vallejo metal color / alclad II?

[Laughingman]

Interested in the creation of a primaris guardians of the covenant (dark angels successor) force, and wish to do a true metallic effect (using a airbrush). I was looking into alclad II paints (enamel based metallics, a hobby shop locally has the full line) or potentially acquiring several vallejo metal color paints. Anybody ever used either line? Im interested in feedback because  reviews for the products I've seen around were limited to military modeling and not smaller 28mm figures...

 

 

[Marshal Loss]

The Vallejo Metal Color paints are superb, better even (imo) than Tamiya metallics for airbrushing, and they're great with a brush as well.

[Laughingman]

Any advice on which ones? I was looking at the Magnesium color, with a Zethithal Dark aluminum or aluminum ? But Not sure on color....

[Marshal Loss]

Gunmetal Grey is my bread and butter, as it's essentially a close match for boltgun metal, a nice dark smooth metallic. I also use Dark Aluminium a lot, and Chrome for extreme highlights. I've bought a few others but haven't used them often enough to really comment. Gunmetal Grey/Dark Aluminium/Chrome would give you some good variety so that's where I'd start.

[Mango Polo]

Alclad II is purely for airbrushing. It's also by far the smoothest and most true to life metallics you can achieve. But is that what you really need?

 

You can't brush it on, so if you need to do a mix of hand and airbrushing that's a no-go.

It's terribly toxic, so you need a proper mask. You should always wear a mask when airbrushing, but some cheap random crap doesn't cut it with the Alclad.

Usually on miniatures you're going to use washes on metallics, which instantly kills a lot of the Alclad's appeal.

 

The Vallejo Metal Color range is basically somewhat close in results, with the advantage of being wildly less toxic, brushable by hand if you want, cheaper and easier to find.

[Ovidius Incertus]

I use both, but VMC way more often because, as said, Alcad is lacquer and requires the spray booth and all that jazz.

 

Alclad's finish is excellent, smooth and shiny.  Be aware that it may require more surface prep because the smooth finish may show imperfections.  Definitely needed for a finish like chrome.  I think Alclad is an excellent base for a candy metallic because it's so shiny.

 

Praise for Alclad aside, the VMC is more or less my go-to for the reasons listed by Mango Polo.

[Arkhanist]

Another fan of vallejo metal color; it's a great airbrush paint that you can also brush on to an extent. I do have scale 75 metallics also (they were on a sale) for hairy stick painting; they do give a better finish than brushed on metal color IMO as it's more gel like and self smooths better. Scale 75 also do a lot more 'fantasy' metal colours, as well as a big range of gold and brass.

 

Scale 75 metals are a bit of a pain to thin correctly for airbrush though, while metal color is great out the bottle, so I use both. Metal color, like most high quality metals, benefits a lot from a good gloss black primer. I found vallejo gloss black to a be a cloggy pain in the  on a .4mm needle so use stynylrez gloss black which goes through no problem.

 

My most used metal color are 713 jet exhaust/702 duraluminium/724 silver, which is very similar to Marshall Loss' triad. Unless you're literally painting a bare metal aircraft, the actual differences between some colours can be pretty hard to spot, and vallejo's paint guide is kinda useless.

 

This is my go to set of pictures for how metal colors looks over gloss black, it's accurate for the ones I have.

 

If you were doing gunpla or something where a high chrome or candy finish on large flat surfaces is everything, alclad is superior. For 28mm scale with washes, edge highlighting and weathering, particularly the darker metals? Alclad is much too much effort for very little if any gain.

[Subtle Discord]

I'll add to the others saying that Vallejo Model Color metallics are great, they're the only line that I've found that compares to the old GW metallics that I really liked. I'd also add that the Model Air metallics are also really good. The Model Air Silver is an excellent bright smooth silver by brush or airbrush, as good or even better than GWs Mithril Silver of old.

 

Vallejo's Liquid Gold/Silver line is also really good but I haven't tried to shoot it through an airbrush yet; it's really some of the best Gold I've ever gotten with a regular brush. However, it's alcohol based product so you need to use 90%+ Isopropyl alcohol with it and there's a bit of a learning curve to using it. It's not that hard once you get used to it, but it dries very quickly so you need to get used to using it.

[Laughingman]

For those wondering I actually have a Spray booth/with extractor setup for airbrushing. admittedly my  respirator game is not on lock, but I've mostly use acrylics in the past, I am fully aware that Enamels/alcohol based paints require a full on respirator. 

 

The Other side of the equation is I'm not sure what kind of Color to use, Guardians of the Covenant artwork ranges appear to show anything from a Chrome to deep steel in color...