Recently I talked a friend into letting me paint some Wood Elves for him, I had this color scheme in mind for a Wood Elf army but I refuse to buy my own, so it was a great chance for him to get his army painted.
Then I got it home and sitting looking at all those stags and horses all I could think was how I needed to learn to airbrush because the paint job would look so much nicer. I only ever used our airbrush once, the result was awful and I haven't tried since. My husband does though and had painted some fabulous tanks and buildings. Finally, yesterday I got out one of our older airbrushes (somehow we have would up with three over the years), and carefully spent an hour cleaning it and reading the instructions that came with it.
I knew my friend Mathieu paints minis with his airbrush so I messaged and asked him if he had any advice before I got started making a mess...he said paint terrain first. It was a lot less frightening to paint terrain than models, for the most part it was just one color. When I switched colors though I realized it's actually pretty tough to control the spray when you don't know what your doing.
I don't so I wound up fully covering areas I didn't want to, and getting paint in spaces I didn't want it. Getting frustrated I stopped, read the instructions again and put it away for the night.
This morning I find the idea of airbrushing far less scary than I did yesterday.
Some thoughts I made note of:
-cleaning the airbrush between colors is important
-putting lubrication on all the parts makes it operate smoother
-wear gloves, at least on the hand that your using to hold or turn the model
-shake your paints like crazy to get the right consistency
-don't use GW paints in an airbrush, they aren't designed for it
-be patient and breath deep.
When I have made more progress I will share more, but for now that's it.
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