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Hey all! I imagine this is the billionth incarnation of this thread, but here goes!

So, this summer, for Emperor-knows-whatever reason, I've had loads of paint give out on me. Just go thick as all hell, and become unusable, even with my patented PoserMcBogus just-add-water-and-shake-it-up-a-bit-c'mon-I-just-want-to-finish-this-squad method for squeezing an extra few evenings out of my Mephiston Red.

With GW prices being what they are out here (along with shipping, which is equally ungenerous), I've decided it's probably about high time I took my business elsewhere. I honestly can't justify keeping replacing GW paints at the rate they charge, in the volumes of paint that has given up on me this summer.

But critically I don't really know much beyond GW, however. I've used a few tamiya paints in the past, but it mostly serves to remind me why I like GW stuff so much - Tamiya paints are formulated a little thicker, so they are a bit of a pain to work with on the palette and the mini, and they seem to dry slightly too quickly, too.

What I really like about the citadel range is mostly the texture of the paint - for the most part, it's easy to work with - brush, waterpot, lil mix, check excess and you're good to go. On top of that, I like how there's a differentiation between layers and bases, and they have simple-to-follow recipies for various colours because I'm stupid, and have lizard eyes that aren't really sure what brightening a colour looks like and I have a chronic tendency to second-guess myself.

With this in mind, anyone got any suggestions? I've at the very least heard of Army Painter and Vallejo, and I know there's a substantial part of the community who swears by "Any paint but GW", so I'm keen to be inducted into those ranks, too.

Cheers for stopping by, I look forward to any answers!

I have tried:

Vallejo, Like em
Reaper line, Like em
GreenStuff line, Like em
Citadel, paint it self I Like (I can't STAND, or sit, the plastic lids with plastic pin holder, end up twisting off whole cap) and (paint dries up on me in those weird plastic jars) overall Meh

Honestly, I can't tell difference between em, nothing stands out as amazing or pisspoor. So I will be of no help. sorry.
the only thing are the dreaded citadel paint jars and citadel paint seems to me a bit thicker than the rest, but that might be due to paint slowly thickening in the jar over time, until it is fully thick solid.

Big fan of Vallejo model colour range, not so keen on their metallics though. Like AP metallics and washes but not a fan of the rest of their range.
Never have an issue with drying out due to dropper bottles and putting a mixing bead in will prevent splitting (well, with shaking it as well).
Why not get a few of each range that is locally available and try them out?

Eh, honestly that you've said that they're thinner than citadel, and given some examples of companies is useful enough, friend! Thanks very much!

I will say I'm mostly unbothered by the citadel pots, but I can understand people's frustration - I've ripped more than my fair share of lids off trying to clean out the underside as it's been so caked in dried paint that I can't even close the top properly.

What are the colour selections like? Say I want some Rakarth Flesh and rhinox hide - would I be putting up with similiar analogues, but with minor differences, or is their range significantly different?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ingtaer wrote:
Big fan of Vallejo model colour range, not so keen on their metallics though. Like AP metallics and washes but not a fan of the rest of their range.
Never have an issue with drying out due to dropper bottles and putting a mixing bead in will prevent splitting (well, with shaking it as well).
Why not get a few of each range that is locally available and try them out?

I've thought about that, but being in the countryside, it's pretty much gundam paints or Tamiya or nothing. Tbf, I've not tried out the gundam stuff, yet...

Cheers for the reccommendation with Vallejo! Seems like their reputation is well-earned! Really appreciate the input with AP, too, had no idea of that at all!

One thing to bear in mind with AP is that they get packed with extra medium in the bottle that has to be squeezed out before use, still not a fan though as I find their coverage does not work for my painting style (or lack there of) but my brother swears by them.

My collection is predomenantily Citadel but some velljo just seem better. The air range and the primers for example.

Some darker browns seem to be much better from vallejo army painter.

I use:

Citadel
Vallejo
Scale 75
Cote d’ Arms (the hex pot and round pot Old citadel paints - think Blood Angels Red, Goblin Green, Chainmail)
Army Painter
Polly S
Reaper

Different colors work better from different manufacturers, so I have an eclectic mix of paints. What I always suggest is to find a brand you like that is available locally. Nothing worse than being in the middle of a project and running out, and having to wait for it to be shipped.

Vallejo are an excellent paint range and a good place to start when branching out from Citadel paints as a lot of their colours match up fairly closely to Citadle's older range. They have a monstrous variety of colours, are widely available and normally at a reasonable price point. Vallejo splits it's paints across 3 primary series. Game, Model and Air. Game is a bit more sci-fi/fantasy orientated, while Model has a more historical/realistic bent. Air, I believe, corresponds to Model, but is designed for airbrush use. There's also a few other ranges for things like painting Mechas and what not. Vallejo also do some really useful starter sets, most of which are based around a particular theme. (wood, metal, flesh, etc.)
I've found some of Vallejo's metallics to be not on par with the rest of their range. Glorious gold, Tinny Tin, Brassy brass and Bright bronze are fantastic, while Polished gold and Gunmetal metal are not so great. Honestly, if you can stick with Citadel for metallics. As theirs are brilliant.

I've also picked up a few Scalecolor paints too and I love the heck out of them. This range isn't as big as Citadel or Vallejo, but it has some very nice colours to choose from. Including the best white i've ever used. Their metallics are sensational too. You can thin them to death and still get great coverage out of them. Better then what i've experienced with either Citadel or Vallejo. These paints are a bit more expensive then Vallejo, and not widely available (at least where I live), but i'd recommend at least checking them out.
Again, their range seems to be split between fantasy and realistic shades. (Easily discernible by the names.) and their paint sets are heavily theme based.


100% recommend jumping in with Vallejo. And if you are able, definitely try some Scalecolour.

Here are some handy conversions if you want to find replacements for GW paints:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xl-x9eW3bLw5eqDeNUG2JUwn2EZwn34TDKfNIg5uul4/edit#gid=1

https://redgrimm.github.io/paint-conversion/index.html

For Army Painter specifically Tale of Painters has a great breakdown: https://taleofpainters.blogspot.com/2019/03/review-army-painters-complete-warpaints.html

Whatever you choose - I highly recommend working with dropper bottles. As you develop your painting skills, the precision of measuring out drops of paint with a dropper bottle will help you better grasp colour theory and is a good way to dive right into creating your own blends and understanding the “recipe” for creating tone. Working with paint in that way will improve your hobby in the long run.

Citadel has great colours, but the wasteful or tedious process of measuring paint out of the pot and onto your palette in comparison to the efficiency of dropper bottles is pretty stark.

The contrast paints however are fantastic and so I do stick with those.

I enjoy Tamiya paints as well - if those are readily available grab some of them, some medium (which will slow the drying time) and get messy with making colours. I use Tamiya white and black for lots of stuff. As said above having easy access to the paint you need is a good way to go and their paint is just as good as all the others. I quite like their cheapo wood brushes too.

Honestly, my go to at this point are
Vallejo: Just the best, hands down, from color variety to consistency, i have not even been disappointed when i bought one, they are a brand so big for a reason
Scale 75> Real great for painting and glazing
Army painter washes and mettallics. Their other colors are meh.

I still like citadel and they somehow make it in every model, they are not bad, just pet em in droppers.

I'll jump on the bandwagon for Vallejo too - they make good paint and since they also make paints for historicals you'll have a huge selection of colors.

I don't see anyone mentioning P3, Privateer Press's paint line. They're pretty decent acrylic paints, with the usual gripes that lighter colors don't have great coverage. I use their metallics a lot particularly their steel and platinum.

I mostly use Citadel but have branched out quite a bit. In reality most of my Citadel paints I use are old Hex bottles.

Almost 100% of my old Bolter Shell paints went T/U. Hmmmmm

I have a handful of their contrasts because they work, one or two metallics and a layer/base. My main move has been AP because it's what I can get locally.

So basically 25y/o Citadel or AP.

I paint to advanced tabletop, assembly-line style, and use brush-on primers with washes.

I find brushing on airbrush colored primers save me time, since I can sort of skip the basecoat step, especially followed by a wash (eg. Army Painter, Secret Weapon), although I don't end up doing zenithal priming anymore.

Airbrush primers are inexpensive per ounce compared to hobby paints, and I use these colors (in order of most to least used): brown, then metallic, black, flesh, red, then white, green, blue.

After priming and washing, I then touch-up with hobby paints. Usually the color primer and wash are all I need, but, again, I'm just going for advanced tabletop.

Kinda interested, you live in Japan? Shouldn't it produce myriad of its own paint brands being modeling/plastic flagship it is?

(Another vote for Vallejo anyway.)

 ScarletRose wrote:
I'll jump on the bandwagon for Vallejo too - they make good paint and since they also make paints for historicals you'll have a huge selection of colors.

I don't see anyone mentioning P3, Privateer Press's paint line. They're pretty decent acrylic paints, with the usual gripes that lighter colors don't have great coverage. I use their metallics a lot particularly their steel and platinum.

P3 paints are great based on my experience. Their limitation is really availability and a limited color selection compared to the likes of Vallejo.

You don't want to mess with Vallejo's metallics unless they are the air ones. Or the vastly superior Vallejo Metal Color series.

Otherwise, Vallejo's paints are great. Scale75 are also fantastic paints and their metallics are decent/good.

 H wrote:
You don't want to mess with Vallejo's metallics unless they are the air ones. Or the vastly superior Vallejo Metal Color series.

Otherwise, Vallejo's paints are great. Scale75 are also fantastic paints and their metallics are decent/good.

Second this.

Metal Colors are the best metallics out there, opaque coverage and extremely thin layers.

When I came back to mini painting a few years ago and all my old Citadel had dried up, I re-started with an Army Painter Mega Paint Set. You won't find better value than that in miniature paints, which is the entire reason I went for it - it was a good value way to restart my paint collection from scratch. My experience with Army Painter is that they separate quite considerably, so they need an especially good shake before you use them, especially if it's a colour you haven't used for a while. I think they're definitely a paint that would benefit from agitators in the bottle, though I haven't done that myself. Their coverage isn't the best, but it's acceptable (I guess in GW parlance it would be more layer than base). As with most ranges, some colours cover better than others. Their silver metallics (gunmetal, plate mail, silver) are pretty good, though the golds don't cover very well in my experience. The majority of my AP don't really get used much these days, since I generally prefer working with Vallejo Model Color, but there's still a few colours that I use regularly. For example, Gorgon Hide is my favourite cool off-white, and (though a fairly boring colour to mention) the matt black is nicely thin from the bottle, covers excellently, has a good finish and since it's AP it's cheaper than most of the other brands, so win-win. Army Painter washes are excellent (I'm talking the ones in the droppers rather than the big 'dipping' tins here). All of my washes are Army Painter. I've seen some comparisons that show they behave very similarly to the very-well regarded previous GW line (Badab Black, Devlan Mud etc.).

I later got into Vallejo. Now Vallejo have a lot of paint lines. People will usually point out that Game Color has more 'fantasy' colours and Model Color more 'historical', but they're also a different formulation:

Model Color - Huge range, mainly aimed at historical scale modellers, so there's a large number of different tones of reasonably desaturated green/brown/grey (basically anything that you'd need for camo, military vehicles, ships, uniforms etc.). But the range is large enough that pretty much the full range of colours are well covered, and there's quite a few brighter more saturated colours too. Because they're aimed at scale models that aren't really handled much, they're not especially durable, so they really benefit from a varnish on gaming pieces. The coverage is excellent and the finish is fairly matte. My go-to range.

Game Color - In contrast to Model Color, they're more durable but don't cover as well. The finish is more satin. The range of colours is smaller, mostly brighter 'fantasy' colours, and is very similar to the previous GW line. Rumour has it that Vallejo were going to take over the production of Citadel paints at one point many years ago, but the deal fell through and they released the paints as their own range instead.

Game Color Extra Opaque - The Game Color equivalent to 'base' paints with better coverage. As far as I can tell, these are pretty much Model Color paints in a Game Color branded bottle.

Model Air / Game Air - Equivalents to the Model Color/Game Color range, but much thinner and intended for airbrushing. I've got some Model Air, but to be honest, I'm quite happy thinning the regular Model Color paints for airbrushing and because they require much more thinning than Model Air do, one bottle of Model Color goes a lot further through my airbrush than a bottle of Model Air does! The Model Air metallics have a good reputation, but I haven't tried any, mainly because of the next range...

Metal Color - Absolutely phenomenal, I find it hard to see how any acrylic metallics can be better than these. They use high quality Aluminium pigments, and come in a range of colours mainly aimed at aircraft models - so you get a range of paints like Aluminium, Duraluminium, Jet Exhaust etc. A large range of silver tones, one of the only places that they fall down is not many 'golds'. There's one rather pale gold, and a copper, which you can mix if you want more gold tones. Come in 32mm droppers with agitators already in the bottle, and are pretty thin since they're intended for airbrushing, but they flow well from a brush too and the coverage is incredible - even the gold will cover just about any colour in a single coat. A bit more expensive - about 3 times the price of the other Vallejo ranges for a bottle about 2 times the size, so you're paying about 1.5 times the price per ml.

Mecha Color - I haven't tried these. They're a newer range, I believe primarily aimed at Gundams and similar. They seem to be particularly bright, striking colours, but I haven't tried them to be able to say anything about the coverage, finish or durability.


---

Of course there's so many other alternatives too, but I haven't tried them so I can't say much. I've been interested in Scale75 for a while. I've heard they use a slightly different type of medium and behave a little differently from other acrylic lines, and that they're quite good for blending, but no personal experience. They also had a kickstarter recently for a contrast equivalent, which I'll be interested to try eventually. I'd also been meaning to give the latest generation of AK Interactive paints a go, since I'm a big fan of their varnishes, weathering and diorama ranges. Seriously, if you want a matte finish, AK Ultra Matte Varnish is the way to go.

I think ultimately most ranges have their own advantages, disadvantages and quirks, and having a lot of paints from various different ranges mean you can pick a paint that's suited for the task.

 Dendarien wrote:

 ScarletRose wrote:
I'll jump on the bandwagon for Vallejo too - they make good paint and since they also make paints for historicals you'll have a huge selection of colors.

I don't see anyone mentioning P3, Privateer Press's paint line. They're pretty decent acrylic paints, with the usual gripes that lighter colors don't have great coverage. I use their metallics a lot particularly their steel and platinum.

P3 paints are great based on my experience. Their limitation is really availability and a limited color selection compared to the likes of Vallejo.

I found p3 paints really frusterating to work with, they have very little ability to actually cover a surface.
I do however LOVE their colors and they are often show through my airbrush.
Arcane blue is one of my favorites TBH.

Others have covered the topic well, so I'll just share my experience. Aside from Citadel, I've used Reaper, P3, Army Painter, Scale75 and Vallejo. I found P3 to be the most similar to Citadel paints, and the others to be much thinner (not necessarily a bad thing) and require a lot of shaking before use. I also found Vallejo Model Air to be too thin to be useful as a brush-on paint, but some-one with more skill than me might not find that, and the thinness of the non-Citadel ranges in general means less messing about mixing paint and water on the palette. All these ranges except P3 use dropper bottles, which don't dry up as readily and are more precise when putting paint on the palette, hence less wasted paint.

Japan seems to love alcohol-based paints, such as enamels and even stronger things. I never really found a good domestic source for water-based acrylics. I tried one paint from the Mr Hobby Aqueous line (a grey I think), but it still had a solvent smell and dried quite glossy.

Hobby Link Japan use to reliably stock Vallejo, but now the range is mostly out of stock with them, although that doesn't mean that they can't be ordered in. What HLJ do stock now is a line from Vic Hobby. These are aqueous acrylics from Japan (I think) aimed at military modellers, but they seem to have a useful range. I haven't had the opportunity to try them out yet, but they could be worth investigating.

Something else to note, is that Reaper price their stuff in different currencies depending on where in the world you order from. For your part of the world it's the Australian Dollar, which is even weaker than the Yen, so your money goes further. I found shipping from Reaper to be a bit slow but reliable. Reaper also sell their paint colours as triads which contain a shade, base and highlight colour which go together.

Lastly, take a look at the dakkadakka paint range compatability chart.

Big fan of Vallejo, but I have to specifically plug Vallejo Metal Color. The Metal Color range is far better than the Model Color metallics, and represents by far the best non-alcohol-based silvery/brass metallics I've used.

If your after something different green stuff world is great, their metallics, colour shift, neon and intensity ink are great. They also do a standard range of acrylic colours f which I I have only used one or two but have more on order. So far the ones I have used are as good as Vallejo. But as everyone else says Vallejo are very good. However I still use citadel as some of their colours are great. I recently started thinking them to put them in dropper bottles and I’m glad I’ve made the effort.

Add another recommendation to the pile for Vallejo, BUT I have gone back to Citadel for washes. I tried a number of different Vallejo ones, but they just don’t stand up (particularly black vs Nuln oil).

Any paint can go bad, but GW does seem to be worse for it.

Your best solution is to get some liquid matte acrylic medium. Add this to the paint in a roughly 50/50 mix. Using only water to thin paints means eventually the acrylic medium has all clumped up... which is the problem you keep having.

 Jadenim wrote:
Add another recommendation to the pile for Vallejo, BUT I have gone back to Citadel for washes. I tried a number of different Vallejo ones, but they just don’t stand up (particularly black vs Nuln oil).

Oh yeah, on that note, I highly suggest trying Army Painter washes. They're a continuation of the previous line of GW washes, and produce a stronger shading effect with less overall tinting.

Badab Black in this image is the same thing as Army Painter Dark Tone:



I still use GW washes for glazing since that overall tinting makes them great at it, but for actually washing models I've switched over entirely to Army Painter.

Honestly you should use a mix. Vallejo has great metalic paints especially if you're using an airbrush. GSW has decent paints to consider too. I like their color shift lines. On that same note, GW has their merits as has already been posted in their washes and inks. GSW has some interesting inks too. Honestly you'll just have to try stuff and find what you like best.

I really think the Vallejo Model Color lime is superior in every way to the Game Color line unless the VGC line has been heavily overhauled. I packed up all my stuff in 2013 and started unpacking it earlier this month.
I had already been in the process of moving out of citadel paints then. Most of my citadels are hexpots; as they dried up I replaced them with P3 or Coat D’arms or Vallejo. Then I started using artists acrylics. P3 has the best flesh and bone colors IMHO. VMC is the most consistent across the entire range. I really like Golden and Liquitex Softbody for some colors; especially purple. If you don’t have some already; acrylic inks are a great investment.

Holy moly, there's a lot in this thread. I wanna thank everyone who's dropped by to give tips (mostly Vallejo tips, interesting to note), and for all the reccommendations that you've all given me. I'll give my local modelling shops a look around, and see if I can find anything good, but if not, after payday I guess I'm going to hit up a few of those brands.

Also, very interesting to know that a few of you stick with GW for some stuff, too. Honestly, I think I'll do the same for one or two products - and if I was in the UK, more probably.
Again, can't express how helpful this has been enough. There's such a daunting range online, and I always felt very comfortable with GW, but the prices here and the speed at which my paints are drying out is just getting crazy.
Really appreciate all of you guys. Cheers!

I've recently started using AK 3rd generation acrylics for brush painting. They aren't super cheap, but I really prefer them over my old citadel and vallejo paints. They can be thinned substantially with acrylic thinner and still maintain superb coverage. They come in dropper bottles too which is a big plus.

Only downside to using them is that their colour shades don't translate at all to most citadel paint shades. But they have a lot of colours to choose from. Also, you can use oils and enamels on top of em without having to worry the oil/enamel thinners ruining the acrylic finish.