Hello fellow modellers,
2020 hasn’t been a very sympathetic year to all if us, and has been beating us greatly badly.
Although like I’m everything in life, there is always a positive in all of this mess that is going around. With the quarantine rules kicking in we have assisted to an increase of people either returning to the hobbies after a long absence or new people trying to keep them self's sane during this crazy and hard times. With this grow I have notice and equal increase to the old question's such as “what tools do I need?” “Which are the best paints?” or “What should I use, airbrush or brush?” And as usually, this creates a lot of debate and confusion, some times ends up creating more confusion than clarity. My goal with this post is to bring some light and offer my personal opinion on to some of this questions. So let’s start.
“What tools do I need to start?”
The first thing you need to think off is that you are starting on the hobby and you are not entirely sure if you gone like and continue or of this is gone be a one off experience and them you realise that is not what you are expecting and end up up with a half model on a shelf abandon around the house. When I started on this hobby, the tools I had was a nail clipper to cut the pieces from the sprue, a couple of nail files, a couple of tweezers that found on the beauty section of poind shop and a X-acto from the same shop. Needless to say that my first builds were something that made the modelling gods turn on their grave, but from those initial experiences I have learned that I truly liked the hobbies and then started to invest on some proper tools for the right jobs. Have bought a proper cutter, have bought an appropriate set of tweezers, better knives and etc. Needless to say that by now have far more than what I need but is always there for a raining day.
In conclusion, if you want to start on.the hobby, don’t go crazy spending loads os pounds to only after realized that you dong actually like it. Take it slowly and accept that your first build are not gone be master pieces. Build for the fun and enjoy it, if you truly like and enjoy it, then think of getting better tools if you font like it at least you didnt bust the piggy bank for nothing.
“Which are the best paints?”
Well regarding this theme, this is a though one to analyse. As anything in life, what works for me, might not work for the next person but at the same time we dont want to give you the wrong advise making you struggle with the wrong choice of paint and throwing you off on your first paint work.
First thing we need to understand is the method that you gone is to apply them, are you using brush or airbrush? If you using a brush, there are some ranges that offer lines optimized to be used with brushes making your first experience a lot easier and pleasant making it more likely for you to continue on the hobby, if we advise you a paint range like Tamyia acrylic, more than likely you will hate your experience and never to want to hear of painting a model again.
The same happens on the airbrush side of the things. What can be amazing paints for some, can be a total head ache for others, personally I cant make Vallejo paints to work on the airbrush even if my life would depend of it, but other modellers think they are fantastic and I totally respect that sometimes the problem is on the modeller and not on the tool. Although, other paints that other people struggle I can ace them easily. Again is all about of what do you expect and how you gone use them, if you going for airbrush, chose a range that can be more forgiven and ready mixed for airbrush, if you go for brush, watch a few tutorials on YouTube as it isn’t and easy as it might look like to obtain a good result. My opinion and that how I have done it, buy a couple of one range, if you don’t like it, look for another one until you find that sweet spot and compromise were modeller and paint are United as one. I know that this isn’t easy, but again, what works for me, might not work for you and I will try to break this down on a future post on the Hope’s of offering a better answer but again and I must stress this point, is all about personal taste.
“What is best, brush or airbrush?”
Now this is the question that fractions more the modelling community, for the majority (me included) airbrush is by far the best, but I’m suspicious, as my skills to paint large areas with a brush are rubbish to say the least. But there are some things you can do to evaluate what is gone work better for you. First thing to think is the finan impact , to get a nice airbrush setup you are looking to spend at least £100 and this is going for budget airbrush and compressor, if you thinking in going to a branded airbrush you are looking to pay that price just for the airbrush. If you comfortable with this financial impact you need to see your work space, is it a well ventilated are or are you hone need a paint booth? And if you need a paint booth, do you have an extraction point for the paint fumes? If the answer is positive for both then you are on the right path to be a airbrush modeller.
Although some of us don’t have this commodities and have to stick to the paint brush . Once again you are the one that needs to access what will work best for you.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, you are the one in control and the one that needs to understand you capabilities and needs and from that make informed decisions in order to progress on the hobby and not to stop on the first model. Please understand that as human beings that we are, we all have different opinion and we will never reach a 100% consensus. We all have different opinions and different perspectives on how to approach the hobby.
We can do is to advise but you are the one in control that need stop understanding what works and what doesn’t work for you. What makes the difference between scale modelling behing a nice relaxed experience or a total waist of your time.
Hope this have helped and more post on the future about this will come .
Happy models.
Plastic Alchemist