Comment by whartung
8 days ago
Oh boy, yea.
I tried to put together a helicopter (probably an Apache) a few years ago, and got a couple of those classic Testor paint bottles to help finish it.
I had to put it all away. The fumes from the paint, my reaction to it was nothing like I remembered. I had no issues with them as a boy. But, today, yea they were making me loopy. I’m surprised the AQMD in California still allows these.
I’d like to try again with some modern acrylic, but the only place in my orbit is a Michaels, and they really don’t cater much to plastic kits. So opportunity has bumbled my way yet.
The other trick is to keep it me and not be intimidated by the YouTube experts. Easier said than done.
The michaels and hobby lobby near me both have a fair amount of acrylic paint for what it's worth, but have you looked for any gaming stores? Lots of them carry warhammer and thus carry model acrylic paints.
If you don't have anything near you, I would look for acrylics designed for models online. Games Workshop sells them, but there are other brands (Vallejo, Reaper, etc) which are also quite good and generally cheaper. And they will, as a rule, be more pleasant to work with than the acrylics you get at Michael's/Hobby Lobby.
Generally I would recommend Vallejo or Army Painter paints over GW ones. They are cheaper, better quality coming with a much better bottle.
It’s an eternal war and I agree with your points. However, I found that for people without much experience with acrylics Citadel paints are much more consistent and forgiving, and are generally of very good quality (there are problematic colours, but then Vallejo or Army Painter are not immune either). They are also easy to source. And honestly if all you paint is a couple of models, the price difference is not that much (not all of us are painting several different armies).
I use personally a mix of Citadel, AK and Vallejo, but for newbies or light uses I still generally recommend GW, or Army Painter for the rattle cans.