"Tamiya Acrylic Paints...Good/Bad" Topic

A friend of mine who is moving out of town gave me 50+ pots of Tamiya Acrylic paint.
I use Craft, Vallejo, and artist acrylics.

Are they any good?

He also gave me 20 or bottles of artist inks. Have to try them on garbage figures.

Tamiya if they are the same as what I had were really only usable in an airbrush. I had them dry on a paintbrush on me!

I'm sure others will post but Tamiya are different from other acrylics. They don't really thin with water; most people recommend the Tamiya thinner but I think you can also thin with isopropryl alcohol. Out of the bottle they are quite thin, so they airbrush well.

Yeah, great for airbrushing, lousy with a brush.

Robert

"Yeah, great for airbrushing, lousy with a brush."

+1

Simon

I found the red very good (very 'red') but the paints do need a lot of mixing and eventually seem to die in the pot.

Phil

"Yeah, great for airbrushing, lousy with a brush."

Ditto that.

However, I use Deck Tan to brush paint "the whites of their eyes". It works great, looks natural, and doesn't look jarring as normal white does. (A trick I learned while reading about portrait painting.)

I have used Tamiya paints with a brush and achieved good results, but agree with the other posters about the swift drying time. I exclusively use them in my Airbrush and get good results.

Artists inks can be used for washes and shading. A block painted figure can be "dipped" to get the same effect as several popular brands of pigment. I use Windsor and Newton Peat Brown as my dark shade, as shown here: link

I have used them with a brush. It was OK but as others have said they don't clean up or thin well with water. I tried to thin some which I had for a year or so using water and the paint was kind of odd (sorry I cant really describe it). There was also a lot of dried paint to clean out of my brush whenever I used the Tamiya paints.

If you use isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol as your thinner and dole out enough in your pallet so it will not dry up immediately, you can have some success painting with a brush.
It is a certain skill set you have to manage, but may not be worth the trouble.

I use it extensively to paint the sides of Flames of War bases.

As others have said, Tamiya performs excellent in an airbrush. I use them very often for just that purpose (in fact, awaiting a new batch of OD so I can airbrush some tanks). Brush painting is less fun, but it works.

One weathering hint: I often use Tamiya buff to weather tanks. Gives a very dusty look. What I do is use a large brush, dip the tip into the paint, then soak the whole thing in Isopropyl alcohol. Essentially you are making a wash. Then slather it all over the area I want weathered. You can adjust the effect by adding more alcohol. Or more paint, depending on the depth you are looking for (i.e. for dried mud, apply fairly heavily or do multiple coats, especially over tank suspension). Works great!

Damon.

Tim, yes it does get into the recesses, but that's the point! What I'm trying to simulate here is ground in dirt, dust, mud, etc. I use this extensively in scale modeling (as well as Tamyia Earth for a wetter or more "earthy" mud), and use it for wargaming vehicles over the past couple of years.

Damon.

Goober, I love the title of your blog!

I use tamiya paints all the time but only with an airbrush

I use a few with brushes with no problem they need to be mixed in the pot really well though. Never had a problem thinning them with water but I tend to use them on white primer almost like a wash rather than as a block colour over black primer. The gold is very good compared to other acrylic golds.

Garand@ I recently found that same technique out by accident using flat brown. works really well.

Thanks for all your advice gents.
I'll have to try them to see if they work with my painting style. I don't have an airbrush and don't see myself getting one anytime soon.

If they don't work for me I may keep a few colors some of you have recommended for washes and eye color, I like those ideas.
The rest I'll flog at our local con which is coming up in a couple of weeks.

I also received from him 5 – 1/35 scale model kits.
An F-15, Viet Nam PBR patrol boat, Bradly with U.S infantry and a Ferrari Enzo. If anyone is interested in these send me a PM. I don't do 1/35 scale at all. If anyone can help me with pricing these kits it would help also.

never had a problem brush painting with them, or mixing with other company's. you can thin them for so long with just straight tap water, but they do last better if you use Tamiya thinner ( or iso alcohol though ive not used this). they can be a bit of a learning curve as they don't always respond in the same way as other acrylic paints, but are well worth persevering with, especially if you want to mix in the Tamiya spray paints, as the colour match is very good.
For the inks they will work very well, though depending on the brand will depend on the amount of tint in them, and how far you can thin them down and still achieve a useful depth of effect.
As for the Kits wile a couple would be lovely being in the UK its a heck of an ask, just for some advice that agrees with what most people above have said, ( you could make them yourself, and enjoy a change to your normal habits)

If you paint with a brush, don't bother with them

I may be off my rocker, but I seem to recall reading that Tamiya acrylics are alcohol-based rather than water-based (like Vallejo) and that is why you may experience them drying too quickly for brushes, or really only diluting properly with (surprise) alcohol.

Yes, the Tamiya acrylics have isopropyl alcohol in them as the medium rather than water, hence the fast drying time and funny smell.
I just threw out some jars as the paint had dried too much to be useable, but I'd had them for 20 years or more, and got quite a lot of use out of them with a brush.

I've been using Tamiya since I was a child, having painted scale models and hundreds of miniaturest, and have used most other brands since.

It is not polemic – it's not a case of are they all good or all bad.

Some apply fantastically with a brush, some not.

Some colours are the best on the market. This is particularly true of the dark colours; flat black is the blackest black and goes on extremely smoothly. Red brown is incredible. But, with some exceptions, the pale colours are bad because the particles are not well suspended in the alcohol. They are chalky and clog detail. White and the flesh colour are the worst.

Water lightens the colours, and changes their consistency, making the pale colours dry-brush on really well – a light blue drybrush over flat black is an excellent technique for truly black clothe, but with some depth.

Their metallics go on far more smoothly than GW, leaving flat surfaces, and the pure colours, particularly aluminium, give an even colour when brushed. The copper is superb. The metallics which are a dye added to an silver flecked paint, for example the blue, brush on large surfaces terribly, leaving brush marks as the colour-to-metal mix changes, and these need airbrushing. On small surfaces they are fine. The gold goes on smoothly but is just not very vibrant – the Vallejo alcohol metallics are better here. However, a wet brush in the Tamiya metallics will not rust the paint, as is so with Vallejo.

Tamiya washes are good, but thick and shiny. The red is excellent for blood. I prefer GW or Future washes made from water-based acrylics.

Being alcohol based, Tamiya paints do not dilute well with Future – you get a slightly blotchy mix (which has its place as another effect).

Don't heed the usual internet "best thing eva ftw" or "omg worst thing ever". There is room for their better products in your set.

Ha! A bleep for an acronym.

That's good info.

I want to use their Clear Blue and Clear Red for visors, vision blocks, canopies, cowlings and such (15mm or 1/100 scale). Any advice? Will they work over something like say GW Leadbelcher or Vallejo Oily Steel? The guy at the model RR store said to definitely get their thinner. It has so many caution labels on it, I can't even find the product name.

What are you using to transfer this stuff to the palette, brush or drop bottle?

Hi grommet,

I've used their red wash over gold paints and it gave a nice, rich colour. I don't recall having done blue over silvers, but I would assume it would work.

I've not used their thinner.

For getting this paint on a dry palette for mixing, I just use a brush. I find it annoying to clean it out of the eye-dropper.