Craft Paint not Drying

[Sane Max]

Hi, making some basic SF Jungle Terrain – Home Made Sculptamold over polystyrene for the bases. I painted the test piece yesterday morning with Craft Acrylic and it’s still not dry. what do we think?

– It’s the plaster – sculptamold takes ages to set and yours is a home made mix so god knows! wait, be patient!

– it’s the paint – Craft Paint takes ages to set (I also added a lot of water and Flow Enhancer to maximise absorbtion into the plaster)

– it’s the weather.

– you are doomed. It will never dry.

I don’t use Sculptamold a lot, the things I have made before have been pure sculptamold used as a casting, rather than the traditional ‘mix dolloped over Polystyrene’ method – may this be the issue?

[Mike]

Sane Max wrote:

– It’s the plaster – sculptamold takes ages to set and yours is a home made mix so god knows! wait, be patient!

My gut says this…

Though give up is an alternative to be patient?   😀

🙁

[Sane Max]

🙂 it’s a bit of a perfect storm, each caused by my basic tight-fistedness. Buy a decent product? Nahhh make my own. Use expensive paint? Noooo The cheap stuff will be fine….

I am in no hurry – I noticed in my diary the last time I played a game at home was three years ago! But I do like making terrain occasionally, and when I do I want it done NOW dammit, NOW.

The whole set up will be a paean to my refusal to pay top dollar – a new SF army entirely made from stand-ins and second hand purchases, on terrain made from left overs, scrap and gribbly bits out of old Electrical equipment… makes me proud to be a hobbyist.

[Thomaston]

“– It’s the plaster – sculptamold takes ages to set and yours is a home made mix so god knows! wait, be patient!”

I also think its this. With plastic on the bottom moisture could onyl evaporate through the top, so you probably made yourself a very nice wet palette there.

I’m always interested in seeing jungle terrain.

Tired is enough.
I like tiny miniatures

[Sane Max]

so you probably made yourself a very nice wet palette there.

I’m always interested in seeing jungle terrain.

😉

It’s not going to be posh – bits of aquarium plant stuck in a mound – standard club-level scatter terrain. I will take piccies when (if) they are done

[fairoaks024]

I was thinking that it was what Thomaston said. The water can only evaporate through the paint, keeping it wet for a long time

[Andrew Beasley]

If you can increase air flow over the pieces it will help dry them out quicker.

I would not use a hot hairdryer as I find plaster based products can crack very easily but leaving it in a draughty area will help.

 

[Tony Hughes]

If you wanted the paint to be absorbed by the plaster then acrylic probably wasn’t the best option. Plaster of any sort needs to be properly dry before painting (never heard of sculptamold so no idea what type of plaster it is) that takes time though can be shortened by heat ( a warm oven, in the sun on a windowsill etc.).

I use craft paints on plaster neat or with minimal thinning for the sealing coat. Washes or dry brush can be more thinned once the plaster is sealed.

 

 

[OB]

Yep, shouldn’t have diluted.  If you wanted the plaster to take the colour it might have been better to mix it in first prior to sculpting.

OB
http://withob.blogspot.co.uk/

[Thaddeus Blanchette]

My take it’s a combination of plaster and flow enhancer. Craft paints, if anything, tend to dry quicker than hobby paints, in my experience.

We get slapped around, but we have a good time!

[bobm]

Painting wet plaster is a classic artistic method…it’s called fresco.  The last supper is fresco I believe.

Plaster cures rather than dries, it’s a chemical reaction.  Excess water usually evaporates due to the heat generated by this reactive process.

I would guess you may have interfered with the normal chemical reaction.

There's 10 types of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don't.....

[Tony Hughes]

Plaster does react to set or cure but there is always a certain amount of water present in the finished casting as you need an excess of water a little beyond the minimum required for setting. The exotherm from the reaction will very rarely be enough to drive the water out so the casting has to dry after it has set.

Various plasters require different amounts of excess and some additives will reduce the porosity of the casting making it dry more slowly, sometimes a lot more slowly.

Fresco is not painted with acrylics or any other medium that would seal the surface and prevent drying. The plaster surface to be painted is a fairly thin layer of special plaster that sets fairly solid quite quickly but does not completely set for a further few hours allowing the pigments to be added to the surface and set within that surface layer. Although it seems to be the same situation, it isn’t.

 

 

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