Look at that, horrifying isn't it? Enough to send a chill down your spine.
It's something that has frustrated me for quite some time with the Citadel paint range. The colour selection is wonderful and covers almost every shade and tone you could ask for.
Well, outside of the oranges. The poor, poor oranges...
Yet they're in such impractically designed pots. I've been thinking about transferring all my paints into dropper bottles to remedy this issue, and finally got around to doing so now I've got a proper hobby desk to work at.
I figured it would be a nice thing to write up a blog post about, so read on to find out how I went about it and a few tips and tricks I've learned to speed the process up.
When I was thinking of transferring all my paints, I asked myself the question,
Is it really worth it?
After all, I'm effectively double paying for the paint; once for the original pot and then again transferring it into a dropper. Ultimately I decided to go ahead based on three core reasons:
- I want my paints to last longer. I've extensively documented how slowly I paint on this blog, and a frequent issue I've run into is that my paints are drying out before I have a chance to really use a good chunk of them. Combined with all the solid lumps that build up around the rim, I end up having to replace pots far earlier than I'd like.
- I don't want to damage my brushes. I've invested in a set of Artis Opus brushes that are wonderful tools to have, and have really helped improve my painting. However, spooning paint out of the Citadel pots always leaves me worried I'm damaging the bristles or getting paint too close to the ferrule. No Citadel pots, no need to spoon out the paint.
- I want an easier way to mix paints. I'm trying to up my painting game and, as part of that, mixing paints is a relative essential. Having my paints in droppers makes it a lot easier to do as I've now got a solid measurement. Hearing the Warhammer TV guys refer to mixing "dollops" of paint always gives me a chuckle, and dropper bottles eliminate the issue.
So with that decided, it was time to get down to business. The first step was to check the prevailing wisdom of the internet on how to do this, and fortunately, there's plenty of guides available on what you'll need. After reading a few methods, I settled on the following pieces:
- 15ml Dropper Bottles with lids and spouts
I bought mine through Amazon, but there's plenty out there. Just make sure you get the thicker spouts, as they are much less likely to clog with paint. - Plastic Funnels
By no means an essential purchase, but one I found immensely useful, funnels are the perfect way to ensure your paint ends up in the bottle and not in a colourful puddle around and all over it. And, being plastic, they're easy to clean off all the residual paint to get the most amount transferred. - Steel Agitator Balls
Something I was unsure on initially, but they're proving to be a handy purchase, agitator balls make resuspending your paints, especially metallics, much easier. When buying, just make sure you buy high-grade stainless steel ones; otherwise, they'll rust in the paint and ruin the whole pot. I prefer my white paints to not be tinged a rusty brown! I elected to go for some from AK Interactive as they're expressly designed for paint mixing. They're more expensive than buying general purpose ball bearings, but the peace of mind is worth it for me. - Paint Thinner
You will definitely need this. I bought a 200ml bottle of Vallejo airbrush thinner as it's cheap, but you could always spring for many pots of Lahmian Medium if you're feeling fancy. - An old Brush, some Clippers and a Hobby Knife
I hope you've got these lying around. If not, how are you building and painting all your plastic goodies?! - Oh, and some BluTac and Newspaper/Paper Towels
Now you've got all your tools ready, it's time to transfer some paints!
Instructions
Step 1
First, set up your work surface by clearing out a good area, and lay down some newspaper as this could get messy.
Step 2
Prepare your dropper bottle by placing an agitator ball into it. I used one for each paint aside from the metallics and thicker whites like Corax White and White Scar, where I used two, as they tend to separate much easier.
Step 3
Place a funnel into the neck of the bottle. What you'll unfortunately notice is that the funnels fit so well, they actually form an almost airtight seal, which will slow down paint moving into the bottle.
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| One minor problem. With nowhere for the air to go, this makes paint transfer a prolonged and painful process. |
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| Much better! |
Give your paint a mix and check its consistency. You want the paint to have a decent flow to it, as if it's too thick it'll just get stuck in the funnel for a long time. This will also be impacted by what type of paint it is - base or layer and what pigment it uses, as some, like white, are denser than others. Give the pot a shake until the paints as mixed as you think it'll be.
Step 5
Add some paint thinner to the pot. The amount will depend on how old and/or viscous the paint is. I only add a minimal amount to any new/fluid paints I have, as they're pretty much ready to go straight into the funnel.
This first image demonstrates an old paint that needs a fair amount of paint thinner added to it. If I tried to get this to go through a funnel, it would take all day!
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| Behold, the glob of doom! |
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| Now that's more like it! |
Using your clippers, snip the two small connectors that hold the lid onto the pot. This will make life much easier in the next step. If you want to use the pots after the transfer, skip this step.
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| Snippy snip! These connectors are surprisingly tough, so do double-check you've actually cut them. |
And now for the fun part, it's pouring time! Remove the now unattached lid, grip your bottle with one hand and, slowly at first, start pouring the paint into the funnel. If you've got the consistency right, it should flow through at a reasonable rate. If not, stop pouring, add a bit more thinner and shake, then try again. You can let go after some of the paint has transferred, as the bottle will now be pretty stable. Keep the flow steady and wait until the paint stops coming out of the pot.
You will now find a combination of paint still on the sides of the pot, and some more still settled at the bottom. Add some more paint thinner, stick the lid back on and give it a shake (seriously don't forget the lid here!). This will help get out as much paint as possible from the pots and into the bottle.
What I'll do now is invert the pot and place it into the top of the funnel. This just further encourages paint to drip out of the pot. I'll leave this propped up against something just to prevent any accidental spills.
I'll leave the paint like this for a couple of minutes, so while that's happening, you can start on the next pot. Transferring pots in a batch like this help to speed the whole process up.
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| All aboard the production line. |
Once you've left your paint for a good couple of minutes, it's time to finish everything off. Remove the pot from the funnel, and this is the sight that'll greet you.
As you can see, there's a lot of paint still left in the funnel. To remedy this, take that ol' faithful brush and use it to push the paint down the funnel and into your dropper bottle.
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| There's still some paint left, but it's much better than before. |
Stick a top on it! Pop one of the spouts onto the dropper bottle, ensuring it's nice and secure in the bottleneck. After that, stick the lid on, give it a good shake, then check the spout isn't leaking (in some cases the spout can be broken so the paint will leak out. If this is the case, just replace it with a new one)
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| Beautiful! |
For the final step, remove the label from the old Citadel paint pot and attach it to the dropper bottle. To do this, you can either attach the whole label or, like me, cut off the section you want and leave the rest.
To do this, I just ran my hobby knife down the label, then peeled up and edge using the blade. Peel off and attach to your new bottle.
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| The bottles are thick, so don't be afraid to apply some pressure. Just make sure you hold the pot securely as you're doing this. |
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| I peel up an edge using the blade, as this doesn't damage the label like using your fingers would. |
Bask in the dropper based glory of your new paint bottles. Pretty, aren't they?
Step 14
Rinse and repeat! Once you've gotten all your paints transferred, you'll be left with a, in my opinion, tidier and nicer looking paint collection.
So there you have it, my method of transferring Citadel paints into dropper bottles. It's a bit of a time investment, I'll be honest. A set of 6 paints would take me around 20-25 minutes depending on the paint condition, so depending on your collection size, you could be at this for a little while. And that is, ultimately, the elephant in the room.
Was it worth it?
Conclusions
The ultimate answer to that question goes back to why I chose to transfer my paints in the first place and can be answered by the following:
Do you use your paints quickly?
Do you like to mix paints?
If you answered yes to the first and no to the second, I would say you absolutely don't need to. For me, the two main reasons to transfer paints are you don't want paints to dry out, or you like mixing them. While the process isn't too costly, it does still take a chunk of time to do.
I've been using the dropper bottles for the past month to paint up a few models, so I can now give an informed review of the process and how it's impacted my painting.
In terms of paint control and the volumes I'm using, the droppers have definitely helped there. I can better manage the amount I need depending on the area I'm painting, and my palette is no longer left with lots of wasted paint. Mixing has become so, so much easier as I'm able to better judge paint ratios. It's paid dividends on the two Necron Warrior models I've painted this month, as there were a few points, such as the face and Gauss glow, where mixing up a base coat was essential.
I have run into an issue with the droppers though, notably the spouts. It's not something I've seen mentioned in any other posts around putting your paints into droppers, but if you give the bottle a shake and then remove the lid, what you'll find is your paint will continuously flow out of the spout, even if you're holding the bottle vertically and applying no pressure.
This will be due to the air you've mixed into the paint forcing its way back out of the bottle, and the paint is too viscous to release it, so instead, you get a nice little paint fountain from your bottle. An easy way to fix this is to shake your paints, then just leave them for a few minutes to settle. A minor adjustment, but I feel it's worth it to save paint in the long run.
I have also encountered some issues with the spouts splitting, which again causes some paint to leak out when dropping onto the palette. There's not much I can do about this outside of replacing the spouts, but I think this is due to the overall low quality of the bottles I've purchased. That'll teach me to shop cheap! If I were going to do this again, I'd invest in a higher quality set of bottles, particularly trying to source some bottles from Vallejo, as they have a good reputation for quality.
If I were to summarise this entire post into a TLDR, it would be something along the lines of:
If you're tired of having paint dry out in Citadel pots and would prefer to have more control over your paint usage, then consider transferring some or all of your paints to dropper bottles. However, it's by no means essential, and the solution isn't perfect, just better.
So there we have it, my long and winding post on this whole process. I hope it's proved useful for you, and if nothing else I wanted to provide a bit more explanation on why I think it's worth going through the process in the first place.
Until next time,
James
Great tutorial and the minor pitfalls of dropper bottles too, great stuff. I may have to invest - lets see the state of my paints when I return from deployment after a few months of sitting in the racks.
ReplyDeleteThanks Siph. I wanted to get the downsides in, as it wasn't something I'd seen discussed in other posts and it may change a few readers minds. Glad you liked it. I'm definitely not getting the same clumping issues as normal. Even things like my Corax White are staying nice and fluid!
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