Enamel paints

[Shamu]

I have ordered some stuff off the GW website including some paints but to save some money I found some paint in a local craft store. I've just looked at them now and realised they are enamel paints. TBH I don't really know what this means...will they work for GW minitures and can they be thinned like the GW paints?

[thade]

I strongly, strongly, strongly recommend you use acrylic paints. The ones from GW or Valejo are ideal. Enamel paint will be an exercise in pain for you. :D

[darth_giles]

Yes, they will work.

 

But they'll make your figures look unusually glossy, and enamels re less forgiving than acrylics. I've painted a few figures with enamels; specifically, some ancient tyranids from the 2nd Edition to early 3rd Eidtion eras, but they just didn't look right and it was much harder to mix some colors like flesh tones.

[Ironwulf]

Yes, you can paint your miniatures with enamels, but the important point that has been omitted so far-- you would need to thin your paint and clean your brushes with enamel thinner (mineral spirits or turpentine), which has some harsh fumes. Do not attempt to mix enamels with GW paints. It's just not something that will work well.

 

It is recommended that you use acrylics, which can be mixed with any other kind of acrylic paints (GW or otherwise), and will clean up easily with ordinary water.

[Jamafore]

Enamel is oil based paint, compared to acrylic which water based.

 

I have found that enamels don't mix well with other paints, even other enamels. and to thin it you will need to mix it with thinner of some sort, which WILL eat the plastic even in small amounts.

[Hemal]

Enamels will make great base coats as they will chemicaly bond with plastic, but I'd really avoid their use unless you want to do advanced effects such as streaking of exhaust fumes or using cracked paint effects as they take a while to dry and the fumes will do your head in...

[Gurth]

Enamels will work perfectly well for painting miniature figures — until the mid- to late 1980s, enamels were pretty much the standard paint for modellers. It's just that acrylics are probably a bit easier to use and easier to clean up, but:

• That they would be "an exercise in pain" is exaggerating — for some things, like blending, enamels are easier to use than acrylics;
  
• If your figures "look unusually glossy" that means you didn't stir the paint well enough — you can just shake a bottle of acrylics and it'll probably be enough, but you have to really stir enamels properly;
  
• If the thinner "eat the plastic" you probably didn't use the right thinner, and probably far, far too much of it — you can make a wash from enamel paint plus white spirit and it shouldn't affect the plastic at all (just don't use it on polystyrene foam, though).
  

 

Or maybe I should just say: do a search for "Bill Horan" ;)

[Brother Excedis]

I did the same thing you did to start off. And I can say it worked..it looked ok. They were not always glossy but the paint is very thick and the thinner can be smelt throughout the house. You also lose a lot of the little details on GW mini's as they get blended over with the heavy paint. Now this is my experience. I also find they were just hard to work with in general

[Vodunius]

They were not always glossy but the paint is very thick and the thinner can be smelt throughout the house. You also lose a lot of the little details on GW mini's as they get blended over with the heavy paint.

 

Depends on the brand you use, last time I experimented with enamels I was amazed at the fact it would cover black in a single coat and how much thinner paint looked on the miniature when compared to the other test model I'd done in Citadel colour.

 

Random anecdote: A few years ago I went into my local GW on a weekday afternoon whilst the place was deserted except for two redshirts, the look on ones face when he realized I'd heard him telling the other that the reason the display miniatures in the window looked so great was that they were painted with enamels was priceless ^_^ .

[Hemal]

aye not saying enamels are massively bad to use - I used to use enamels when building aircraft kits, just I find most techniques (washimg, glazing, dry brushing etc) to be far more effective with acrylics. Enamels make fantastic sources for doing effects though even over acrylics.

[Shamu]

Thanks for all the advise people!! I think I'm gonna steer clear of them, they only cost about a dollar each so not too much of a waste! I wanna get some more GW paints but there is no store near me and I have already ordered the rest of the stuff I want so will have to get some more stuff to get my order over 30 bucks so its free delivery..

 

I'm thinking of getting the fine cast emperor's champion as he looks awesome. On the website it says it comes as 4 separate resin parts. Anyone know which parts of him are separate? From the looks of the unpainted image on the website its the backpack, sword arm, head and main body, this right?

[Gurth]

I find most techniques (washimg, glazing, dry brushing etc) to be far more effective with acrylics.

Odd, my experience is more or less the reverse … washes made with acrylics tend to suffer from surface tension of the water used, while ones made from enamels don't have this problem, and the best paints I know to drybrush with are Humbrol enamels (the old ones that were made until the 1990s, not the "Super Enamel" range that replaced it — not bad either, but not as good as the paints I sometimes still buy in rusted tins made in the 1970s :wallbash:).

 

The main drawbacks of enamels, as I see them: you have to really stir them very well, especially with old/rarely-used tins or bottles; the paints and thinners smell more than acrylics (though, TBH, I don't really smell either anymore); cleaning them from an airbrush is much more work than with acrylics; and enamel paints aren't flexible like acrylics, which means they're not the best choice for models that will get handled and so may fall or otherwise flex or bend a little.