Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Badger Minitaire Airbrush Paints - Review


I have been using the Minitaire line for about a month now. Lots of pros, lots of cons. Here is my breakdown:


 Pros

  • Great value for money. The bottles are 30ml compared to the 17ml you get from from Vallejo Air. If you buy the complete set for example from Amazon, you will pay $1.62 per paint - A really nice price!
    Be aware that the individual paints from Amazon right now are 60ml (2oz) editions specially made for Amazon apparently.
  • Vibrant, saturated and bold colors that are ready for the airbrush. Awesome for wargamers who like bright, colorful tones. VMA has a lot of earth tones.
  • Unique Ghost Tints. Great to shade, saturate, and tint colors. You can really make some special effects with them.
  • The bottles are easy to open with one hand.
  • Easy cleaning - I use Isopropyl Alcohol.
  • Great with a brush! They have a nice consistensy - no need to thin the paints.

Cons

  • REALLY difficult to look at the bottles and choose a color. All the bottles are frosted so the colors look significantly diffrent on the outside. The Ghost Tints are the worst - some look exactly the same.
    I fixed this by painting the tops. It does take some time though...
  • Some paints have different consistencies. The pink for example is very thin. One of the dark browns dries glossy.
  • Ghost tints are REALLY thin. As a beginner in airbrushing, I often get spider webs with the ghost paints. So you should really have some practice. They also clog the airbrush really easy.
  • I have found the silvers to be really dark. I have heard the VMA silvers should be better.
  • Difficult to buy them in Europe - hope more suppliers will stock them in the future.

Overall, the Badger Minitaire line is pretty good. There will always be cons for a paint line.
The low price was probably what made me buy the complete set and I do not regret it. I have 80 really nice airbrush colors with a great color range. I would probably expand my collection with some VMA bottles, depending on what specific colors I need in the future.

Compared with my GW paints I am used to - they are definitely a lot easier to work with through the airbrush.
The fact that you need a brush every time you transfer paint from the GW pot to the airbrush really makes it time consuming.

Color chart



Where to buy?



Webairbrushes.com

1 comment :

  1. Thanks for the handy review. I decided to buy the Ghost Tints from you Amazon link. I share you concerns over "spidering" hopefully I wont need all 12 bottles to work it out.

    ReplyDelete