I printed several things with very small details (skin Pores and veins)
my question is what is the best primer to use to conserve and bring out those tiny details?
thanks
If you have an airbrush, then I can certainly recommend the Vallejo Surface Primers. They come in a few different shades, from white to black and a couple of grays in between. Using the airbrush will give you the best control, and will put down the finest and thinnest layer of primer, letting all the details come through, but also every imperfection.
So if you’re going that route, make sure your model is perfectly clean and smooth.
Out of a can, I recommend a few things. Tamiya makes a very nice light grey that goes on very nice and thin, I’ve also used Citadel and Armory primers. The Armory primer goes on a bit thicker, which has a nice benefit of hiding very fine imperfections, like layer lines, while letting normal features come through.
Anyway, god luck and have fun painting.
,yes I have an airbrush so I will look into that thank you, I ordered a Tamiya but was disappointed how small the can was for the price it was
Yeah, Tamiya isn’t cheap. The Armory primers are much better price, about $6 for a large 12oz can.
As for the airbrush primer, Vallejo comes in 3 size, 22ml, 50ml and 200ml. the 200ml is about $12-13, so it’s not worth getting the smaller bottles unless you want to try different colors to experiment with, in which case, you should get the 60ml. The 22ml is simply not worth the money.
I de-cant Tamiya primer and apply it with an airbrush. This allows me to preserve even tiniest details printed with 0.025 resolution.
Are you referring to the Tamiya bottles, or the spray cans? The bottled Tamiya primers are acrylic, whereas the Spray versions are lacquer based.
If you’re “decanting” from the can, how do you do it?
I’m going to suggest Tamiya primer too.
As for decanting it. Just spray it into a bottle and fine a way to contain the inevitable blowback.
I’d second the Vallejo primer, sprayed on lightly in layers with an airbrush it really brings out all the small surface details. You can then take it a step further and dry brush a second coat of grey or white primer to bring out more detail if you don’t plan to final paint it.
If you want to buy primer for rusted metal then I recommended this article for you: https://toolsarchive.com/best-primers-for-rusted-metal/