Airbrushing Wargame Terrain: Dispelling the Myths

As stated in my previous post I used an airbrush to help with the look of my Outbreak City roads. The roads were the second attempt at using an airbrush. Here is my first.

Generic 28mm Ruins - Made for 40K, LOTR & Zombies

Every Day is a School Day
When I joined the blogosphere at the beginning of this year it was clear how much incredible talent there was around and how much we can learn from all the gamers, painters, modellers, customizers and bloggers in the community.

A big part of starting this blog was to develop new skills under the watchful eyes of a discerning audience. We all like to look at the shiny things we see in magazines and on commercial websites, but what does it really take to achieve the look and feel of those pieces for ourselves?

A school friend of mine, Jude, recently became interested in the hobby again after an absence of around 20 years. His ability to pick up his hobby tools and leap into the fray again at such a high standard is, quite frankly, astounding. Here’s an example of some of his recent work. Once again, consider the 20 year absence from the hobby. Jealous, me? Well, just a little.

Jude's ForgeWorld Demon Prince - Superb.

Why an Airbrush?
During a recent get-together we talked about making custom terrain to pro-modelling standards. He immediately asked “Do you have an airbrush?” My answer was no. After all, it’s one of those expensive gadgets that only people with subscriptions to military modelling know how to use, they take ages to set up and clean, mixing paint is a nightmare and you need a huge compressor which is really noisy, certainly no use when the kids have gone to bed. All myths! Whilst that might have been true 10-15 years ago. Today it is a very different story.

Five minutes later he’d set his one up, given a quick demo and I was having a go. What can I say? I was hooked from my first ‘pfffshhhht’. “Where can I get one?” I asked.

2 days later my first airbrush arrived. I picked up the cheapest bundle I could find which included 2 airbrushes and a compressor. The verdict?

The cheapest Airbrush I could get on e(vil)Bay. £80 all in.

The Verdict
For anyone who makes war games terrain (quite a few of us), buildings or vehicles it is a highly recommended investment. The airbrush is simple to use, easy to clean, quick to set up or dismantle and the compressor is actually quite quiet and only runs when it needs to, stop spraying for a few seconds and it stops running.  I’ve purchased a little acrylic mixing medium and some ionised water for cleaning (you shouldn't use tap water) and that’s that.

The Result
Here’s the rest of those generic 28mm ruins that I recently gave the airbrush treatment to. It was my first attempt at using the airbrush and after initially spending so much time on these (they were dry-brushed copiously to before I started) I was pretty nervous. I’m pleased with how they turned out and can’t wait to use the airbrush on future projects.

Put acrylic mixing medium in the cup.

Add umber acrylic paint.

Mix in some black. Spray slowly and evenly.

Increase the paint slowly by pulling the lever back.

More Airbrushing Tips

Matt from Too Much Unpainted Lead discovered this little gem from RubbishInRubbishOut in which Viv shows us, with the right medium, you can even put house-paint through your airbrush. It is an awesome channel from one of the Battle Bunker TV guys and well worth checking out, if you've not already done so, and you make, or want to, make your own terrain.