Mixing acrylic paint with ink?

[wizardwolf]

Ok to do or not? I have the GW paints and use liquitex airbrush medium to dilute. I have a ton of artist acrylic inks, and also black ink used in super small technical pens (so it is super fine). I have used the black ink for darkening my paints without using black paint, and I like it because it is easy. But I am no expert so I was wondering if the forum users might know if this is a good practice.

Is there any problem using inks to mix into your hobby paints? I see an advantage because the ink is super dark but also fluid - and saves you on paint.

What say ye?

 

[BPI]

Only issue I've had with inks is that they can lift when working over them too vigorously, a particular pain when brush varnishing! Whether mixing with paint would mitigate that I don't know but I can't see it making it worse. B.

 

[wizardwolf]

Right - well the ratio of the ink is small - the black ink packs a punch so not much is used. But maybe it weakens the bond of the paint to the surface?

 

[MAXXxxx]

you can do it, no problems.
See the MiniatureMentor video with Thomas David, there you can see the advantages of mixing the inks with paints.

the thing that BPI wrote shouldn't really happen if there was enough time to let the inks-paints dry.

The only problem I see if that the surface can get glossy, but that's remedied with a matt varnish or that may be the desired effect for starters (glossy armor, blood, etc.)

 

[Einion]

Broadly speaking if something mixes properly into any kind of acrylic paints and there's no immediate adverse reaction (you'd know it if you saw it) then it's fine. There are some issues with anything that doesn't dry on its own but obviously that doesn't apply here.

Most acrylic or vinyl paints of any consistency - this includes pigmented 'inks' - will mix with all others without any problems.

Einion

 

[MrPickles]

i love ink. it doubles as flow improver for me. i mix it in to metallics almost every time - never had any issues.

 

[wizardwolf]

Yes I discovered it by mixing black ink with "bolt gun metal" - very useful - easier then mixing the black paint.

One thing I need for mixing paint is a better tool for the job - maybe a small plastic spoon that lets the paint slide off. I just hate mixing paint by dipping in a brush to gather it, or trying to pour it - ends up being a bit wasteful and or messy (if you squeeze out the paint with your fingers). The ink comes out of a dropper, so I just add it to the paint and mix it with a small stick.

 

[Einion]

i love ink. it doubles as flow improver for me.

That's a good nugget of info :good:

One thing I need for mixing paint is a better tool for the job - maybe a small plastic spoon that lets the paint slide off. I just hate mixing paint by dipping in a brush to gather it, or trying to pour it - ends up being a bit wasteful and or messy (if you squeeze out the paint with your fingers). The ink comes out of a dropper, so I just add it to the paint and mix it with a small stick.

You can get disposable pipettes (very cheap) that would be useful for transferring paint that comes in pots. Pipettes can obviously be used to drop-measure paint for mixtures, but you can do this roughly with a cocktail stick, piece of plastic sprue or even the back of the paintbrush handle.

For mixing there are a lot of different techniques, including also using the end of the cocktail stick you used to transfer the paint. That does work pretty well for smaller quantities of fluid paint. Except for small on-the-spot mixtures you should try to avoid mixing with your brushes as it shortens their lifespan, although you could use a cheap synthetic specifically for the purpose.

Speaking of spoons, it occurs to me that you could use the back of a small spoon to mix paint on the palette paper, although they are an obvious thought for measuring paint (in much larger quantities than we usually deal with) I've never thought of using them for mixing before and I think it could work well.

Einion

 

[cav21]

one thing you can use for mixing is a plastic syringe. easy to get hold of and have measurements on the side so mixing and remixing later is spot on. you can get the same shade again

 

[wizardwolf]

Thanks for the tips!

 

[sippog]

One thing I need for mixing paint is a better tool for the job - maybe a small plastic spoon that lets the paint slide off. I just hate mixing paint by dipping in a brush to gather it, or trying to pour it - ends up being a bit wasteful and or messy (if you squeeze out the paint with your fingers).

A 'paint shaper' is good for mixing - easy to wipe clean. It looks like an eraser on the end of a ferrule, comes in a variety of shapes and sizes, and most big art shops stock them.

You can also use 'em for applying ground pigment so they're pretty handy.