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I’ve recently gotten back in the hobby. I’ve airbrushed once or twice with the GW paint (was mildly underwhelmed). Citadel was never a “go to” paint for me. This time my son (who got me back into this) wanted his minis based in a color couldn’t find a match in any other brand (considering my favorite brand has gone away. So we buy the paint. I fire up the compressor & open the bottle to mix. This stuff is twice as thick as I remember. I almost doubled my mixture to thin this stuff for my airbrush. ( I thin acrylic w/isopropyl alcohol) After the first couple minutes I had to change out my syphon tube because in the past I use an inline mesh strainer, it clogged! I’m asking what’s your mixing/thinning ritual for citadel paint?

I use lifecolour thinner to take it most of the way to usability and a drop or two of Vallejo flow improver.

I had acceptable results with Zamesi Desert Layer + Aircast thinner in an about 4:1 to 3:1 ratio. But I used one of these quite rudimentary airbrushes from Revell as I was doing large areas:


For a more professional airbrush one would have to find the exaxt nice place between 4:1 and 3:1 I guess.
In either case the result was better after long and intense stiring/shaking. Starting off with really getting in there with a disposable chopstick to get the thicker parts of the Citadel paint to mix.

I use Liquitex airbrush medium with a couple drops of Liquitex flow improver.

I've managed to airbrush GW skaven dinge or fur through a .2.

I mix the medium into the paint in a clear measuring cup (like the ones that come with liquid medicines). Then I let the paint roll up the side, then back down and I look at the level of opacity on the cup. If its covering well, and flowing, its good to airbrush.

Certain colors also I find will clog more easily than others, but even "air" paints from all manufacturers require some thinning IME.

I really struggled thinning Citadel paints. The big issue was different pigments thin differently, was never able to hit a universal thinning technique that worked reliably across all colors.

Pro Acryl doesn't seem to have this problem (and also works with a regular brush.) I pretty much use their stuff except for certain colors like Sons of Horus / Death Guard Green that are hard to reproduce.

That said, thinning acrylics, avoiding dry trip, getting things to dry evenly is pretty predictable once you understand what thinners, flow improver, etc actually do.

Found this video to be very helpful for understanding how to control the dynamics of acrylic paints.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpgEDMQyz0s

With Citadel specifically, I found isopropyl was really useful for paints coming from pots you've had open a little while. The paint gets a little thicker over time, about halfway through the pot. For me, that was the delta that was always changing, and a drop or two of isopropyl could make a big difference.

Thanks guys. Never was I considered “professionally painting”, but I did a bunch related to automotive & aviation work I’ve done, and I thought spraying DuPont Imron on a humid day was difficult. Other acrylics like tamyia I could 50/50 mix with isopropyl & go!