Monday, August 29, 2016

Hobby Tools that I Love

1) Master's Brush Soap - One of the best brush soaps I've used. I have this in several sizes from travel up to a 42 oz tub. The best part is that you can leave it on the bristles as a conditioner.

2) The Color Scheme Bible - I find this very helpful for coming up with color schemes especially for single fantasy miniatures. The book is divided up by main color sections. Then you pick a hue from that section (The picture on the right is Sunshine from the yellow section). On the same page it has "accent" colors  and "highlight" colors (book specific terms). To me this is the best part because the accent and highlight colors are not always ones that I would pick out just using a color wheel. Using this page for reference, the accent colors are a different hue of the main color (paler yellow) and a triadic color (dark rose), and the highlight colors are a tint of a triadic color (light blue) and a split complementary (navy).

3) Martha Stewart 1" Circle Punch - I have a paint palette that consists of six 1" wells. I use this punch to cut circles out of parchment paper and paper towels and then I have an instant wet palette.

4) Condiment Cups - I collect these from fast food restaurants (I believe the ones pictured came from Wendy's). They are great for mixing large amounts of paint for batch painting or terrain. If I need to stop painting for a little while I add some retarder and cover the tops with aluminum foil.

5) Badger Paint Mixer -Saving old paint one pot at a time.

6) Paint Swatch Flip Book - This is a Piccadilly brand sketch book that I picked up at Barnes & Nobles. I use a template to draw circles on the page and fill a circle with each paint color I own. This lets me see the color of each paint when it is dry. I have the pages divided up by main color, pinks, reds, oranges, yellows, etc.  The spiral binding is helpful because when the color sections start to fill up, I can pull apart the book and rearrange the pages. I use this a lot when picking out colors schemes or trying to match already painted models. 

 7) Instant Mold - This is a great product for duplicating / repairing parts on miniatures.I used this to replace a missing shield for an old Deathwing Captain miniature.

8) Sculpting Tools - I've collected these from a variety of places. The six on the left are old/broken dental tools that I got from a dental hygienist friend. The red handled tool is a clay sculpting tool from a ceramic store. The next three with wooden handles are embossing tools from a big box craft tool. The red paintbrush tool is an old brush the bristles fell out of that I used green stuff to wedge a pin in the ferrule.The three black handled tools are clay shapers from an art supply store. The next four are from a miniature sculpting tool set, but I don't remember what brand they are. The last one is a paint mixer that I've gotten from Amazon.

The tools I use the most are the far left dental tool with the really sharp point, the flat ended clay shaper, the metal sculpting tool with the end that is flat on one side and beveled on the other (fifth from the right) and the little spoon end on the paint mixer.



Honorable Mention: I cant really say that I love this tool, but I use it all the time. While it has some good points it also has some harsh drawbacks.

Citadel Fine Detail Cutters - These were not a bargain; I feel that they were more expensive than they should be. The clipping action is really smooth, and the spring is hidden in the "pivot join" (I don't know the proper word for that part). Before getting this pair of clippers I had a rubber coated yellow handled pair with an exposed spring that would pinch me if I was not careful (small hands..sigh) so I really appreciated that the spring is enclosed. The picture on the right is what happens when you try to clip paperclips or metal wire with the Citadel clippers. They are far too soft to use on such metals so I would only use them for plastic and finecast.

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