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I noticed that myself once, although I assumed they had kits stored that come out when needed. Proper equipment sets for airbrushing can be several hundred dollars, so it wouldn't surprise me if they have just a couple that get taken out when needed. Then again, maybe not. BTP have a reputation for running through painters rather quickly, so whether they have them use their own equipment or provide that much is hard to say.

At the moment I'm actually running the numbers on my first couple years doing this so that I can get a loan to expand. Little place and a couple new painters first, but each will damn well get access to a set of airbrush gear, as you can't do this job properly without them.

they probably have a couple hidden away in a booth somewhere I know they have a large garage area where they do rattle can sporaying for scenery. not sure what the us health and safety would be, but im pretty sure they would not be allowed to have an airbrush on there normal desks out in the open.

The thing that bugs me the most about them, they didn't even stay in the damn lines on the head gear. My god my kid is 3 and tells me to stay in the lines -_-

Please dont say y'all, its just horrible.

Well an airbrush is needed to produce good quality results pretty fast... so I guess BTP doesn't need one since they are not producing neither quality nor fast results.

 cerbrus2 wrote:

 changerofways wrote:
I think some important numbers to post, ill put them up in the OP as well.

Model cost: 129.94
Painting cost: 123.89
Assembly Cost: 23.47
Decorative Bases: 11.61
Total cost: 288.91 for wages/supplies expenses
The other $95 I paid was their profit.

I got $60 off the 288.91 and $60 of what was the $155 profits payment, for a total of ~$325 out of my wallet.

How much was that daemon prince model, And was it a Scribor Mini as A squad of Chaos space marines plus Thousand sons upgrade pack is only $58 dollors, Providing that was US prices you put down. If the daemon p[rince had exstencive work done for converting etc then the model prices would not be that bad.

From the one picture I'm able to access the Daemon prince is the Hi-Tech Miniatures Archfather Samael model which costs about 30 dollars. Although I can't see the entire model in the image (top missing) I can't see any conversion work done at all (and assuming the wings are on the model these come with it).

Broken links, but I copied and pasted them to see what all the fuss is about. Fundamentally, these aren't THAT BAD of a paint job. It's a great tabletop standard level. On par with a lot of the stuff posted in this forum. They're not perfect, but it's also far from noobsville. And I've seen worse commission work posted here.

For the pricing...I wonder what all these guys who say they could do better for less charge. I'm not a commission painter, and just simply enjoy painting my own stuff for my own collection. I don't want to be a commission painter.

Are commission painters who charge less doing this as a full-time job? Or on the side with their primary income from a real day job?

I would think painting high-quality work for cheap prices would be a complete waste of time. This is just me, but why not get a second job? Why bust your butt making great work for anyone but yourself if you're charging very low prices for your time, which is valuable. I couldn't do it, I'd get a little disenfranchised if I was selling my hard work for crummy prices. Just saying.

I mean, what does the dollar-per-hour breakdown become if you're spending many hours making awesome stuff for someone? I wouldn't work for 5 bucks an hour. Even if I loved painting miniatures, and I do love to paint miniatures. I've heard BTP pays their painters around $8 per hour and I wouldn't work for them at those low wages.

I guess if you have a primary job and do commission work on the side for reasonable prices (and I do agree these prices are high for BTP's work, I wouldn't pay them these prices for this work), and you enjoy doing it, more power to you.

You can bash BTP all you want, and it seems quite the popular thing to do around here. But, you gotta hand it to the guy for founding a successful business that apparently has customers.

 Cave_Dweller wrote:
Broken links, but I copied and pasted them to see what all the fuss is about. Fundamentally, these aren't THAT BAD of a paint job. It's a great tabletop standard level. On par with a lot of the stuff posted in this forum. They're not perfect, but it's also far from noobsville. And I've seen worse commission work posted here.
You can bash BTP all you want, and it seems quite the popular thing to do around here. But, you gotta hand it to the guy for founding a successful business that apparently has customers.

I watched the video and the guy named some reasons for using BTP... One of them was the high level of security they have in their building. They have alarms, motion detectors, cameras but they have no airbrush, I guess motion detectors help more in miniature painting than an airbrush.... They go throught 3 quality control checks and 26 steps from start to finish before you get your minis and still they manage to produce that kind of crappy results.

 cerbrus2 wrote:

 changerofways wrote:
I think some important numbers to post, ill put them up in the OP as well.

Model cost: 129.94
Painting cost: 123.89
Assembly Cost: 23.47
Decorative Bases: 11.61
Total cost: 288.91 for wages/supplies expenses
The other $95 I paid was their profit.

I got $60 off the 288.91 and $60 of what was the $155 profits payment, for a total of ~$325 out of my wallet.

How much was that daemon prince model, And was it a Scribor Mini as A squad of Chaos space marines plus Thousand sons upgrade pack is only $58 dollors, Providing that was US prices you put down. If the daemon p[rince had exstencive work done for converting etc then the model prices would not be that bad.

Sorry it took me so long to reply to this. The DP was only $33. I bought 12 thousand sons but the upgrade pack has only 9 and the CSM kit only 10 models, so I believe the other $40 comes from the 3 extra tson upgrades and 2 extra CSM models and shipping costs for the plastic.

Got no prior bias against BTP here, but I gotta agree those models are pretty sub par for what you paid. Tabletop standard sure, but I'd even say lower tabletop - and this is a guy who averages 30 minutes of painting per model

Seriously, try some of those commission painters on here. The Necrons on page one are a great example of what I'd expect from commission work - if BTP (or any other company) is going to take six months and give you that quality for that much money, you'd be better off hiring someone who actually cares about their work.

My 2 cents. Not taking away from anyone who does commissions. Doesn't paying someone to pretty much assemble/ paint etc. just take away about 75% of what the hobby really is ?

Yikes. You paid that much for that paintjob? I can do better than that, and I'm not even that impresive of a painter. I hope you're happy with them.

Absolutely shocking. How can they charge that much for something that abysmal???

 Sammoth wrote:
My 2 cents. Not taking away from anyone who does commissions. Doesn't paying someone to pretty much assemble/ paint etc. just take away about 75% of what the hobby really is ?

No. It doesn't. For some, the hobby is playing games, and the whole 'assemble and paint' thing is just a pita. For others, they may have a disability that means they can't paint themselves, but still want to participate. For others,they may want to pay for something a bit special, beyond their own skill level. Funnily enough, everyone is different...

^This

Nobody should just assume their version of the hobby is the right one

 Capamaru wrote:

 Cave_Dweller wrote:
Broken links, but I copied and pasted them to see what all the fuss is about. Fundamentally, these aren't THAT BAD of a paint job. It's a great tabletop standard level. On par with a lot of the stuff posted in this forum. They're not perfect, but it's also far from noobsville. And I've seen worse commission work posted here.
You can bash BTP all you want, and it seems quite the popular thing to do around here. But, you gotta hand it to the guy for founding a successful business that apparently has customers.

I watched the video and the guy named some reasons for using BTP... One of them was the high level of security they have in their building. They have alarms, motion detectors, cameras but they have no airbrush, I guess motion detectors help more in miniature painting than an airbrush.... They go throught 3 quality control checks and 26 steps from start to finish before you get your minis and still they manage to produce that kind of crappy results.

That was a pretty bad video. Almost as bad as their painting service.

BOOM!

Sorry OP.

I know you said you like them but I feel that these were way too rushed. As if they forgot about them then decided to rush them out immediately.

 Eggs wrote:

 Sammoth wrote:
My 2 cents. Not taking away from anyone who does commissions. Doesn't paying someone to pretty much assemble/ paint etc. just take away about 75% of what the hobby really is ?

No. It doesn't. For some, the hobby is playing games, and the whole 'assemble and paint' thing is just a pita. For others, they may have a disability that means they can't paint themselves, but still want to participate. For others,they may want to pay for something a bit special, beyond their own skill level. Funnily enough, everyone is different...

Like I said it's my 2 cents = Opinion about it. However, I did not look at it in the form that people may be disabled. I agree everyone is different. I was just giving my personal opinion on it.

I'm new to painting miniatures and the hobby in general. Maybe I'm OCD, but a lot of things should have been corrected and/or caught by so called quality control. I would be ashamed to charge someone for a paint job because I'm simply not that good. In looking at these models I feel I could have achieved the same result myself with less time and no cost.