I am always reading things others are saying about the paints they use and have seen it often mentioned that some people are using artist grade paints such as Liquitex Soft Bodied paints and Golden Liquid Paints to paint dolls. If you have tried these or use these please share with us your methods and show photo samples of your work. I am interested to see how they compare to other brands in terms of ease of use and cure time. I am also interested in how durable they are in terms of fading and rubbing off.
Following
I look forward to see what you come up with Angie. I read through your blog the other night and I am definitely a follower now 
You’re so helpful and full of great knowledge!!! Thank you so much for what you do for our reborn community 
1 Like
I’m interested in this too. And kicking myself for not ordering a discounted seconds kit when I placed my last order- they had some for $12! Would have been perfect to try out my stash of artist grade paint. Ah well…
I have been using GHSP for over a year now and Yesterday I Took the plunge and purchased the Liquitex paint along with Matt medium, satin varnish, slow dry, and distilled water and new paint brushes and sponges for the air dry. I am planning to use the Air dry paints to make my my zombie babies for more color options then that of GHSP so it should help give the zombie babies a deeper living dead look at least that is what I am hoping for as for drying time and over all quality and any different techniques then those used with GHSP would be greatly appreciated. I know there is quite a learning curve from Heat set to Air Dry but I think the challenge will be fun.
3 Likes
I know it can be done as I see others have done it. I am going to be very frank in my next statements. I have seen some who did it and I did not like the look of their outcome. I learned a long time ago that a paint is only as good as the techniques used. I am looking specifically to see if a natural looking baby with dimension can be achieved this way. I am not interested in a harsh vibrant painted look nor just a blushed looking baby with no dimension. I know that in the past we have seen someone promoting her methods using artist paints and mediums and when she finally showed the doll she was working on it did not have a natural look to it IMO. That is why I am interested to see what anyone else has done. I am also curious about cure times. I was looking at the Youtube by Golden about their liquid acrylics and they say their cure time is 72 hours. That is not so bad.
6 Likes
This baby was painted with air dry paints, not sure which ones but she has a lot of depth to her. She was painted by @allhisgrace, maybe she can chime in on what paint she uses or how she achieves the depth.
Picture isn’t uploading right now I will have to try again later.
4 Likes
Angie, thank you for your frankness, I love it when people speak their minds and offer input on anything regarding reborning. I am a new user to FX paint and have done 2 dolls so far and have a lot to learn. That’s why I appreciate when people who have a lot of experience with air dry speak out and let us learn from their experience with it!! Thank You so much, I will be following this to hear anything that may help me improve.
2 Likes
I use Art and Magic Waterborne and I do like them. I had decided to buy FX but not sure. @Rnd210 I like your idea of the Liquitex paint for alternatives. I can’t wait to see how it works for you!
2 Likes
I use a combination of babyfx and liqutex soft body paints. … Just for fun, I may try to just use liquiex and see what happens. 
Here is a current WIP.
9 Likes
Yes, I am familiar with Misty’s work. I do remember her saying she uses artist paints and she is very knowledgeable on it. Misty’s style is totally different from mine as her coloring is much more intense. When thinning the paints more to get softer skin tones there has to be a balance acheived so as not to cause the pigments to be so thinned they break down and fade out over time. I am specifically looking for the work of those who have been able to achieve it using artist grade acrylics not marketed specifically to paint reborn dolls.
2 Likes
This is closer to the look I am talking about. When you say you use the 2 paints in combination with each other, do you mean you mix them together or layer one on top of the other?
I mixed them together… And actually now that I think about it, it wasn’t liquiex on this baby. It was some very highly pigmented paint that I found at Michael’s which was in a babyfx looking container. Like everything else, it’s a little pricey, but with Michael’s coupons it wasn’t bad… If you want to know what it is, let me know and I’ll take a pic. @anjsmiles
Yes, I would love to know.
OK @DollyPardon I just ordered Soft Body Paints from Blick last night, I am going to try them on an alternative that will stay in the family. I see you did not mean that you used them but I wanted to try them anyway, lol. I think there are others that use Golden paints, I know Golden Glazing liquid is used.
1 Like
I have used Golden fluid acrylics over Jillian Trigg’s air dry reborning paints because I felt unhappy with the colours and the depth of the skin colour I achieved on this doll. This is my first reborn so I have no idea how fade resistant it will be. My next doll will be totally done in Golden fluid acrylics I will take photos over time to see how much the colours fade. Fingers crossed they won’t. Love to hear more on this subject.
7 Likes
Post some pics when you get get done, @AnnieSokay!
I actually started off reborning with regular acrylic paints. And I mean whatever I had laying around from painting on canvas. But being as new to the craft as I was, I struggled because I wasn’t sure what colors to use. Now that I know, I’m fairly confident that I could make dolls with just a basic set of acrylic paints.
Who is it that uses liquiex… @rainbow?
I’m only using these for alternatives NOT realistic Everyone that is a pro says regular acrylics not made for the vinyl reborn dolls will peel over time. I will post when I finish though.
I have a trial doll that I got from Goodwill that I used regular acrylic paints from Walmart on to see if this craft was something that I would stick to before I fully invested in reborning. The doll is in storage right now but I will be getting it out in a few weeks. I did that in early March which is only 7 months. I wonder how it looks now, lol.
Yay for experimenting!
3 Likes
It is the craft grade acrylics that some have experienced peeling with just because they do not have as much pigment binders in them. If you thin them down like we do for reborning it weakens them further. I believe that it is possible to use the artist grade like the Golden Liquid Acrylics to paint a baby. It is just a matter of mixing/thinning them properly.
I do know this:
Retarders slow drying time but do not contain any binders.
Glazes do add binders to the paint as well as slow the drying time some and make the paints translucent.
Gels add binders to the paint, somewhat slow drying time and add texture to the paints.
5 Likes
Those are either the Golden Liquide Acrylics or the Golden High Flow Acrylics. Your bottle doe snot say it under the name like usual but it is the time of bottle the High Flow Acrylics come in. If you look closely at the description on the bottle on the left you can just see the words HIGH FLOW.
Here is a video on the High Flow paints:
If you read some of the comments underneath the video, they do state that the pigment load is lower than it is for the Liquid Colors.
GoldenPaints 9 months ago
To attain the properties of a High Flow paint, pigment load is lower than it is for Fluid colors. Fluid colors have the same pigment load as our Heavy Body colors, but High Flow will be more transparent because the very low viscosity produces a thinner paint film when applied. However, you should see exceptional vibrancy from these colors and perfect pigment match to the same color in our other color lines.
So the regular Fluid Acrylics have an even higher pigment load. I am leaning towards the thought that they might be a better choice in terms of binding to the vinyls. Regardless of which one is used, I would use the satin glazing liquid or the matte or ultra matte gel to thin them and very little water.
This video explains what I just said very well about thinning.
4 Likes