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i was curious how you painters operate.
do you assemble and paint, paint then assemble or probably a mixture of the two if i were to guess.

if you paint first i was wondering how glue like mr cement and tamiya thin handle the paint since it melts the plastic to form the bond... does it just eat right through it to make the bond?

it seems so odd to me for a large model like say a tank or big monster to paint it first.
sometimes i have a hard time envisioning what will and wont be seen to know if its worth painting not to mention x and y will be touching so i have to make them look the same.
it probably boils down to experience but here we are...

thanks in advance

Partial assembly here.

I scrape away the paint from the contact points before gluing.

 usernamesareannoying wrote:
i was curious how you painters operate.
do you assemble and paint, paint then assemble or probably a mixture of the two if i were to guess.

if you paint first i was wondering how glue like mr cement and tamiya thin handle the paint since it melts the plastic to form the bond... does it just eat right through it to make the bond?

it seems so odd to me for a large model like say a tank or big monster to paint it first.
sometimes i have a hard time envisioning what will and wont be seen to know if its worth painting not to mention x and y will be touching so i have to make them look the same.
it probably boils down to experience but here we are...

thanks in advance

I first hold the parts together and see if it will cause hardship in reaching spots I need to reach for detail etc and if so.. keep those parts -appart- and paint them seperately. Only rarely I need to clean up a bit with paint on the mold line because I don't drench my connections with glue, the less glue you use the better it tends to melt in place (it needs to dry too afterall).

I have had very bad experiences with glueing first and painting a completed mini, trying it a few times with the same sculpts (one being glued then painted, the other done my regular way) and the outcome was always the same, the ones I paint seperate parts for always look way better.

A mix of both really. I assemble as much as I can without compromising access and then get to painting. In reality this means infantry tend to only be assembled legs, body and one arm, everything else painted on sprue. Whereas monsters/vehicles get built into pretty substantial sub assemblies or even fully built on occasion before painting.

Glue wise it's always best to remove the paint from the glue surface as the chemical reaction just melts the paint instead of the plastic resulting in a weak bond.

I'm lucky to have a good feel for 3D shapes and spaces so I rarely have an issue envisioning what will and wont need painting. However as a matter of caution I do overpaint by say 10% just to make sure. It is frustrating to finish a model and spot grey in an area now inaccessible to the brush.

It depends.
Interestingly I have uploaded a detailed response to that with examples here.
https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/812690.page#11631460

thanks guys.

@mothsniper... yeah it was funny to see that post after this one. lol

good info in both.

Unless it's really blinking awkward, I will fully assemble before painting. Generally, painting takes me ages - but I can play with a built model. I also tend to find that if a space is so awkward to get a brush in, it's probably not that visible, and a dark primer will more or less do the job. Disclaimer - I am by no means aiming for perfection!

Terrain I often partially assemble and then paint, then finish assembly. Infantry are always assembled and then painted.

Cheers,

CB

I do subassemblies for large and/or complex models, but most basic infantry are fully assembled before I paint them. On small models, I figure if I can't get a paintbrush on it, nobody will see it anyways. This is not always true on bigger models though, hence subassemblies.

I assemble as much as I can without obstructing things, and then paint.

For WFB, it mostly means assemble everything but shields, paint, then install shields. For 40K, it means one arm and the gun usually get painted separately.

I also do sub-assemblies, mainly with vehicles and smaller mounted minis, but I also used to leave out the 2 handed guns and do underneath, then glue them on. Playing Orks from way back when- this was a hassle, so I glue them all together, zenithal prime and paint the infantry. So I think it depends on the model, and I'm always asking myself "How will a paintbrush/ airbrush get to that spot?".

I often over-assemble. Case in point, I got over-excited with my Lion El'Jonson and ended up building him fully. Now I'm looking at him and wondering how I'm going to paint behind the shield, on the inside to the cape, etc. etc...

I think I do this because I do a lot of converting and it's very difficult to know exactly how a model is going to come together when you're throwing disparate bits of kit at each other. You kind of have to go too far assembling things just to make sure it's going to work. particularly if you're doing greenstuff work. That said, I generally leave heads off to paint them separately, especially if they're unhelmeted, because faces take a lot of work to paint and its best to be able to get at them from all angles.

I tend to assemble everything except weapons across chests. If I want to use it before painting the wonders of blu tac prevail

It depends on the kind of kit I'm doing. For Gundam kits, I always paint as I assemble. For Warhammer, I tend to fully assemble before painting.

I'm changing my approach from complete sub-assembly painting which took me 5-10 hours per model (or more) to slapchop which I'm hoping will take me a lot less time.

There are some things I keep a bit separate if it looks like it'll be too awkward to paint but, on the whole, I'm now just assembling everything.

Even though I enjoy painting I also want to play the game and realistically if I continue on at my current rate it'll be 2030 before I can even play a 500 point game!

One thing that I have to remind myself is that the tiny details on a model you only see when it's 2 inches in front of your face, not 2 meters away on the battlefield lumped in with all the other models!

For what it's worth, I've never had any issues using the bog standard Citadel glue when assembling after painting - I just slap it on the correct joint and it sticks them together fine.

slapchop... god i had that word.
its forever stuck in my mind as a kitchen utensil on late night infomercials.

thanks for all of the tips and opinions guys.

one thing i didnt see a reply to though, apologies if i just missed it.

will capillary glue like tamiya thin and mr cement still work on painted joins?

I generally assemble first and then paint but I'm a dipping speed painter with a tabletop standard so if there's a nook that's tough to reach it's not generally a problem.

 usernamesareannoying wrote:


will capillary glue like tamiya thin and mr cement still work on painted joins?

You can glue together painted surfaces, but the bond will always be weak. That goes for super glue and plastic solvent glue.

I recommend scraping off the paint before gluing or you can mask the join surfaces during painting with a bit of sticky tack.

Capillary stuff is likely to be the least effective just because it is designed to use minimal amounts of liquid to create the join. I have had good success with brush-on polystyrene cement where you can basically flood the connection point, and it strips off most of the paint layer anyway and incorporates what is left into the new join. It’s messy though.

If you use superglue, then the join will be subject the weakest layer in The build up. Glue, paint, or the surface adhesion between any of the layers.

Can you make it work, yes, is it the most robust? No.

10 4 guys, thanks.
i kind of figured what you said would be the case but theres always that tiny hope of a super solution right... lol

 usernamesareannoying wrote:
10 4 guys, thanks.
i kind of figured what you said would be the case but theres always that tiny hope of a super solution right... lol

Give Sticky Tack (poster putty) a try. Seriously, just stick it to the join points then paint the sections as you wish, then remove the sticky tack, (which can then be reused) and assemble.