Metallic Paints Therapy Session

[Magos Takatus]

Hi there. I've just finished a layer of metallic armour trim using GW Sycorax Bronze and it was flat out frustrating to use and it struck me that in general metallic paints really aren't much fun so I decided to start a thread about it.

 

As I said, I find Sycorax Bronze horrible to work with. My paint pot looks like the pigment is in large clumps and trying to paint it onto a model feels like dragging snot across the surface. Thinning the paint hasn't yielded much success and it starts to separate and needs to be stirred/mixed as you work with it. I'm using it on a wet pallet so the consistency shouldn't be so bad. Trying to get a line highlight on it is horrible. However, that's the closest match to the colour on Archaon's armour trim judging by the box art. Perhaps I could mix them with acrylic medium next time.

 

The new gold paints like Liberator Gold feel a lot more straightforward to work with. They seem to layer nicely like normal GW paints and it's easy to get nice neat edge highlights with them. I also find Silver paints have always been fairly forgiving compared to the others.

 

What metallic paints have you tried? Are specific manufacturers a problem or is it individual paints in a paint range? Which work well and which are a struggle to use? Have you found ways to overcome the issues with metallic paints? It would be interesting if it turns out the paint that grinds my gears is a universal problem! :p

[Aspecti]

I'd recommend trying out Vallejo metallics. Especially the Game Color Bright Bronze is incredible, you can thin it a lot and it's still very opaque, giving a smooth coverage with a single layer.

 

For example, the gold parts of these Contemptors have been basecoated with VGC Bright Bronze, washed with agrax earthshade, highlighted with Bright Bronze and a 50/50 mix of Bright Bronze and Vallejo Model Air Bright Brass.

http://aspecti.mbnet.fi/kuvat/figut/UM/cont_legs.jpg

[shaun03]

Brush work and AB work scale 75 metals overall some of the best metals out their, good range of colors and easy coverage, cant say enough good things about them.

 

AK interactive true metals and extreme metals, the wax ones might not be best 28mm stuff but the ones in the glass bottles, those are becoming my new go to metals, wide range of colors that blend together well, and take weathering and anything else you want to do to them. The work great in AB and brush work, just clean the :cuss out the brush when done.

 

So for me its tough call and depends on what I am doing where or not I grab my scale 75 or AK metals. 

[Magos Takatus]

I'd recommend trying out Vallejo metallics. Especially the Game Color Bright Bronze is incredible, you can thin it a lot and it's still very opaque, giving a smooth coverage with a single layer.

 

For example, the gold parts of these Contemptors have been basecoated with VGC Bright Bronze, washed with agrax earthshade, highlighted with Bright Bronze and a 50/50 mix of Bright Bronze and Vallejo Model Air Bright Brass.

http://aspecti.mbnet.fi/kuvat/figut/UM/cont_legs.jpg

 That's a really nice warm base colour that looks great, but the colour I'm looking for is quite different. The shield in particular is what I'm trying to emulate. Sycorax Bronze seems to be about the right colour but at the very least my own pot of said paint is awful.  https://www.games-workshop.com/resources/catalog/product/600x620/99120201045_ArchaonEverchosen05.jpg

 

For what it's worth I have been hand painting with the Forge World airbrush metallics. Despite not actually using them through an airbrush once they are mixed thoroughly they are pretty good for brush painting, just a little bit more time consuming. Their Bronze and Gold colours are really nice. I need to get round to using my airbrush so I can try them out as intended.

 

It sounds like the consistency of the game colour is better to cope with People talk fairly generally about model range metallics but even in the same paint range I've noticed some paints are a lot more straightforward than others to work with. 

 

Having a general overview of various metallic paints from different ranges seems like a useful topic.

[Magos Takatus]

Brush work and AB work scale 75 metals overall some of the best metals out their, good range of colors and easy coverage, cant say enough good things about them.

AK interactive true metals and extreme metals, the wax ones might not be best 28mm stuff but the ones in the glass bottles, those are becoming my new go to metals, wide range of colors that blend together well, and take weathering and anything else you want to do to them. The work great in AB and brush work, just clean the out the brush when done.

So for me its tough call and depends on what I am doing where or not I grab my scale 75 or AK metals.

It's interesting you pointed out the Scale 75 paints since I only heard about them a few days ago and I was looking at their flesh paint range. Thanks to you I now know they have metallic, Non-Metallic metal sets and wood sets which is pretty interesting.

[betrayer41]

Ok Vallejo metallics are ok......

 

Try Vallejo metal color. They are absolutely fantastic. I use them through a brush and are more or less airbrush ready.

 

Highly highly recommend Vallejo metal color

[Tyberos the Red Wake]

My pot of Sycorax Bronze is a bit newer and it has been a joy to work with, much better than the other GW metallics which I bought two years ago, like the golds and Leadbelcher. It might be the old pots were not as good as the new ones.

 

But if you want a paint that will always please, go for Vallejo Model Air metallics.