Finally get to Airbrush!!

[wolfcoast]

Well my airbrush finally got here.. Yay! Here a quick chronicle of my first AB adventure!! hehe

Things start off with a surprise in the box. I thought I was just ordering the Paasche VLS with a single set of needles. I open the box and "woohoo!!" inside are 2 extra sets of needles being the #1 and #5 with the #3 loaded in the brush. Very nice surprise.

Also order a basic set of Paasche air extreme paints.(the primary color set, total of 7 bottles) The bottles are 2 oz and look suspiciously smaller than my 2 oz bottles of Createx that I bought in anticipation.. Oh well, it's paint I get to airbrush finally.

Not wanting to just mess with a single color, I immediately mix some blue, red and white to make a medium purple. Might as well have some fun with mixing right off the bat. The bottles say they are ready for AB but I still thinned them down with a little water.

On to finally spraying. For my first time, was actually half way decent at making small dots, at least in my opinion hehe. Found out that making a decent line is harder than I thought, especially considering you have to start moving before you slide the lever back for paint, and continue past the end to avoid the blob ends. Have a lot of difficulty with that so will have to practice those a lot!

Also with lines, I have a problem with consistency of the line. I feel like I'm keeping the distance from the board and level position the same but I keep getting what looks like dots along the line. I suspect it may be from the compressor pulsations. I have a Badger Whistler II and, after reading the specs, found it puts out a max of 28 lbs. I imagine it's normal pressure is lower than that so I may have to look into a different compressor.

Had some fun with some stencils I cut out, mostly skulls. Practiced trying to follow outlines after stenciling and some shading. There's a lot of skill in keeping an even shade I found out.

Back to the brush for a minute, I seemed to have a problem with clogging. Had to keep clearing the brush every so often. Not sure what the cause of that may be, but I may start straining the paints.

Overall I had a lot of fun making strange marks on the paper. Some things were harder than I thought they would be, and some were easier than I imagined.

Not gonna show my doodle papers yet. Want something that looks remotely like a picture before I post anything LOL

[shovelhead]

You sound as giddy as a school girl. I'm glad you got your airbrush today. I had a post today telling my story of cleaning my VL without the nozzle on it. And it slipped ,and when I went to grab for it,I inoculated my wrist with that sharp assed tip. OUCH. Anyway,watch out for the tip .They hurt!

[wolfcoast]

Well part of it was the anticipation. I had bought an aztek A220 and was not happy with it. (single action, hardly any paint control, you have to twist the bottle LOL) So I had convinced the wife to order the Paasche. The shipment got delayed because it was on the Train in Illinois that had a car derail. (nothing serious, no one got hurt, etc.) but that delayed my shipment for a couple days.

[brushbyair]

Hi and welcome aboard Wolfcoast. Nice to hear you got your new airbrush, a Paasche VL is a nice brush, you will learn to like it alot, it is best known as the workhorse of airbrushes. Some of the dots along the line could be from a pulsating compressor, the blobs at the end of your lines is most likely the way you are ending the line. You would be wise at this stage to practice alot of dots, you need to be able to spray 10 good looking dots in a row without once turning off the air, remember "GOOD LOOKING" dots, then your ready to start making lines that graduate into dagger strokes. Remember what ever you do make sure you have fun with it.

[heartless]

welcome aboard & congratulations on the new toy!! it is a lot of fun, isnt it?

sounds like you do need to get a bigger compressor tho - 28 psi max (actual pressure at the brush will be much lower) will not hold up - sounds like that one was intended for fine illustration work at very low pressures - that is more than likely the reason for you inconsistant paint flow...
you will want to look for something that puts out more like 100psi max with a good regulator & moisture trap on it.

good luck & spray lots!! it is only paint after all!