Buying paint

Full size 1/1 spray cans are not much more cost than a tiny 1/4 oz bottle. Krylon makes a line of plastic compatible spray paint and goes on like glass! Heat a bit with warm water and shake for at least 1 minute. Also automotive red oxide & gray(s) primer works well. I use all 3 frequently with good results. A wet sand between coats and a final wet sand helps keep the finish perfect.

Now before all the 'spray bomb' non-believers add in look on page 74 of FSM's 'Great Scale Modeling 2008'

Dave Straub exclusively used Krylon spray cans to finish his scratch built  Curtiss NC-4 Flying Boat.

I'm a big fan of Krylon's plastic compatible spray paints.  Much, much cheaper than hobby specific paints.  I use them extensively for priming and where possible, covering large areas like hulls if the color is close.  One idea you might consider, if you need to adjust the color, is to decant the Krylon, tint it as you need with a hobby paint to get the right shade, then airbush the mixture.  I've never tried that, but I don't see any reason it wouldn't work.  Might want to try it on some spare styrene sheet first, just to be safe.

Bob

Actually, I find airbrushes very economical of paint.  Especially if put on over a good primer so they don't need many coats.  I use Krylon primer which is grey to start with, so need very few coats.  Compared to the price of styrene kits these days (between one and two hundred bucks) the price of paint is minimal.

As an airbrush user, I'm with Don. I use far less paint than an equivalent paint job using a brush. OTOH, I don't do ships, which are HUGE! If I did, I would be heading to the hardware store for a rattle can of Krylon.

Gosh, if I had the same amount of paint in Krylon as I do in Tamiya bottles, I would need twelve times the space, just for paint. I wouldn't have room for models!!

I use rattlecans for primers and clearcoats, but never for color. But then I mostly work with 1/48 single-engine aircraft, and a rattlecan feels like overkill (especially with my clumsy spraying).

For ships, I guess you could go that way. 

Another option would be to plan out all the paints you'll need, then make a big bulk shipment online. Paints can be significantly cheaper depending on where you buy them (Scale Hobbyist seems to have great prices on Tamiya and Model Master), and once you cross the threshold of like ten bottles, the savings have already paid for the shipping.

Thanks for all the useful replies everyone, Especially to you Doug for that lead to Scale Hobbyist.  I had already done a lot of searching and found Hobbylinc out of Atlanta who seemed to be the cheapest around on paint and bought a few bottles to get started, but SH is 30-40cents cheaper per bottle.  Hobbylinc seemed perfect at first cause they are so close to me, that even by parcel post a package should only take a single day to get to me, but for some squirrely reason they like to hang on to your order for several days before processing it, so no advantage there.  30cents may not seem like a lot, but when your starting out, and having to buy a lot of bottles it can add up pretty quickly.  Not to mention all the other things I need, hopefully their a little less expensive on those too.

I like SH's website a lot more than any i have seen for paint cause it fairly easy to find and see the colors.  Most websites you can't see any clue to what the color your buying really is.   It bad enough buying paint by computer and the inherent variation in monitors and graphic cards, but at least I'm not flying totally blind here.  Even testors website is terrible, they have color dots of their paints up there, but they look terribly wrong.  I know cause I compared a couple that I had already bought to what was displayed, and they aren't even close.

Right now I'm planning to get a couple basic colors in a couple different brands other than model masters just to see how they cover and handle so I can decide which brand to go with, than I'll probably be buying a rainbow of things.

Glad you like Scale Hobbyist! I'm a big fan of their site design, especially compared with what else it out there (Sprue Bros. isn't bad. Great Models is navigable. I hate Squadron's site with a passion). Outside of paints, kits, and basic type supplies (tweezers and such) their selection isn't that great, so I don't order from them too often, but what they've got is usually really well priced.

I airbrushed my Lexington 1:350- that is a big model.  None of the colors took more than one bottle of MM enamel.  Considering the kit cost around a hundred bucks (I usually do not spend that much on a kit but had just earned a bit extra) the cost of three bottles of MM enamel was a minor cost.  Even the photo-etch set was considerably more than the paint.

One secret to minimizing paint use is to get the base as good as possible so that you only need one or two coats of color.  Prepare the surface well first, prime, fill, sand and reprime until the surface is basically finished except the wrong color.  Then apply the finish coats of model paint.

You need to look outside the Model Paint aisle and into craft paints... The craft paints, mostly acrylics, are around half the price of model paints and have two or three times the amount..  The colors are named to attract the "chicks", but take a color chart with you and you'll find matches for parctically all of the military colors...

"Model" paint manufacturers will soak ya...

You pay for convenience. Regardless if you are buying a handful of snack mix at the checkout counter when purchasing gas at the local convenience store or buying hobby paints, you pay for the convenient sized container. Sure it is cheaper to purchase products in large amounts/volume but do you really want a five pound bag of trail mix or a gallon can of flat black sitting on your workbench? Typically the smaller the quantity something is sold in the higher the price. That's not to say that there are some consumables that are just the reverse...ladies perfume as an example.

Paint mfrs have provided larger sizes, but the sales of those containers didn't justify their production. Apparently not enough people wanted them so they were discontinued. I have sold my products in larger containers...I can count the number of customers who ordered it that way on one hand and have fingers to spare.

Looking at SH site, my guess it this is a one man part time operation. It appears to be located in a residential neighborhood. Use Google's Street View to see it for yourself.

Its not that a one man show can't be a viable business, just if it isn't the person's primary means of income, it can mean they don't stock everything they  offer and can cause delays in product being shipped. Also a business who doesn't publish a contact number and/or actually answer said number during normal business hours...is a good indication that they have a day job.

If you aren't wedded to acrylics and are comfortable with enamels you might want to check out Mid-Tennessee Hobbies.  I use WEM Colourcoats almost exclusively since their military color selection is the best I've found.  I agree that if you use Wal-Mart Krylon rattle cans to prime, particularly ships where you are doing larger areas, then prep the surface so that all you have to do is apply the color coats your hobby paint use will be relatively minimal.  As to Mid-Tennessee Hobbies, I've found their prices to be very competitive and their customer service first rate.  They even called me at home on a Sunday evening once to clarify a question on an order I had placed.  Prompt shipping as well.  They are a relatively new site, on-line only, and their inventory is constantly expanding.  I use them as often as I can.

Bob