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So, ever since I discovered the little god-machine called an airbrush, I have noticed something in person and online.
People hating on airbrushing and work done with an airbrush. By my local "Friends" at gaming nights, whenever I told a few of an effect was caused by an airbrush, they would get mad or say it was cheating.
I had one guy tell me that he is a better painter than me(He isn't) because he doesn't use an airbrush so his painting is more "Pure"
At a GW store, I was told by one of the regulars that airbrushing is "Pure Cancer" and shouldn't be allowed in the store(The owner had an airbrushed IMP Fists army he was working on)
When I look online, I see the same type of comments. one that stuck out was "Great, Another tutorial that uses an airbrush, why cant I find ones that use normal painting anymore"
Why the hate on airbrushing so much?

I think a lot of it, like the disdain for drybrushing in some quarters, comes from a lot of hobbyists' exposure being primarily the 'bad' stuff. Airbrushing, other than in the hands of a master, tends to be quite distinctive, and it's a style that many aren't fans of... And not knowing any better, they just assume that this is all airbrushes are capable of and write off the entire technique as a result.

There's also those (generally those who've never tried to do it) who think it's an easy shortcut (akin to just using a spray can) and therefore not on the same level as 'real' painting with a brush, which is perceived as requiring more skill. Which is, really, a little ignorant (since airbrushing is only easier for certain specific things) and a little weird...

At the end of the day, they're your miniatures. If you want to brush paint them, air brush them, or dip them in house paint, just do it. Paint for yourself, not the approval of others.

The real "cancer" is people shaming others by how they paint their miniatures.

If its is painted, just decent, who are you to say others that they are cheating? Or that they techniches are "cancer"?
Thats the kind of ignorant people that just don't want to learn new techniques.

Bad Airbrushing is bad airbrushing, just as painting bad is bad whenever the technique.

Ask how they got to the game store. If they respond with anything other than "I walked" accuse them of cheating.

Ask if they primed their army and if so, how. If they used a rattle can instead of a brush, express disdain and claim they cheated.

An airbrush is a tool. It is a piece of technology. It has strengths, but also significant limitations.

Best thread I ever saw on this topic was Doomthumbs' opinion on people who complained about dipping;

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/394884.page

Still makes me chuckle.

I heard one saying that vivid brush strokes feel more natural He wasn't hating on the airbrush in general though.

 insaniak wrote:
I think a lot of it, like the disdain for drybrushing in some quarters, comes from a lot of hobbyists' exposure being primarily the 'bad' stuff. Airbrushing, other than in the hands of a master, tends to be quite distinctive, and it's a style that many aren't fans of... And not knowing any better, they just assume that this is all airbrushes are capable of and write off the entire technique as a result.

There's also those (generally those who've never tried to do it) who think it's an easy shortcut (akin to just using a spray can) and therefore not on the same level as 'real' painting with a brush, which is perceived as requiring more skill. Which is, really, a little ignorant (since airbrushing is only easier for certain specific things) and a little weird...

At the end of the day, they're your miniatures. If you want to brush paint them, air brush them, or dip them in house paint, just do it. Paint for yourself, not the approval of others.

This is all that needs to be said. A lot of super well done miniatures start with an airbrush, and you'd never tell once completed.

I think most people who don't like airbrushing, don't necessarily hate the technique but rather don't like the transition heavy, overdone OSL look that took off a few years ago among commission painters.

Refusing to use an airbrush doesn't make you a "better" painter any more than refusing to use a hammer to drive in a nail makes you a better carpenter, in my opinion. You're just deliberately refusing to use a tool designed to make a certain job easier for the sake of boosting your ego, or just to say you can. I can respect someone who just wants the challenge, but for everyone else it's hobby elitism and nothing more.

The right way to respond to airbrushing is being happy that someone painted their army, which if anything is the REAL "cancer" of this hobby (second to the extremely negative and elitist community), if you're going to call anything about it "cancer" in the first place. And I'm saying that as someone who hasn't painted anything in years. I always found it incredibly irritating how everyone shames people for playing with unpainted armies or never bothering to paint at all, while also condemning the use of drybrushing or dipping techniques, or the use of an airbrush, to get an army painted up. You don't get to lament about people not putting in the "bare minimum" to get an army done and then give them gak for not doing it to Golden Demon quality, with only "approved" tools and techniques.

I notice this also. I was even told after a local painting comp by a GW manager that by using an airbrush for a blend on a weapon it "almost cost me the win" such was the hate people have for airbrushing.

In other events I've also experienced people going to great lengths to ensure I knew their models were painted "by hand".

It's almost as if people think that airbrushes just spray a fully painted model in one go!

Don't we have this discussion every few months?

Some people don't like airbrushes because they don't like the look it produces when used to create exaggerated blends. Some people don't like it because they feel it's "cheating".

At the end of the day, feth 'em, it's just another tool and if it gives you a look you like then go for it.

ingtaer wrote:
Best thread I ever saw on this topic was Doomthumbs' opinion on people who complained about dipping;

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/394884.page

Still makes me chuckle.

Oh my, what an insane thread! Haha

I hate airbrushes and paintbrushes equally and have taken to keeping my miniatures free of the impurity of paint.

When people ask me how I paint fast, or ask for advice on painting armies etc...my answer is simple: "Cheat".

Would you rather see an army of grey plastic across the table or something painted? My entire army is dipped (outside of vehicles) and hell yes I'll continue to cheat. My goal is simple - not to "lower" the level of the game aesthetic when I place models on the table --- my group happens to consist of excellent painters and people who take the table very seriously, as I do. We love great terrain and nicely painted minis.

I'm not entering painting competitions, so I will continue to "cheat" as often and as thoroughly as possible.

The only caveat here is that with so much fantastic stuff available, I find people have less and less excuses to not actually paint their damn minis. If you can spray paint a Space Marine a bas colour...paint his bolt gun and eyes and dip it...and then throw grass on the base, you have no excuse.

Never encountered such snobbery myself.

They're a mighty useful tool, especially if you like your tanks or Maureens - you can get your base coat on in pretty much no time.

It's jealousy. You have a nice tool that makes your life easier, and they do not. Therefore, you are a bad person and you minis are bad because it's unfair that you should have something nice because you were willing to spend money and learn a skill.

They feel you are trying to force them to buy a thing, because if they don't they can't keep up (with either the speed or quality of the paint job), and it's ALL about keeping up with the Joneses.

The very fact that one guy insisted he's a 'better' painter is pretty much proof of that. A 'better' painter doesn't turn up his nose at what works. Some effects would take hours with a hair brush that takes minutes with an air brush. That doesn't make it 'cheating' to use an airbrush, that makes it SMART to use an airbrush.

I don't find the style of "OMG OSL EVEYWHERE" I often see with airbrush armies all that appealing.

Other than my preference NOT to have MY armies painted that way, whatever helps kill off the hoard of unpainted mini's I am all for.

Your hobby, your money, your time, your life. Spend it how you will.

Just kill the unpainted mini's first...

Airbrushing is a tool in the arsenal. I have no issue with it, just like dry brushing. What I do have issue with is when it's the only thing done to a model and people act like it's beautiful. Some people get blinded by the amazing blends and highlights that can be produced and don't even notice that not a single detail is picked out or painted. Bleh.

It seems this thread pops up every month in the Painting and Modeling forum, I think its been discussed ad nauseam. Lets all go tell H.R. Giger's ghost that airbrushing is cheating.

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:
What I do have issue with is when it's the only thing done to a model and people act like it's beautiful. Some people get blinded by the amazing blends and highlights that can be produced and don't even notice that not a single detail is picked out or painted. Bleh.

That right there is your problem, you get that right? You're saying they are wrong for finding something beautiful, because YOU know better.

I hate people who airbrush because I don't have one.
Seriously. I want one and want to learn to use one.
I just hate people who have the time money and talent to have already gotten that done.
Rot in hades you airbrushing baguettes!

Of all the things to worry about in this world, to airbrush or not to airbrush is not one of them. They're your models. Roll them in glitter.

 dracpanzer wrote:
I don't find the style of "OMG OSL EVEYWHERE" I often see with airbrush armies all that appealing.

Too true. I feel many people's exposure to airbrushing is from various "studios" that'll slap a load of OSL and other gak on the latest GW release they've knocked out in a weekend just to be the first to have a painted example of it and it frankly is a terrible example of the art.

Personally I think not only is an airbrush cheating, but so is a handbrush.

All my models are exclusively finger painted, and anyone who uses tools to apply paint isn't a real painter.

When I first started, 30 years ago, I had to make my own brushes from harvested cat fur and take-out chopsticks, I volunteered to clean chalkboard after school so that I could make white paint. We didn't have Spartans, we had to blow pigment through straws...and only had one of those. I consider any other technique to be cheating


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Seriously though, do whatever brings you the most satisfaction and ignore the naysayers. I use mine mostly for associating which delivers better results in less time. Obviously, just because you can e.g. OSL, doesn't mean you should

Anyone who thinks any method of decorating wargaming miniaures is "cheating" is an idiot. It's all about the end result.

Choose oil paints and turps, choose cheap craft-store acrylics or "proper" miniature paints, choose airbrushing. Choose free-hand painting unit emblems or decals, it's all the same in the end.

I chose heroin instead ... no, wait, wrong script, sorry.

The final result is all that matters. As long as you enjoyed yourself getting there, anyone who complains you did it the "easy" way is an idiot.

If by "cheating" they mean "having more free time to engage in other activities", then yeah, sure, I guess.

I'm a brush guy myself, mostly because acquiring one o fthe better machines would put me out of funds for a bit and I just do it for its own sake of a zen moment.

 Zach wrote:
It seems this thread pops up every month in the Painting and Modeling forum, I think its been discussed ad nauseam. Lets all go tell H.R. Giger's ghost that airbrushing is cheating.

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:
What I do have issue with is when it's the only thing done to a model and people act like it's beautiful. Some people get blinded by the amazing blends and highlights that can be produced and don't even notice that not a single detail is picked out or painted. Bleh.

That right there is your problem, you get that right? You're saying they are wrong for finding something beautiful, because YOU know better.

Read my post again. I said "I have issue with" which is pretty up front in saying it's my problem. Keep your preachy assumptions in your own vapid skull, thanks.

This is Dakka...the most dangerous place to have an opinion.

 Elbows wrote:
This is Dakka...the most dangerous place to have an opinion.

Wasn't that North Korea?

 John Prins wrote:
It's jealousy. You have a nice tool that makes your life easier, and they do not. Therefore, you are a bad person and you minis are bad because it's unfair that you should have something nice because you were willing to spend money and learn a skill.

They feel you are trying to force them to buy a thing, because if they don't they can't keep up (with either the speed or quality of the paint job), and it's ALL about keeping up with the Joneses.

The very fact that one guy insisted he's a 'better' painter is pretty much proof of that. A 'better' painter doesn't turn up his nose at what works. Some effects would take hours with a hair brush that takes minutes with an air brush. That doesn't make it 'cheating' to use an airbrush, that makes it SMART to use an airbrush.

I honestly feel it might be this, atleast with my FLGS guys who complain that me and some friends also buy too much and pay to win the game.

IMO the problem is not the airbrush, it's the "LOOK AT ME I HAVE AN AIRBRUSH" style that is popular with certain minimal-talent commission painters. They want to make models that their customers aren't able to do on their own, but they don't want to spend any time on it. So what's the easiest solution? Make it incredibly obvious that an airbrush (which the customer doesn't own) was used to paint the models, but don't bother to spend any more time than absolutely necessary. So you get dramatic shading that has nothing to do with where areas of light and shadow would be on the real thing, "OSL" that is just giant blobs of white sprayed over every possible light/lens/plasma coil/vent/whatever with no concern given to where the emitted light would fall (or if the thing in question would even emit light at all), zero attention given to fine detail work, etc. It all looks like trash that should go straight into a bucket of paint stripper, but because the customer can't duplicate the airbrush "effects" and apparently don't know any better they're willing to hand over their wallets. And then even people who aren't doing commission painting duplicate the "LOOK AT ME I HAVE AN AIRBRUSH" style, probably on the mistaken assumption that if people are paying money for something it must be a style worth learning from.

In contrast to this you have the kind of subtle airbrush work that is often found on historical kits. The airbrush is a useful tool for getting smooth coats with no brush strokes and for certain weathering techniques, but there's also a ton of conventional brush work involved and you probably couldn't tell which parts involved an airbrush without a very careful inspection and significant knowledge of painting techniques. And I don't think anyone can complain that this kind of thing is "not real painting" or whatever.


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 Zach wrote:
That right there is your problem, you get that right? You're saying they are wrong for finding something beautiful, because YOU know better.

They know better, I know better, anyone with a basic understanding of painting can know better. A model with dramatic airbrushed highlights (usually done with no concern for realistic light and shadow, because good shading takes work) but zero attention given to detail work is unfinished trash.