Type of varnish/tutorial please

[Boze]

Hello! NEw to the boards here, i searched the stickys and the forum and even the internets on exactly what kind of varnish to use!

I am specifically looking to "Bullet Coat" my minis. (gloss coat then matte)

Now, this is what i have at home.

Vallejo matte varnish (in the eye dropper)

Humbrol Gloss Cote (enamel and i am pretty positive it is oil based considering it is flammable)

Now i was going to go ahead and try the humbrol, let it dry then vallejo matte on top but i got scared when i googled the internets and it said that i shouldn't use oil based enamel varnish on top of water based acrylic paint/varnish. Apparently it can melt or cause clouding or something?

Either way, i can return the gloss cote i haven't opened it yet, but i am looking for either the thumbs up on this method, enamel oil on top of acrylic then acryrlic matte on top of it all.

or

something different all together that won't ruin my minis! And no unfortunately I do not have any "extra" minis i can test this on!

Cheers!

[PPS_Meg]

Yes, never mix acrylic and oil paints. It causes all sorts of problems. Oil also takes a long time to fully cure and you shouldn't matte coat it until it has cured. That can take 6 months or more.

Just find a gloss coat at a craft store. I have used Kyrlon Gloss Coat before and it's worked just fine. Let it dry over night and then hit it with matte. Also, I recommend this for gaming minis only as extra protection. On anything that will be a display piece, I do not recommend this as adding extra layers over top the paint will make the paint read a little different. It won't ruin it, it will just add a little bit of a filter over top the paint.

[Boze]

Ok kyrlon gloss coat in the spray can right? look for water based as well?

Also i would be open to tryin a different Matte i am not comitted to my 1 bottle of vallejo matte varnish.

Whats the optimal combo here?

I heard that you want to use 2 different "types" of varnish so they don't mix? saw it in a painting video

[PPS_Meg]

I don't know about using 2 different types of varnish.

Krylon gloss coat should be an acrylic. It is in a spray can and will be easiest to apply an even coat that way. Testor's dullcote is used widely for a matte agent. It is not a protective medium though, it only kills the shine. Try two even coats, not applied too heavily, of a gloss coat and then start with a single layer of dullcote after that. If still too shiny try another coat of dullcote.

[MaxKool]

I find no spay clears proved very much protection, and I do the 2 step gloss for protection and Matt for shine removal. It's still way to easy to chip paint with these minis.

This is how you make a bulletproof mini.

1)do a light spray with a gloss clear coat of your choice.

The reason for this is sometimes when using varnish u can possibly reactive the inks/washes. This is especially true with my method. As u will be rushing on the final sealer. This adds to the chance of spoiling your mini. The light spray will prevent his from happening.

2) Once the spray is dry, get out a bottle of future floor wax. Pour some into a cup and paint it all over the mini. Try not and have it pool, but make sure u put enough on.

Using the lightbulb+coffee can oven u can have a dry mini in about 20min

3) you can do more coats of the floor wax(wich is realy just a clear acrylic resin) to make your mini dam near undamageable

4) kill the shine with a few light coats of dullcote


The reason I say sprays alone arnt good enuf is mostly due to the tendency of pp models to be much larger than the base and the huge amount of pointy metal bits.
No amount of spray will accumulate of the finest points of the metal and will wear paint off. And the oversize models can leave u clinking models into each other fairly often.

I just stripped and redid all my trolls cause I hated how the paint was wearing.
My grim angus feels like a plastic mini when you touch it and looks fantastic. I've tried to scratch paint off of it wih my fingers and nothing will come offf barring realy realy trying to wreck it.

Cheers

Ps best part is. 7 dollar bottle of floor wax will probably last u forever. I've always poored the unused back into the bottle and it's still clean and Pretty much full still.

[PPS_Meg]

future floor wax will yellow with time. And not much time at that.

Lots of people recommend future for many applications and it is something I tried in my early painting days. I do not recommend using Future for anything other than your floors.