seriously thinking Army Painter colored spray primer for my next project.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
When I was painting, paint and supplies were minimal compared to the value of labor. Always been this way. You can get a lot of paint for $100 or so. Brushes and tools are not very expensive. I'd guess $100 to get started, another $100 in follow-on expenses, and $50 annually in consumables.

About the only thing that burns money is spray primer - that stuff goes fast and can be a little expensive if you're buying good primer. Even so, a rattle can covers a lot of models.

I'm seriously thinking Army Painter colored spray primer for my next project.

"Labor" is a great irony for me. I would pay money to have more time to paint In guess I do -- I pay people to do all sorts of stuff that I could do myself, so that I get more hobby time.

I highly recommend an airbrush over the AP colored primers. The AP colored primers are ok if you paint very little, but are inferior to airbrush priming in almost every meaningful way, including cost, if you do enough models to collect, say, a typical 40k army.

Thanks for the input on AP primer.

I would estimate about £2-4 a week on average.

Minimachine wrote:
BONUS QUESTION: Is it normal to form emotional attachments to inanimate objects such as brushes?

I do have a little pot of scorched brown that is my bestest ever friend and I will never ever throw away.
I feed it the blood of other, lesser Scorched Brown pots to keep it sustained.