"Are your paints right in front of you?" Topic

This is an offshoot of a post I had about setting up a new hobby station (just moved into a new house). There isn't room enough in the new space for all my paints (about 90 or so Pro Acryl, Army Painter, AK, and Citadel mix) to sit right in front of me. There's room on the wall behind me for racks but they won't be within arms reach. I'd have to (shudder) get out of my seat to grab different paints. Do those of you who do not have all your paints within arm's reach mind? Does it matter? Would you change the arrangement if you could? Thanks for your thoughts.

You only have about 90 paints?

Buy some more soon!

I have around 150-200 bottles of paints at my table. They are all around me all within reach. It's almost like I'm sitting in a burrow of paints and figures…but I know where everything is 😉

I have about 40 or 50 paints in a double layer of trays on my desktop in an arms reach. I have a double layer of trays in a one desktop drawer with about 60 paints, a second drawer with about 30 paints in a single layer and a third drawer with about 20 larger paintpots (Howard Hughes). I have about 5 or 6 paintpots actually on my painting station immediately in front of me for my current paintjob.

Then there are about a dozen un-opened in a pile on my game table just out of reach and then a tray with all my contrast paints elsewhere on my game table also just out of reach.

I also have another drawer out of reach with all my really old paints, maybe a dozen or 20 which I only go to in desperation.

I just placed another online order today for some more paints, just a few.

I have a nagging doubt about a commission I will be starting in the autumn that I might not have enough shades to complete them.

All current paints right in front of me on back low shelves on painting desk. I also have a flat wall attached to the table with magnetic bars that hold all my tools (files, nippers, tweezers, and the like).

There is a second storage box filled with unopened paints.

I only have the paints I intend to use immediately in front of me. The rest is in boxes or scattered loose about the table around me.

The paints I most commonly use are in a shoebox. You can get a lot of paint pots in a shoebox, especially VJ or Humbrol. The shoebox lives next to my painting area. I get one out at a time to paint with it.

The rest are in a cupboard.

All of my paints live just out of arms' reach, inside drawers or sliding paint racks with handles that are in arms' reach. I open a drawer or slide a paint rack out to get the paints where I can view/select/reach them, then slide the drawer/rack back into place to make room for painting/crafting.

This does mean I have to keep the sliding area clear in order to view paints, but it's okay if the drawers interfere with each other. I just keep the sliding containers off to one side, or on a shelf over the desk surface, so that I have a reasonably large work area. Work areas tend to fill up with stalled/waiting projects from the edges inward toward the center, so it really pays to have a large work area.

- Ix

I have an old teacher's desk with paint in the left hand drawer, tools in the center drawer, and next figures up in the right hand drawer. The desk top is mounded with stuff I can't seem to put back!

Only the paints I am currently using are on the desk top. All other paints are in drawers on either side of the desk. I do not have to get up to reach them.

I have a cart closeby with my paints. I pull over the few I am using at the time, then switch.

I also don't sit when I paint, so I don't have to get up.

I also don't sit when I paint, so I don't have to get up.

Heathen! Burn the heretic!!!

A lot on my desk/shelving near by but still have a lot more in bins. Ok I'm a paint addict.

Everything is in reach. I'm old and lazy.

Not in front, but within arm's reach. Mostly in stacked trays with the colors I know I need out and right next to the castings.

@Yellow Admiral. I am another heretic! I find it more comfortable to stand when painting; sitting over a desk means I get neck pain. My paints are in wall mounted racks and can easily be selected when needed.

I don't have a permanent painting station but use several areas of the house at different times (game room table, outdoor patio table, living room in front of TV, sometimes breakfast table). All my paints are put away in small storage containers, of different shapes but each of roughly shoebox capacity. I have about 6 total for painting. 3 are paints, one is primers, one is mediums and varnish, one is fillers and paint additives. Hmmm … plus some more for glues, basing, etc. Plus cup-shaped containers for brushes and tools .

Anyway for straight painting I use a tray with liner, and scatter about 4 paint boxes around me in stretch arms reach. I grab the colors I'm working with, typically 3-6, and my (usually wet) palette and rinsing cup and put these on the tray or just beyond its edge. Plus brushes and tools beyond that.

I'm sure I lose time setting up and taking down but it works for me.

Note, I use artist paints and have oh, about 40, plus simple mixing for additional shades.

Paints that I'm using right now are on my painting desk. The rest of the bottles of paint are in my late mother-in-law's Samsonite make-up case (which sometimes goes to conventions with me), which is on the floor of my painting room, next to my desk.

Paint sample jars from the hardware store are on a shelf of my painting desk.

Spray paints are in a banker's box next to the painting table. The never need to be on the table, because they are only used outside.

I don't have a huge number of different coloured paints, perhaps 40 or so plus duplicates of those I use a lot. All sat in a rack directly in front of me. I mix and blend a lot of the time so I don't need lots of different paint. Plus I don't actually have space for more than that!