I live in the Commonwealth of Virginia, in the suburbs around Washington, DC… and it’s freaking humid here. It’s not the most humid place I’ve lived (I used to live in South Texas), but it’s a certainly a notable feature of the area.
Something I hear (read, really) is “I’m waiting for better weather so I can go out and prime my models.” “It’s too humid to prime.” “It’s too cold to prime.” Primer doesn’t love humidity or low temperature, so if it’s cold or damp outside you can’t prime (or varnish) outside. You can’t spray aerosol primer (or varnish) inside because it’s toxic. What’s a hobbyist to do, besides just wait for a good day before they start a project?
This drives me nuts. It does’t have to be this way. Folks’ hobby velocity is stopped up waiting on optimal weather and it doesn’t need to be.
Keep your models and spray inside. When it’s time to spray: take everything outside. Spray your models outside, where the spray won’t poison you. Put the sprayed models into a tub, and put a lid on it. Bring the tub inside. Let stuff dry. Do this year-round.
So: I’ve switched over to airbrush priming pretty exclusively, but pretty much every model I primed from the beginning of this blog until 2015 or so was rattle-can primed outside in all weather and tub’d. Every model I have varnished in the past 15 or years years has been varnished outside in all weather and tub’d. If you want to see the impact of weather on my priming and varnishing, skim through my painted model photos.
The photo examples I have were just after it’d stopped raining: I’ll spray in the pouring rain, even, just not where raindrops will hit the model I’m spraying. The air was thick with wet after a rain.
This is my tub. I cracked it, so just duct taped-over where the plastic shattered.
I’ve also got a grotty piece of foam that I keep in it to hold my minis in place; I don’t want them whacking into each other while they’re drying.
I stick my dudes onto old Dullcote caps and empty P3 paint pots to hold while spraying.
“That’s varnishing, though” you might say. “I was talking about priming.” Fine. I grabbed a mispacked ASOIF Free Folk and primed him with a GW Wraithbone rattlecan. Note the lack of pebbling.
Here’s the model washed to help make the lack of pebbling more clear.
That’s it! You don’t need to wait for a perfect day that’s not too hot, not too cold, not too dang humid. Just spray your stuff and put it in a tub. Don’t let not great weather prevent you from painting your minis!
