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That said... what is the best brand of Kolinsky sable?
I've been buying W&N for years, you never really lose the point but the bristles do vanish under heavy usage.
I bought a set of D'Artsians, thinking they were pure sable, turns out they are synthetic. Knew it as soon as I dipped it in water, the bristles bunch up in a distinctive way.
da Vinici's seem like overkill. Could use some advice.
I think everybody builds a preference. But W&N 7s and Raphael 8404s are almost universally recognized as some of the best brands for Kolinsky brushes.
Some people are loving Artis Opus brushes, but I find their lengthy and lack of snappiness makes them rough to "sketch" quickly and roughly with, and there are some cheaper brands like Handover that do really well for their price point.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/03/21 07:24:57
queen_annes_revenge wrote: As usual, there's a middle ground that we should be able to reach here. Of course, technique comes first. Once you have that, then you can work out which brushes are best for you. A sable brush won't make you a master painter, but if you have developed your skills, then quality sable brushes will definitely be something you can try out.
You don't even have to be a master painter to benefit from better brushes, though. I'm by no means a 'master' painter (I don't have the patience to paint at that level) but I use sable brushes for detail work because I find them so much easier to get neat results with.
As has been discussed though, it depends in your definition of ethical in this context.
The following have been points that I noticed, or have inferred from other sources, that could influence ethics.
Are the animals killed humanely?
Are the animals hunted in a sustainable manner? Once killed are the animals utilized as far as they could be?
What is the absolute carbon footprint of a kolinsky brush? What is the carbon footprint compared to some other kind of brush? What is the relative contribution of a kolinsky brush compared to the other materials that already make up the hobby?
Does the hunt represent a significant portion of a relevant person's livelihood?
Are paint brushes made from dead animals particularly needed? Could they be effectively replaced by another source?
And at the end of it all, each person needs to derive their own opinion and either buy kolinsky sable brushes, or not.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I suppose in comparison to other protests against the use of fur in fashion, protests against kolinsky brushes by throwing paint on them are unlikely to be as effective...
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2020/03/21 21:43:03
Please excuse any spelling errors. I use a tablet frequently and software keyboards are a pain!
Power Elephant wrote: Personaly I simply can't produce results over a ceritan level without a kolinsky brush. Synthetic stuff simply isn't good enough. As far as animal death is concerned I couldn't care less as long as it doesn't effect the overal population negatively.
Don't take it personally, but true craftsmen never blame his tools.
Bull crap. Tools DO make a difference. But a superbly skilled master can produce a moderately good result with greater effort with inferior tools/materials but he will produce more and better quality results for less effort with the proper tools.
skchsan wrote: I'll chime in my pro-synthetic here again. Kolinsky's are top tier brushes in the market, and it is a waste of brush to use them for acrylic paints IMO. Kolinsky's will only last if you use them for water color only.
By nature, acrylic paints are permanent unlike water color and oil paints. Whatever you do, no brush can be cleaned 100%. The solvents used to get acrylic gunks are harsh enough the damage the bristles.
In the long run, cheap, disposable synthetic brushes will run you the same amount, if not less, money compared to a full kolinsky set. And it doesn't kill any animal.
I can get about 20 round 00 synthetics for a price of W&N kolinsky round 00. And each brush lasts me a week of heavy painting and 3-4 months for moderate use.
I've been saying this for years and tried to explain it to one local guy but he really couldn't wrap his head around the economy of it. He kept telling me that with moderate use and a strict care routine his brush would last him a year or two. This was a guy that constantly craps on airbrushing and claims it's not worth the time to clean up, despite having never even held an airbrush. I asked him how long it takes to clean once and he told me 30 minutes at least lol.
I tried expensive and cheap brushes. Never really thought the expensive brushes were worth the price, they are meant for water color applied to paper, not poked and prodded into tight gaps made of hard plastic or metal, often with rough texture. It gets even worse when you use metallics which shred natural fibers. Folks can buy what they feel happy with at the end of the day, but I try to encourage folks to try out different things, I mean for the longest time when I started I thought I needed a size 0 or even 000 to get small details only to be frustrated as paint always dried to the tip and didn't transfer to the models, I now do 90% of my painting, detail included with a size 1 or 2 (also synthetic). Plus as you get into enamels and oils as you expand your techniques you don't want natural fiber anyway or you will ruin it with the solvents.
That said I am always trying to get faster without sacrificing quality, and with speed comes rough use and it just ain't worth the price for me since I will ruin the tip on any brush under the sun (Seriously, I never split brushes but always curl the tip lmao).
Power Elephant wrote: Personaly I simply can't produce results over a ceritan level without a kolinsky brush. Synthetic stuff simply isn't good enough. As far as animal death is concerned I couldn't care less as long as it doesn't effect the overal population negatively.
Don't take it personally, but true craftsmen never blame his tools.
Bull crap. Tools DO make a difference. But a superbly skilled master can produce a moderately good result with greater effort with inferior tools/materials but he will produce more and better quality results for less effort with the proper tools.
There are two extremes here, you don't want to drive a horse drawn covered wagon to work but you also don't need a formula 1 racer to make good time. Acrylic miniature painting is facilitated by a brush that has a good belly and tip, both of which are found in synthetic or natural fiber brushes. Biggest defining difference between the two IMO are the snap of the bristles, I like a firm brush and often find natural hair brushes to have too much slop which slows me down.
I can get about 20 round 00 synthetics for a price of W&N kolinsky round 00. And each brush lasts me a week of heavy painting and 3-4 months for moderate use.
I have a sable detail brush that I've been using since 2012...
I have a synthetic detail brush from 09 at least, that's the brush with the easiest work load.
Power Elephant wrote: Personaly I simply can't produce results over a ceritan level without a kolinsky brush. Synthetic stuff simply isn't good enough. As far as animal death is concerned I couldn't care less as long as it doesn't effect the overal population negatively.
Don't take it personally, but true craftsmen never blame his tools.
Ok, here's some planks, some nails and a banana to drive them in, go build me a box.
This is flat out stupid mate. Replace banana with box-store fiberglass handled hammer as opposed to hand forged hammer. Most of the price on sable hair brushes comes from the insanity it takes to make them.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2020/03/22 20:12:02
I'm amazed they work out of Lowestoft! Never thought that place would have a brush making factory!
Also interesting to see they use those overhead lights the same way I do - just for the light and not the magnifier (at least I didn't see any of them with the magnifier cover up in the panning shots)
I get the feeling from reading these comments that an issue we have is that we are always using brushes designed for something other than we are using them for. We have a huge range of paints designed for painting war game minis but the brushes we use were all designed for conventional artistic purposes
Racerguy180 wrote: The funny thing is, all of this talk about how good they are, hasnt answered the question is it ethical.
The continued existence of humans is unethical, are we really going to worry about brushes?
As for me, I will use the right tool/item/foodstuffs for the right job regardless of the feelings of some sanctimonious twit on the internet. We have controls to keep species from being Dodo-ed out of existence, though they don't always work the way we want in certain countries, so I'm not concerned the volume of nerds using sable hair brushes will result in the extinction of a life form whose defining traits include massive reproductive volumes.
Red Corsair wrote:I've been saying this for years and tried to explain it to one local guy but he really couldn't wrap his head around the economy of it. He kept telling me that with moderate use and a strict care routine his brush would last him a year or two. This was a guy that constantly craps on airbrushing and claims it's not worth the time to clean up, despite having never even held an airbrush. I asked him how long it takes to clean once and he told me 30 minutes at least lol.
I don't think your local guy knows what he's doing. I buy my Raphaels for $15 apiece, they last me one to two years. My 'strict care routine' is thirty seconds to swirl the brush in soap at the end of my painting. My experience with synthetics is that either I get really cheap ones and they curl almost immediately, or I get more expensive ones and they still become unusable quicker than the sable brushes. In the meantime I find the sable brushes feel better, behaving less like a pen and more like a brush, and hold better points.
But I think what makes the sable brushes the better buy is versatility. For the price of a tiny synthetic brush to do eyes and fine detail, a moderate size for layering, and a big one for basecoats, I can just buy a Raphael that does all three roles better, and typically lasts longer despite being used in all three roles. For me at least the economy is clear- it's not just buying a more expensive brush that lasts longer, it's a more expensive brush that lasts longer, works better, and is ultimately cheaper than the myriad of brushes it can outright replace.
RE: 'technique comes first', I have taught several people how to paint, and the ones whom I've started on sable brushes have learned more quickly and produced better results than those who started on synthetics. There are a number of properties to natural hair that I would argue reduce the learning burden on new painters.
Power Elephant wrote: Personaly I simply can't produce results over a ceritan level without a kolinsky brush. Synthetic stuff simply isn't good enough. As far as animal death is concerned I couldn't care less as long as it doesn't effect the overal population negatively.
Don't take it personally, but true craftsmen never blame his tools.
Come over to my place and show me how I can put concentric holes in hardened tool steel using my cheap Harbor Freight special drill press and bargain-basement Chinese drill bits. I find the patterns they make on the metal as the bits wiggle and bend in their less-than-stable armature to be almost artistic.
'Bad craftsmen blame their tools' is one of those chestnuts of 'wisdom' that I really hate. Crap tools don't make a novice a master, but there's only so much a master can do with crap tools.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2020/03/23 19:26:39
Back to the OP’s question about if use of natural sable hair is ethical, I would ask why just question the use of natural sable hair?
Is the use of synthetic bristles ethical? They come from petroleum and I assume you know what goes into the recovery, transport and refining of petroleum.
What about the brush handle? If made of plastic, see above. If made of wood, was it “responsibly” sourced or from illegal clear cutting.
What about the carbon footprint of making such brushes whether natural hair or synthetic?
Also consider the paints you use and there manufacture. What about the rattle can you use? What about the miniatures you paint.
What are health risks and safety hazards are the workers who produce these things exposed to or chronically suffer from? Watching the video on making brushes makes me think that person is destined for some kind of Repetitive Stress Injury or Illness at the very least.
What about the waste this whole hobby produces from manufacture, to FLGS to you? (Got a secret tip for you, those boxes the minis come in, the plastic around them, and the left over plastic bits are really not getting recycled). By the way, don’t look to close at the life cycle of the glue you use (whether CA or plastic cement).
But then for that matter what about the practices employed to make the computer or smart phone you used to post to this forum. Think of how many underage kids were employed (enslaved) to make some part of it, what environmentally unsustainably practice was used to get and refine the rare earth metals used as base components?
If you really are opposed to the use of natural sable hair in your paint brush then you likely should be opposed to the whole hobby and use of this forum as from some perspective is it contributing to the destruction of the bio-sphere for what is essentially a non-essential luxury past time.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/03/23 20:15:14
"Preach the gospel always, If necessary use words." ~ St. Francis of Assisi
yeah, but is trapping ethical? I'm all for hunting and have most of my life, I've never set a trap, always stalked and killed with the chance I might not bag my quarry.
do you understand what kind of death a trap is? rather than sitting there one minute and the next nothing, you basically sit there and either wait for the trapper to come check the lines or die from starvation/internal injuries, infection etc
Racerguy180 wrote: yeah, but is trapping ethical? I'm all for hunting and have most of my life, I've never set a trap, always stalked and killed with the chance I might not bag my quarry.
do you understand what kind of death a trap is? rather than sitting there one minute and the next nothing, you basically sit there and either wait for the trapper to come check the lines or die from starvation/internal injuries, infection etc
In the latter days of Carter/early days of Reagan my family trapped animals for food along with hunting. Having pulled some out of traps who took the clamp to the head I can tell you most assuredly the result was instantaneous.
Trapping can be ethical however it relies upon strict guidelines and trap designs. Ergo traps that make effective and reliable kills; keepers/trappers who regularly check traps. The UK even has mandatory time limits within which traps must be checked - I forget what they are its either 12 or 24 hours.
Of course one aspect of trappers and keepers is that being in the countryside they are somewhat a law unto themselves in that lots happens out there that never gets seen. So enforcement can be quite a tricky thing. Though by and large effective trapping works in their favour too - especially for something where they want the animal as intact and undamaged as possible. If the animal were badly caught and left too long in a trap without checking it could damage/destroy its tail and the hairs in a bid to escape. Thus resulting in no resource for the trapper.
Lord of Deeds wrote: Back to the OP’s question about if use of natural sable hair is ethical, I would ask why just question the use of natural sable hair?
I tried to explain this earlier. Sables (and most other weasels) are vicious predators that will kill humans under the right conditions. They like to eat children. They often carry disease. They breed like crazy, not unlike Nutria.
The ethical question has nothing to do with brushes, it has to do with not keeping your neighbors safe.
If turning these weasels into brushes is how we manage the population, using such a brush is a right and proper action. Unless you just hate people, which is a much more serious ethical dilemma.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/03/24 13:55:29
Lord of Deeds wrote: Back to the OP’s question about if use of natural sable hair is ethical, I would ask why just question the use of natural sable hair?
I tried to explain this earlier. Sables (and most other weasels) are vicious predators that will kill humans under the right conditions. They like to eat children. They often carry disease. They breed like crazy, not unlike Nutria.
The ethical question has nothing to do with brushes, it has to do with not keeping your neighbors safe.
If turning these weasels into brushes is how we manage the population, using such a brush is a right and proper action. Unless you just hate people, which is a much more serious ethical dilemma.
...Kolinskies (Siberian weasels) feed on insects and, opportunistically, on small birds. They're hunted for their fur, and when overpopulation poses a threat to game bird farms. I am not aware of any recorded instances of a Siberian weasel killing a child, let alone an adult.
The average weight of an adult Siberian weasel is just over a pound. Are you confusing them with something else?
What would they use the pelts for if not brushes?
The cull is likely to happen anyway. Using as much of the animal as possible is always better than burning or burying it.
Lord of Deeds wrote: Back to the OP’s question about if use of natural sable hair is ethical, I would ask why just question the use of natural sable hair?
I tried to explain this earlier. Sables (and most other weasels) are vicious predators that will kill humans under the right conditions. They like to eat children. They often carry disease. They breed like crazy, not unlike Nutria.
The ethical question has nothing to do with brushes, it has to do with not keeping your neighbors safe.
If turning these weasels into brushes is how we manage the population, using such a brush is a right and proper action. Unless you just hate people, which is a much more serious ethical dilemma.
...Kolinskies (Siberian weasels) feed on insects and, opportunistically, on small birds. They're hunted for their fur, and when overpopulation poses a threat to game bird farms. I am not aware of any recorded instances of a Siberian weasel killing a child, let alone an adult.
The average weight of an adult Siberian weasel is just over a pound. Are you confusing them with something else?
I had a ferret chew on my daughter's head when she was an infant. Escaped from an enclosure on my neighbors property, got in through a window. It was pretty light and usually dined on feed, kind of cute when it's whiskers were not covered in blood.
Not getting ferrets confused with other weasels, stating the proper relationship is to treat all weasels like part of nature. Nature is unrelenting, vicious and will kill you given the chance.
There is no right or wrong when it comes to dealing with something that will kill you. Doesn't matter if it's an imminent or distant threat, there's not really an ethics to it.
Soo Techsoldatens solution to nature is to exterminatus everything alive except humans (except humans are, these days in many developed nations the MOST dangerous and likely thing to cause you harm...).
Of course any animal can be a threat given the right situation, however in the grand scheme of things most things like ferrets, sabels, and suchlike are not a huge threat to human life nor habitation. That is unless we get a zombie ferret plague going with super fast breeding ferrets that hatch like mice and mature in minutes. ..
In general, I don't think it's unethical to use animals, even to the extent of killing them, if doing so improves human life. Obviously, we all have our own definition for where to draw the line, from veganism up to dog fighting. For most of us, I think the key is that the animal product is used, that it it is harvested humanely, and that it remains sustainable.
There is no right or wrong when it comes to dealing with something that will kill you. Doesn't matter if it's an imminent or distant threat, there's not really an ethics to it.
And yet humans hold unique power over nature just now. Pretty much every animal.plant and human in the world has the potential to kill you as an individual, and yet we as a society tend to get grumpy with people who take it upon themselves to "protect" themselves by killing everything around them. Ethics is most definately the study of the actions that are within the power of an individual.or a society with the aim to determine the actions that are acceptable and the actions that are unacceptable.
Defence of self or other against imminent threat is one thing. As an extreme example I would suggest that most people would take issue with a person taking a sack full of baby ferrets and dropping them into a wood chipper for sexual gratification. Sure you could do it, and even take the approach that you are defending future persons, but I would suggest that its ethics and society's consensus on right and wrong that indicated that the latter is an pretty horrible idea.
Anyway, I'm not philosopher. Here is a link i found that seems interesting and vaguely relevant.
Overread wrote: Soo Techsoldatens solution to nature is to exterminatus everything alive except humans (except humans are, these days in many developed nations the MOST dangerous and likely thing to cause you harm...).
Of course any animal can be a threat given the right situation, however in the grand scheme of things most things like ferrets, sabels, and suchlike are not a huge threat to human life nor habitation. That is unless we get a zombie ferret plague going with super fast breeding ferrets that hatch like mice and mature in minutes. ..
Exterminating a breed of animals would be excessive. I'm saying there's no ethics to it, at least not one that can be applied consistently.
I like dogs. People in other countries like dogs for dinner. Would I ever kill a dog and eat it? No, unless it was a last resort. My friends from Asia and the South Pacific would not care, they've brought me canned dog and tried to get me to eat it.
There's no right or wrong to it. The people who pretend an ethic exists are doing so to make themselves feel superior. The few times there's a clear right and wrong, the people who should do something about it do not.
The point about people being the most dangerous and likely thing to cause you harm... that depends where you live. If you measure your safety based on national statistics, sure, people in urban areas enjoy murdering each other, it has something to do with being densely packed in a suffocating environment where your worth is based on synthetic metrics related to assets and profession. If you measure your safety based on proximity to the thing that ate your neighbor, you might have a different perspective.
It's not lost on me that people in cities tend to be the ones running their mouths the most about ethics and animals. And they tend not to care about dog meat, their ethics extends solely to people they can boss around.