Airbrushing 101, a complete how-to guide (Part 3, Section 1 of 4 underway) Options

[voyager]

!!!THIS IS A MAJOR WORK IN PROGRESS!!!

((and it will include real pictures))

Introduction to Airbrushing

This is a SIX (6) PART tutorial.

Part 1 covers the basic anatomy of an airbrush, how it works, some of the common features availabe, what you can put through it and how to clean it.
Part 2 covers basic airbush exercises to get your general skill up with the brush.
Part 3 will look at using your airbrush on your models - we'll go through 2 forms of camouflage masking, some simple weathering and how to use a shield.
Part 4 will look at common problems you may encounter and how to deal with them
Part 5 is the masterclass section, where I will set you a number of "challenges", and if you post the results I'll give you some feedback on them and how to improve.
Part 6 is an FAQ - I'll just be copying questions & answers from the thread into this section.

DISCLAIMER - I am not making my living from airbrushing. I'm NOT a professional artist - I can't even draw! I'm just an enthusiastic amateur. This is not the ONLY way to do things, but its the way/s I know and have been taught in the past. Take from it what you will.

IMPORTANT NOTICE - I'm happy to provide feedback, answer questions, help you troubleshoot and the like, but do me the courtesy of reading the article BEFORE asking questions. I'll be trying to cover everything I can.

Introduction

Materials Required

In order to complete the exercises and challenges, you will need access to the following items (these will be discussed in detail in Part 1):

1. Double action, gravity fed airbrush & air supply ***
2. Soap, clean water, a sponge, cotton buds, a bit of rag & a toothbrush
3. Ink, more clean water, acrylic paint & some basic non-laser-printer paper (not needed until Part 2)
4. Droppers/pipettes, paint strainer, clean jar or paint pot and a bottle with clean water. (not essential but makes your life easier)
4. Masking tape, blutac & a piece of stiff cardboard or styrene (not needed until Part 3)
*** - discussed later

A note on airbrush types and this tutorial - I'll be targeting this to a gravity-fed, double action airbrush. However, where possible, I'll try to include notes for using siphon feed brushes, and even single-action brushes. Whilst siphon feed won't be a major limitation here, single action will.

PART 1 - ANATOMY OF AN AIRBRUSH

What is an airbrush? Well, at the most basic level, it is an atomiser - not any different in function from a bottle of perfume or a weed sprayer you use on your garden. It is simply a tool that mixes an amount of one medium (usually paint or ink) with an amount of air, and directs the spray. And you thought it was something more complicated? This, believe it or not, is the first hurdle you need to cross to get into and enjoy airbrushing in all its forms. Get over the "technofear factor" and have some fun. Because believe me, you will.

I'm going to assume now, since you, the readers, are already geeky enough that I don't need to explain this any further. Good, because its boring. Lets get straight into it.

Types of Airbrushes available.
You've heard the jargon - double action, gravity fed, internal mix - and it can be a bit overwhelming. Let me break it down for you.
Brush vs Gun - these are interchangable terms for an airbrush, although don't confuse a "spraygun" with an airbrush. I'll try to use "brush" at all times, but since airbrush artists call spraying "shooting (paint)" it gets a bit blurred.

Single Action vs Double Action
this refers to the control method of the brush. In a single action airbrush the trigger has a single movement (usually backwards like on a gun) whereas a double action has 2 moves - down and back. On a single-action brush you set up the spray pattern for what you want via a rotating control on the front of the brush, then pull the trigger to deploy that pre-set spray pattern. On a double action, you don't do this - you press down on the trigger to start the airflow (with nothing coming out) and then pull back to control the flow of paint. This additional control makes a double action brush the preferred tool.
Why would you even buy a single action brush? Well, for simple applications like basecoats, they're fine. They have few parts, almost no maintenance requirements and are hard to get wrong. That said, I still don't recommend them. The double action can do all of that for you anyway, and a lot more.

Gravity Fed vs Siphon Fed vs Side Feed
this refers to where the paint is drawn from. Gravity fed is a hole (typically inside of a cupola) on top of the brush. Siphon feed is a jar underneath with a hose in it. Side feed is a form of gravity feed but its side-mounted. Pros and cons for all three.

Siphon feed is good for large volume spraying. The paint is contained below the brush in a jar with a hose in it (hence the siphon name). Pros? The jar holds plenty (smallest I've seen was about 30ml) of paint, and you can easily see the contents in the glass jar. You can store paint in some jars (they have replaceable lids that are airtight), and if you need to change colours you can run multiple jars. So pretty handy for some tasks. The cons? Wastage can be high, particularly as you'll never fully drain a jar and you need quite a bit to get it going. Very susceptible to clogging and can be inconsistant at low PSI. Paint can settle in the jar leading to inconsistant results (although you can just take it off and shake the hell out of it). Cheaper models have poor seals and the jars like to fall off the brush. You can realistically only spray withing 45 degree of horizontal. Some people say that you can't get as fine a spray with a siphon feed brush compared to a gravity fed one, but I've spoken to many professionals and they seem to use gravity feeds for the very fine detail work - that said there are loads who just use siphons. I can neither confirm or deny this one.

Gravity feed is good for smaller volume spraying. The paint is held on top of the brush in either a small well or a cupola, and joins the mix by the force of gravity. Pros? The cupola (if present) will hold typically between 3ml-17ml of paint and may or may not come with a lid (generally 7ml+ will have a lid). You need a single drop of paint (I'm not kidding) for it to work. They're an all-in-one unit generally (with the cupola being part of the brush- some have removable cups but I don't recommend those) so are quite sturdy. You can use them on any angle short of vertical or upside down. The down side? If your cupola has no lid you can't easily mix within the brush. You can create spillage pretty easily too. If the lid is on you have no idea how much paint is inside it. Cleaning them is a bit more involved, and you've got more of a cleaning issue between colours than a siphon feed. Some say that the cupola can obscure your view - I've never encountered this problem. If you have a gigantic cupola maybe it could be - I can't confirm or deny this.

Side feed is good for spraying stuff with tricky access. The paint is held in a cup mounted to the side of the brush that can rotate around - theoretically there is no position you can't spray in. In the end though, the feed is gravity based. Pros? complicated and difficult objects are the reason for this, otherwise most of your pros are the same as the gravity brush. Cons? MUCH more involved to clean and more parts to go wrong. My experience has them as the most likely to clog and spit (although my experience is limited). If you forget to rotate the brush or don't do the nut up tightly you're in for a messy accident. Plus, for our purposes - unless you're airbrushing an Imperial fortress thats glued down to a 6x4 table - just pick the bloody thing up! We don't need to spray vertically, so don't feel that you'll need one of these because we're airbrushing small stuff.

Internal Mix vs External Mix.
This just refers to where the paint is atomised - inside the brush or outside it. I've not personally seen a double action brush that uses External mix, but almost all siphon feed single actions are (its that flamethrower like attachment on the end - the Citadel brush is a good example). For what we're doing, this is largely irrelevant anyway.

0.3mm vs 0.5mm.
This is a reference to the size of the needle/nozzle combo used by the brush, and ON PAPER dictates how fine and how wide a line you can get with the brush. Honestly, for what we're doing, this is mostly irrelevant. Whoah, I heard that from here. Wash your mouth out and read on. The most common sizes you'll encounter are 0.3mm, 0.35mm and 0.5mm. I personally own both a 0.3mm and 0.5mm, and to be honest, it comes down to the skill of the artist. Yes, a master can use a 0.18mm brush to do very intricate details that a 0.5mm brush won't do - BUT that same master will do things with a 0.5mm that we won't achieve in years even with a finer brush. I'm assuming you're just starting out here, and I promise you - you'll be able to do just as much with a 0.5mm as you will with a 0.3mm one. I prefer my 0.3mm brush, and its solely because its more comfortable. We'll talk about this as we continue. The major difference we'll find in our hobby is what we can force through a 0.5mm vs a 0.3mm one.

So what features should you look for on your brush?
I've noticed a trend lately towards adding stuff that is frankly superflous to the "must have" shopping list for an airbrush. Let me try and put down the needs and wants clearly.

NEED
1. Solid, precision engineered airbrush. Get a fully metal brush. If it contains plastic (and I don't mean a rubber handle coating, I mean actual plastic parts) cross it off your list.
2. Smooth & comfortable trigger action. Find the one that suits you. Some triggrs start vertical and rock back, others are sloped forwards to begin with. Some triggers have a flat top, some are indented, domed, two-angled, ridged - whatever. Find a brush you can hold steady whilst being able to rock the trigger smoothly back and forth whilst keeping it depressed.
3. Brush that is comfortable for your hand. Some have a scalloped piece from the hose connector towards the nozzle. Some don't. Others have rubber-coated handles. Find one that suits. This ties in to point #2, above.
4. Select your feed preference. I'd recommend a normal gravity feed at all times for hobbyists, unless your sole purpose for spending loads of money was to do basecoating and terrain (and even then I'd suggest a gravity feed with a big cupola).
5. Teflon seals & packing. Its just less headaches for you. The old rubber & nylon ones just weren't as good, and many cheaper units still use them.
6. Local support for your chosen marque. Its no good getting a funky brand if no shops in your vicinity carry parts for them. Do you really want to wait a week for a new needle when (note I said WHEN, not IF) you bend one?

NICE TO HAVE
i) Trigger restrictor/preset. OK, this one is useful, but tends to teach lazy airbrushing. My 0.3mm has it - and on my course the instructor confiscated it so I had to learn to not use it.
ii) Quick-change mounts. These are an optional extra you can buy from good supply stores - basically a ball-and-socket coupler that goes between your air connector and hose. You can snap them apart for quick changing of brushes. However, its not the quick change that I like them for - its the fact that the ball-and-socket join rotates freely, meaning the hose won't try to twist your brush around on you - and that gets old REALLY fast.

NOT NEED
a) changable needles/nozzles. I don't like these. I don't know a single professional artist who uses them. An airbrush should be a high precision item - I can't see these kits that offer a 0.2mm through a 0.7mm combination having the same quality as a dedicated 0.5mm kit. I just can't. They go on my NOT NEED list.
b) MAC valve. MAC - "micro air control" - lets you subtly change the pressure at the brush level. Whilst I'm sure they're good and all, they're not essential and thus not important. If you're really desperate for this, get an in-line regulator which costs less.
c) removable cupola. See A, above. I think its pointless. The cupola rarely presents a problem - why remove it?

I've not mentioned compressors here, and I'll only take a few paragraphs to talk about them. You need an air source, and those stupid hobby cans are WORTHLESS. Don't waste your time and money. You have 3 options for air sources really, and they are:

Hobby Airbrush Compressor. Small, quiet and portable. Generally good for about 1-2 hours continuous use as some do get heat problems. Make sure it has a tank. They almost all come with a regulator and water trap. They range from $150-$1000 depending on the one you get. Make sure its an oilless piston job with around 1/4hp or more, and can handle a 40PSI (or higher) output.

"Supercheap Auto" compressor. Typical home/trade compressos. 2hp motor, big tank, noisy as hell (not good inside or late at night...). You'll need to buy a regulator and water trap as an extra, and probably a hose converter to size down. Look for the specials when they're $79 or so.

CO2 cylinder. Silent and doesn't need a water trap. Don't use in confined spaces. You can get these from places like BOC. They're actually more viable than you may think.

No matter which option you take, it will work fine for our purposes.

Now we've chatted about airbrushes and air sources, what about the third thing - paint? We know there are 2 main types of paint in our hobby - acrylic and enamel. If you followed the advice above, your airbrush will have teflon seals, which means you can run either option through it. For this tutorial we'll only be looking at water soluable mediums.

We all probably have a huge collection of paint from various sources, and of varying type. Which of them is suitable for our airbrush? Probably all of them. Yes, even the metallics and the Citadel Foundations. Fear not. Washes? No problem! Reaper MSP liners? sure! Ink? Absolutely! All it takes is a bit of planning and as you progress, experience will make this second nature.

Talking brands, I've run the following through my 0.3mm airbrush with no problems - Citadel paints, washes and inks, Derivan paints & inks, Vallejo Game Colour, Vallejo Model Air Colour, Reaper Master Series liners, P3 paints, Alclad II metallic lacquers, Tamiya paints, Gunze airbrush primer, Humbrol enamel paint, AutoAir automotive paint, House of Kolor automotive paint, Createx Airbrush paint, Spectrum ink, Pledge One-Go and some wierd no-name brand signwriting paint I got in a $2 store. The only things I've not managed to force through it was some matte varnish and Jo Sonja dark green paint I got from Bunnings to paint my 6x4 battle board with and decided to see if I could airbrush with it afterwards. So long as you prepare your paint right, there's a world of options out there - and thats the trick. You have to prepare them properly.

Since preparation is so important, AND you'll need to develop a feel for it, the first thing we should do is to learn exactly how the airbrush SHOULD feel at all times, and fortunately this is easy. Its been all talk until now, but its time for ACTION!!!

PRELIMINARY EXERCISE - ESTABLISH AIRBRUSH BASELINE

Materials: sheet of paper, airbrush, air source, ink, water (in future I'll leave off "airbrush, air source & water")

We establish this baseline by getting a spare container from somewhere, and add to it 9ml of clean water. Now, find a pot of ink, and add 1ml of ink. Any colour is fine (although black or blue is preferred). You should now have a strongly tinted liquid. Put some of this into your airbrush. Be generous - its not like its an expensive thing we just made now, is it? ((If you don't have any ink on hand, just use clean water)). Switch on your air source and set a PSI of about 25. Stick the paper to a vertical surface (like a wall).

All we're going to do now is spray the diluted ink onto the paper. Push down on your trigger and rock it back slowly (which will spray) and the ease it back off. Repeat with the brush in motion a few times. This is the perfect scenario, and your airbrush should always feel like this when its working properly. Don't worry if the pattern on the paper is a mess - thats not the point.

Preparing your paint

RULE #1 - Thin the damn paint!!!

With very, VERY few exceptions (Vallejo Model Air if you're in a hurry) you're going to HAVE to thin your paint. And indeed, you should - because the greatest strength of the airbrush is to lay down controlled, incredibly thin layers of paint and carefully build up the paint over many layers. The trick is knowing just how far down to thin the paint BEFORE it denatures and won't stick to anything. Thankfully there are things you can do even then.

What to thin with? With few exceptions, I find good old H2O is the best choice. You can use distilled if you want, but I use tap water. The other thinner you may find useful is an alcohol based thinner like Tamiya X20A - or make your own. Its pretty much nothing more than 15% isopropyl alcohol (which is cheap and fun at parties) in distilled water.

We're not going to thin down to water consistency. We'll thin down to around about the consistency of milk - which will be anything from 1:1 paint to water to about 1:2 paint to water. The bigger the needle size, the less you'll need to thin down. If you have a 0.5mm brush, start with 1:1, and if you have a 0.3mm, start with about 2:3. Now this is variable depending on the paint. For instance, GW Desert Yellow doesn't need as much thinning down as GW Tallarn Flesh. Its really hard to explain in a conceptual sense.

There are two problems you're going to face doing this - and (unsurprisingly) they are not thinning enough and thinning too much. Yeah, it can be a bit hit & miss early on. You get better at it pretty fast. Its hard for me to tell you here "thin paint x y:y for your z brand brush" as I don't know the X and the Z value. So instead I'll tell you how to find out what went wrong.

Not thinned enough will cause the brush to spit and clog. You'll know pretty fast - you'll get a shotgun-like splatter and inconsistant trigger response (pull back and nothing, then sometimes it splatters, etc). Fixing it is easy - add more water - but you'll need to clean the clog out. If you're lucky, the easy way is to drain the cupola, add some water and wind your PSI right up to 40, then hold down the trigger and give it several quick pulls back to fully on, then release. The needle will combine with the water to clean out the brush.


Paint too thick

Overly thinned will have adhesion problems on your surface, and you'll get "spidering" happening. Again - fix it by adding more paint, then purge a bit of paint through the brush. Of the two, this is the preferred problem to have as its easier to resolve.


Paint too thin


"Spidering"

((Pictures are borrowed until I can take my own on the weekend))

So what if you hit the "fail spot" - to get paint X through your brush, you have to thin it down so far that it loses adhesive properties? In other words, it either clogs or won't stick. There is a product on the market called "liquifying medium" (some places call it airbrush medium but this is often misrepresented as a thinner) - it looks like hair conditioner. It is basically the adhesive medium used in acrylic paint - add some of that to your mix and you'll be away. I use it regularly when I want to "over-reduce" my paint - that is, thin is down beyond the normal point of thinning for ultra-transparant layers of colour.

One last point about thinning paint - sometimes paint dries around the lid and particles of this get into the paint. Its not a massive issue with a brush as you can remove them when you see them, but in your airbrush they'll cause nozzle clogs that require stripping down the brush to remove them. Best thing to do is avoid them altogether - and you have two options. The simple one is to use a pipette to take the paint from the source container, avoiding the bottom and/or lip of the pot. The other is to use a paint strainer. Personally, for the trouble it will take to get the strainer, just buy another pot of paint! Dropper-style bottles don't typically have this problem anyway.

PRELIMINARY EXERCISE #2 - THIN, MIX & SHOOT SOME PAINT

Materials: paint, preferably a dark colour like black, and some non-copier paper. If you don't have a lid for your cupola, find a spare (clean) pot.

First we'll mix up some paint. In your cupola (or spare pot) add equal parts water to paint. Unless you're using some crazy small needle or a nasty thick paint this will be fine. Pop the lid on the cupola, and give the brush a gentle but vigorous shake. Set yourself to about 25PSI. Now, just as we did in the first exercise, push down for air and gently rock back for some paint. It should feel almost identical to your first practise attempt.

Cleaning Up Afterwards

Rule #2 - Clean up AS SOON as you're done. Getting fresh paint out is easy, getting well-dried paint out is much less enjoyable.

Since I already wrote a whole sequence on this, I won't repeat myself. Go to the link below and read it, then try it out. You have a used airbrush now...

How To Clean & Maintain An Airbrush

Thus endeth Section 1

This post has been edited by voyager: Aug 20 2010, 06:03 PM

[voyager]

SECTION 2 - BASIC AIRBRUSH EXERCISES

OK, now we're beyond the basic operation - I'm assuming now that you can thin your paint down and understand the concept of pressing on the airbrush trigger for paint flow. Next I'll be setting you some basic exercises to improve your control of the airbrush. Before we begin each exercise, I'll cover the method for achieving results, the common problems and how to correct them.

There is an exercise sheet attached to this post - its a basic PDF file with an A3 marked sheet. You can print this out for use if you like, otherwise just draw a version of it yourself on artists paper with a ruler and pencil. If you're going to print it out, please use PAINT and not INK as the common household laser printout doesn't always react well to thinned ink - it often won't stick to the paper properly.

To perform these exercises, you will need:

- Airbrush loaded with either adequately thinned paint (please don't over reduce it) and set to about 25PSI
- Mostly vertical surface you can stick the paper to where it won't matter if you miss (the box you use for priming - tape the paper to the back)
- Piece of paper with the lesson diagram on it (You can just reproduce it with a ruler and pencil on whatever you have avaialble)

HOLDING THE AIRBRUSH

There are two ways I've seen for holding the brush, which I have heard termed the "Pencil Grip" and "Pistol Grip". This refers to where your fingers are placed. To grip the brush properly, place it so the air connector and hose run down the inside of your palm between your index finger and thumb. Wrap your thumb gently around the air connector, and place your index finger on top of the trigger, then complete the grip. You'll find you are most comfortable with your middle finger either hooked around the air connector (pistol grip) or run down the side of the brush and your annex finger (thats the one between the little one and the middle one) around the air connector (pencil grip). Neither is wrong, but try them both out - you'll find one is more comfortable for you than the other.

<<this needs a picture. Its coming, bear with me>>

When working with your airbrush, where possible I want you to imagine you're a soldier. Hold the brush in your chosen grip in front of you. Bring your other hand up to cup/support the heel of your main hand as if you were going to fire a handgun. This two-handed grip will give you more control of your brush for precision work. I also like (when doing models) to bring my supporting hand back to my wrist to stabilise it but leaving more freedom for fine details, but this is generally when I can prop a forearm or elbow on a supporting surface like my desk.

THE MOST IMPORTANT AIRBRUSH TECHNIQUE OF ALL

This is the technique for -ALL- airbrushing you do. It is, very simply, this:

Air On, Start Movement, Paint On, Paint Off, Stop Movement, Air Off

There is NO OTHER WAY we're going to do this. And yes, "movement" for a dot is not moving - but the sequence is still valid. At all times, when I talk about making a stroke, I mean it EXACTLY as written above. The easiest way to explain this is in Exercise 2 (Lines) but we'll summarize here too - if I want to paint a line (for ease of visualization, lets say I'm going to paint white between the exhausts on the side of a Rhino tank), I begin with my airbrush beyond the line (eg: left hand exhaust) I want to paint. I push down on my trigger for airflow. I start a left-to-right movement across the surface (tank). When I reach my line (left hand exhaust), I pull back to begin paint flow. I keep a smooth motion until I reach the end of the line (right hand exhaust) then I rock forwards on the trigger to stop the paint flow. I continue to move beyond the end of the line (right hand exhaust) and then stop the airflow. Here's a diagram:


Example of painting a line

Why do I do it this way? Simply - if I try it any other way, I'm going to get what we call a "dogbone" or "barbell" - a line with two distinctly heavier, circular ends to it, instead of a smooth, even line.

*** Those of you with a single action airbrush, your air & paint come on together, so you skip the "Air On" and "Air Off" steps. The rest of this still holds true - and you can do the exercises as well ***

PRIMARY AIRBRUSH STROKES

There are apparantly 8 but for the life of me I don't know what they all are. We'll focus on the DOT, the LINE, the ARC and the DAGGER. Beyond this you can progress on your own. Each exercise I set you will teach you how to perform each of these in several varieties. The most difficult is the dagger stroke, and it will be the hardest for me to explain here. Some exercises will seem to contradict others, but thats intentional - each technique is different after all. We'll begin with the DOT.

THE DOT

Yes, its a bloody dot. Not complex in its formation but it has many ways we can execute it with an airbrush. We'll look at putting down a tiny dot and some much bigger dots (and honestly I reckon the mid-sized dot is the easiest). We'll also be CAREFULLY watching how heavy we spray here. This is an exercise in trigger control and precision - a great place to start.

If you look on the exercise sheet, the top left is the Precision Dots exercise. These will be your challenges:

* Exercise 1A. Fill the top 5 circles with a single dot of the appropriate size
* Exercise 1B. Place a small dot inside the line of 6 circles
* Exercise 1C. Place a tiny dot on each of the grid points on the left hand grid (the right hand grid is for a different exercise)

Here's how you do it.

IF YOU HAVE A TRIGGER RESTRICTOR, PLEASE BACK IT COMPLETELY OFF - YOU ARE GOING TO LEARN CONTROL

Exercise 1A - Fill the Circles

You do this with three techniques. The first is to adjust the HEIGHT at which you spray from. The second is how HEAVY or LIGHT you spray. The final one is PRESSURE.

HEIGHT
The distance away from the target dictates how WIDE A LINE or how BIG A DOT will be. Close in means not very big. Far away means large. When you're learning, you're going to get this wrong A LOT. Don't stress it. I'll show you how to judge it.

HEAVY & LIGHT
Heavy paint spray is pulling back on the trigger aggressively, letting out loads of paint. LIGHT is the opposite. I will almost always recommend LIGHT - because you can always apply multiple layers to build up the colour, you won't saturate your medium (and thus get spidering problems) and you'll have that important measure of CONTROL.

PRESSURE
The PSI you set in your air source. High means strong atomisation, bigger spray patterns, etc. Good for large areas. Low means smaller dispersion. Good for fine detail. Also, high pressure will increase the chance of getting spidering. I always live by this rule of thumb - if you need to over-reduce your paint FOR DETAIL AND/OR CONTROL, then turn DOWN the PSI.

OK, lets have a go. Pick that big circle in the top left (its 5cm across, if you care) and line up your brush. Remember to stay as perpendicular to the surface as you can (thats important for precision). Position yourself say, 15cm away from the page (this is a rough guess based on this exercise without seeing your exact setup - its probably wrong!!!). Press down for air, keep it steady, and rock GENTLY back on the trigger (not too much paint now) for about 1/2 a second and release. Stop your air. How did that go? What you should see is a darkish centre and gently faded paint out to the edges of the circle. If thats what you got - SWEET!!! Nice going! If not, well, its your first go. What happened?

1. Can't see the paint on the page. Too little trigger pull-back and/or too quick. Have another go and be a bit more aggressive.
2. Big dark wet spot. Too much paint. Ease up a bit next time.
3. Big dark wet spot and spidering. Stayed on the paint too long.
4. Didn't fill the circle. It probably won't edge to edge, but should be close. Try leaving the paint on a bit longer and coming back from the paper a bit more.
5. Overfilled the circle. Come closer to the page, and possibly re-check your PSI. Could be up a bit high.
6. Everything seems OK but I got spidering. Paint too thin and/or pressure too high. Recheck.

The remainder of this exercise is trying to deploy paint in varying sizes into all 5 circles (each is 1cm smaller than the last) to give you practise in height and trigger control. So go for it. Have a go. Oh, and by the way - you don't actually NEED the circles. You can just do this freely on your page and try to CREATE the varying size dots. You're going to have to go back to some of them for a second go and layer it up, and thats fine.

PRO TIP - HEIGHT GAUGE.

Remember I explained earlier about pistol grip and pencil grip, and what to do with your off hand? Well, here's a trick I picked up from an old school draftsman (my father), who used to use his hand to make a "ruler" and draw pretty straight lines down the edge of a page. Place the end of the thumb of your off hand just below your little finger when you're holding your airbrush. Now extend the little finger of your offhand out sideways (splay your fingers) and touch the tip of it lightly to your paper. Now, using that as your guiding hand, extend and contract your fingers to use them as a simple height adjustment. Try the exercise again doing this and see if it helps.

<<this needs a picture. Its coming, bear with me>>

EXERCISE 1B - 6 SMALL DOTS

Now, after that last step, lets do this on. In the line of 6 circles, I want you place a small (not tiny, just comfortably small) dark dot in the centre of each one. The dot should be no more than half the size of the circle containing it, and should be nice and solid. No spidering allowed, and I'd like you to NOT do this in layers (yes, I know - this is unusual). Its perfectly feasible to leave your air on for the entire 6 dots - thats up to you. I usually do.

SO you're going to need to balance your trigger aggression with the duration of the spray. This is NOT something I can give you a magic formula in mm and seconds, but I CAN say this - the longer your trigger is pulled back, the less distance you want to pull it back. This is for you to get some feel for your brush and your STYLE of airbrushing (which you are now beginning to develop).

Once again, the troubleshooting guide above will help you out.

MASTERCLASS - repeat this exercise at 15PSI and again at 35PSI, and feel the difference. Learn to do this at any pressure your rig is capable of.

EXERCISE 1C - The Grid

This is an exercise in pure precision and control. THe first time you do this it will probably be horrendous. Don't worry. Paper is cheap, keep at it.

You're going to get in REALLY close to the paper and place a TINY (as small as you can) dot directly on top of each dot in the 5 x 5 grid. Again, I want it dark enough to see that you did it with a single layer. You ARE NOT permitted to remove your needle cap to achieve this - firstly you WILL bend the needle when you hit the page, and secondly I want you to learn this without the benefit of eyeballing the needle tip. Its judgement as well as control - both are important.

Once again, the same troubleshooting applies.

MASTERCLASS - place a grid of 5 x 5 dots INSIDE a 1cm x 1cm square. Each dot must be distinct. Its doable with a 0.5mm brush I assure you. It means your dots need to be no more than 2mm across, AND you'll need to be neat and precise.

THE LINE

Second exercise is how to spray a smooth line between two points. To do this, we need to master the technique presented at the start of this article. Thankfully its easy to learn. Grab the next exercise sheet (top right).

Exercise 2A. Spray a simple line between 2 points
Exercise 2B. Spray a segmented line between 2/4 points

EXERCISE 2A - Single Line

Load up your brush. All you're going to do is try and spray a line between the top set of vertical lines. This is pure practise of the core technique - air on, begin move, paint on, paint off, stop move, air off. This needs to be your mantra. Ensure that whilst doing your exercise that you spray lines of different thickness and tone, and go right->left and left->right. The end result is your ability to spray a very fine, very straight, very smooth line starting right on the left hand line and finishing on the righthand line.


Exercise 2A - Single Line

Common mistake - moving at the wrist and not your entire hand/wrist/arm across the surface - this will create a dark spot in the middle of the line.

Your first attempt will likely be nowhere near the lines. Don't worry - it takes practise. Repeat the exercise a couple of times and you'll find you get a lot more accurate in short order.

EXERCISE 2B - Broken Line

OK, so this is a little trickier. The second set of lines has a gap in the middle. I assume you can see where this is going. Yep. Try to stick between BOTH sets of lines and do it in a SINGLE movement keeping a consistent line size/opacity.


Exercise 2B - Broken Line

Don't forget to repeat this in the opposite direction.

MASTERCLASS - turn the paper 90 degrees and try them both vertically.

EPIC LEVEL - see that grid of dots in the upper left hand corner? stitch them together with single lines between each dot. Include diagonals. Thats a LOT of lines and they're small.

THE ARC

This is pretty easy to learn and difficult to master. Essentially, you're going to spray a smooth curved line. The exercise is the lower right section of the exercise sheet. The movement for this needs to be adapted a little because its no longer a straight line, but the same principle applies.

To draw an arc, its the same as a line but curved. Sounds straightforwards. Here are your challenges:

Exercise 3A: draw 360 degree circles
Exercise 3B: draw segmented circles

EXERCISE 3A - Circle

On the top-most cross, spray a full circle that is even, smooth, and just crosses the outermost tips of the cross. So air down, do the entire circle move once before you deploy paint, complete the circle, stop your paint, stop your move, stop the air. Well. Its probably patchy and nothing like a circle is it? Don't worry - like all things, it needs practise. This one still gets me - I can get a reasonable circle (in that its obviously not a square...) now but still a bit lopsided. I should practise more.

Continue the exercise - alternate clockwise and counterclockwise, and make the circles increasingly smaller as you proceed towards the centre of the cross. Yes, this is the same as Exercise 2A but in a circle.

Troubleshooting - you know what? its the same as the dot and line exercise. By now you should have a handle on common faults. The new problem you'll run into is the line seeming to stray a bit - which is most commonly caused by you not keeping the brush perpendicular to the surface. Slow down a bit and get it right.

EXERCISE 3B - Arcs

This is a trickier, so expect some frustration at first. You'll nail it in a few goes though - hang in there. In a SINGLE 360 degree movement, I want you to spray 2 arcs at opposite sides of the cross, staying between the arms of the cross. So you'd fill in the 12-3 o'clock and the 6-9 o-clock section, for instance.

So the technique is the same as Exercise 2B, but in a circle again. So its air on, start the move (make a full circle move to get the feel for it), paint on, paint off, continue the move, paint on, paint off, stop move, stop air. Yep, you're seeing the pattern by now. I'll stop reminding you after Section 2. Promise. Maybe.

As before, get smaller and smaller. Change direction. And spray in the opposing arcs as well.

This will take some practise, so don't get disheartened.


THE DAGGER

This is the trickiest but most important stroke to learn. Why are we doing this then? Simply because to learn the dagger stroke is to master your airbrush. If you can do it successfully, every time in the manner you wish, then you can do anything. So lets begin.

The dagger stroke is a line that ends in a point. Sounds straightforwards there, but its the execution that takes some getting used to. This will be the first move we've done where the brush does not remain at a constant height from the surface you're spraying. Its also the first where we'll be adjusting our paint flow during the move. So a BIG step up in terms of difficulty.

We'll break it down into 3 stages to get it right.

Dagger Stroke, Stage 1
Begin painting a normal line. As you reach the end of the line, lower the brush swiftly closer to the surface you're painting. This will inevitably end with a darker line (and probably spidering) but thats OK. We're practising a move.

Dagger Stroke, Stage 2
Begin (as before) painting a normal line. As you reach the end of the line, swiftly back the paint off (not instantly like we'd normally do, just quickly). What you're get is a fading line at the end.

Dagger Stroke, Stage 3.
Put them together. Begin with a normal line. As you reach the end of the line, in one fluid movement, swiftly lower the brush to the surface AND back the paint off. You should end up with a tapering point.


Dagger stroke (bad example but I didn't have much time - please ignore the overspray)

EXERCISE 4A - Daggers

The exercise page has one last section that looks like the line exercise. Use this to practise doing daggers in all directions, trying to stay within the lines provided.

MASTERCLASS: paint a palm tree, using dagger strokes for the fronds. Add a flying seagull made from two curved dagger strokes.

A Word of Thanks

I'd like to offer full credit where its due. These exercises are pretty much the same as the ones my original instructors put me through a few years ago. So if you get a chance to take a class from Lynette Orzlowski and/or Simon Gruar, I highly recommend it. Both are very passionate about their craft and you'll learn a lot.

This post has been edited by voyager: Jul 20 2010, 12:25 AM

[voyager]

PART 3 - AIRBRUSHING MODELS

So after that massive wall of text above, I'm back for Part 3. Now we get into the fun stuff - aiming our airbrush at small plastic and metal men. Here's the materials list you'll need for the entire Part 3 exercises.

- Airbrush, air source, etc.
- white primer (gray or other pale colour in a pinch, just not black)
- low tack masking tape, blu-tac & newspaper
- piece of clean paper, 80-100gsm, preferably not that recycled stuff
- pencil, ruler & hobby knife
- something to paint on. Ideally a scratch vehicle ($2 shop toys work fine), but in a pinch a piece of decent artists paper will be fine.
- finally, if you're a bit squeamish about getting covered in paint, a latex glove

OK, lets break it down into objectives.

Section 1 will discuss airbrushing a 3D object and how to handle it - not just in terms of spray.
Section 2 is all about camouflage, we'll do hard edge and soft edge patterns
Section 3 will cover shields - how to make one and how to use it. We'll also be looking at one-handed spraying in some detail.
Section 4 will be some extra tricks you can use with your airbrush from various effects, including starfield splatter, weathering and cheap zenithal lighting

So that's the objective. I'll post this in the various sections so its not a huge mass of stuff in one hit (plus it means I don't go blind staring at the screen)


SECTION 1 - Airbrushing 3D Objects

So far we've played on flat surfaces, such as paper - now we'll move to something a little more complex. Before we do, I want you to think about this - we know that height from the surface dictates how wide the spray pattern is. Well, look at the side of one of your larger models. Its not exactly flat now, is it. In the case of something like an Eldar Falcon or a Leman Russ its not really an issue, but something like a Space Marine Rhino has several areas of recess (door wells) and others of elevation (exhaust stacks). If we want to spray a thin line straight along the hull, we'll have a problem. If you spray with your brush at a constant height you're not going to get an even line - it will become narrower and darker on the exhausts, and wider but more diffuse through the door wells. So how do you combat this? There are a couple of techniques we can use.

Option 1: spray in sections - simply start and stop the spray so you do all the basic hull, then do the exhaust stacks, then do the recesses. This is the easiest "freehand" method.

Option 2: mask the line. We'll cover this in Section 2. This is the most precise, but most time consuming method.

Option 3: learn to move the brush in relation to the target, including angle of spray and smooth height adjustment. This requires the most skill with the brush.

I'm hoping by now all three of these options occurred to you, and probably a fourth - "do I actually care about it?". I hope you do - thinking like this BEFORE you hit the target with paint is EXACTLY what I'm pushing you towards. Once you can visualize the moves of your brush, this becomes easier.

Am I going to tell you which method is "best"? No. They all have their place. I may elaborate on this later, but for now this will have to suffice.

OK, with this in mind - I want to pose this question to you: I have myself a beautiful new ForgeWorld vehicle. It cost me damn near $250 include postage, took 11 weeks to assemble and I'm amazingly proud of it. I've primed it white, I've picked my colour and I'm ready to spray it with my airbrush. Whats going to happen as soon as I hit it with 40PSI of air pressure?

Answer: its going to blow off my table, hit the concrete of the garage floor and shatter into more pieces than it arrived in.

This is NOT the ideal scenario.

Unlike paper, which we've simply taped to a wall, this model will catch the air, it will move (even VERY slightly) around wherever we put it, and we really want to have both hands on the airbrush to do the job. So we need to fix it down. Easy answer is of course to use blutac but this is only viable if there is no paint on the area we're touching the blutac too. Airbrushed paint has a nasty habit of coming off to the stuff. So here's my solution. Put some low tack masking tape onto your model where it will contact the surface. You can then put the blutac onto your surface, and stick it to the masking tape. The stick from the tape will be sufficient to hold all but the lightest of vehicles in place. Don't just double over the tape - you end up with movement which we want to avoid.

OK, so what if your target is so small that you can't realistically tape it down? Or you need to get low down and don't want to stick a painted area to your surface? Well, now we have to paint single handed, holding the model in one hand. This presents a couple of technical challenges. Again, I can't teach you HOW to do this, but I CAN teach you how NOT to do this.

Point #1 - DON'T move the model, only move the brush. If you're holding the model in one hand, keep that hand perfectly still. If you try to co-ordinate the movement, you'll just make a mess. Let the brush hand make the movements.

Point #2 - If you have to change grip, put the model down and wait. You will get overspray on your hand. You might get a spot of paint still quite wet in an hard to see area. It can be wet, it can smudge. Put down the model and reset carefully. Wait a couple minutes if you can. Use your airbrush's air source (just push down on the trigger) to dry your hand and any surfaces you're working on.

Point #3 - Don't get lazy. Same principle as before - air on, start move, paint on, paint off, stop move, stop air. Its just now you have to think a bit harder to keep your co-ordination.

MORE TO FOLLOW...

This post has been edited by voyager: Aug 20 2010, 06:02 PM

[voyager]

Part 4 Placeholder

[voyager]

Part 5 Placeholder

[voyager]

Part 6 Placeholder

[Blue Cypher]

Excellent so far mate. Quick question though, I have never heard of liquefying medium. I'd much prefer to be able to thin paint down quite heavily but I have noticed that it isn't really possible just using water to dilute. When you use liquefying medium do you just use that or also add water? In normal painting I probably go a 1:3 paint to water ratio at least.

[voyager]

You add it alongside the water - basically thin down the mix as you normally would then add just enough of the liquifying medium to restore the cohesive properties of the paint. Its only needed when you have that oddball paint that just won't behave nicely. I used to use it more, until I learned exactly how far I could reduce any paint I owned - usually that is sufficient. I normally find its not required with GW paints in my 0.3mm brush, but I have cut a few of the Derivan Minis with it to make a really thin mix, particularly with black and white.

[Drummer]

Excellent, thank gawd someone has the time to do this for people.


Whats your thoughts on the Model Air paints? (I know what mine are..)

PS - I think that many people will discover their own "flowing agents" for the paints they have also. Trial and error can also be a great exercise.

[Blind Pig]

Excellent, thank gawd someone has the time to do this for people.

It has taken several months of naging Voyager to do this for us.

But that is what I do best (and why I'm single).

I hope others take the time to do such wonderful Tutorials on what they do best in the hobby.

This topic will eventually be moved into the Airbrushing link, BTW. I have just pinned it for easy access for Voyager, and to show it off a bit.

Bec

[voyager]

Whats your thoughts on the Model Air paints? (I know what mine are..)

I've got 5 or 6 of them on my desk (black, white, 3 x blues & I might have a silver but not sure) - I haven't used them that extensively, and its not because I think they're bad - I tend to mix up the colours and I need and so far I've not needed those ones. I bought them with the idea that I could use them for spot work without needing to mix up - just drop into the brush and go. Haven't needed them yet.

I did notice some inconsistency with them thinning a little with water. I didn't notice a Model Air Thinner product on their website in the products list but they do mention it by name in places. Unsure what that is made of - it would answer a few questions if I could find out. I'll have to order one and taste it. (no, thats not a spelling mistake)

[Blind Pig]

I didn't notice a Model Air Thinner product on their website in the products list but they do mention it by name in places. Unsure what that is made of - it would answer a few questions if I could find out. I'll have to order one and taste it. (no, thats not a spelling mistake)

I've got some in the garage.

I'll have a look and let you know in the morning.

IIRC it is milky white in colour. Dunno the smell or taste though (but willing to give it a go)......

[voyager]

The reason I say smell/taste is because it will IMMEDIATELY tell you if its got any form of thickener (typically adhesion medium) and/or alcohol in it - which in turn tells you a lot about the paint and what you can do with it. A thicker thinner (sic) means overreducing with water won't work. Alcohol in the thinner tells you that thinning with water will inevitably result in inconsistancies and splitting when you overreduce.

[Blind Pig]

Hmmmmmm.....Well I found it.

32ml bottle. The same colour and about as thick as milk. It smells like the Vallejo Air paints (that funny, slightly ammonia smell) and is just slightly sticky when dry on the fingertips.

Tastes like vallejo paint too, without any alcohol.



[edit]

On the bottle it says " Thinner for Model Air and liquid Acrylic. Dilutes color (sic) without loss of adhesion, resistance and consistency"

This post has been edited by Blind Pig: Jul 7 2010, 10:57 AM

[Heble]

Do not Drink....

[voyager]

The same colour and about as thick as milk. It smells like the Vallejo Air paints (that funny, slightly ammonia smell) and is just slightly sticky when dry on the fingertips.

Thats probably standard liquifying medium in water. That tells me - theoretically - I can overreduce with water, add a bit of the medium I have in its neat form (somewhat thicker) and it should be fine. I'll test it tonight and post the results.

And no, do not swallow it (although it shouldn't hurt you any more than the paint will) - I figured I didn't need to actually post that bit.

UPDATE - from what I can gather by some hardcore googling (many of the pages were in Spanish), the Vallejo thinner is part varnish so it will extend drying time by a small amount (maybe 5-10%) and should also make the paint slightly tougher wearing. However, everything I can find suggests that it's likely to be VERY BAD mixed with the Tamiya X20A thinner (alcohol based) as it will probably react poorly. I'd be sticking to tap water and liquifying medium myself.

This post has been edited by voyager: Jul 7 2010, 04:42 PM

[Blind Pig]

Do not Drink....

yes Mum.

And no, do not swallow it (although it shouldn't hurt you any more than the paint will) - I figured I didn't need to actually post that bit.

Doh!

This post has been edited by Blind Pig: Jul 8 2010, 12:35 AM

[Blue Cypher]

This is going the be a very long article & probably the most worthwhile thing I have ever read on the internet. Thanks for putting in all the effort mate. I'm sure you will help a lot of people, myself included, to get to grips with how to properly use an airbrush.

Now I'm hanging to paint some dots & lines

[voyager]

Now I'm hanging to paint some dots & lines

Wait until we do daggers - those will cause you unbelieveable amounts of frustration early on. I'm struggling to write that section in a way that won't make people run for the hills screaming "Cthulhu has come early". Its one of those things that takes a while to learn (most airbrushing stuff is easy to learn and takes time to master). I'll have the text up for Arcs later today.

This weekend I'll dust off the camera and in some decent light get the reference photos to make this easier to understand.

[CursedDice]

Voyager,

Awesome write up mate!

I stumbled across all my Airbrush Venturi "textbooks" on the weekend. I should be able to scan them up and compile them into something. Not sure if this might help but if you want let me know.

If ya want mate happy to help.

Russ

This post has been edited by CursedDice: Jul 8 2010, 05:06 PM