Using Artist Oils

Artist oils will not dry/form a durable paint surface. What it can do however is either be thinned sufficiently to flow very well (as a wash), or be applied on surfaces and retain the brush stroke/texture. Don't expect artist oil to cover evenly like normal paint but at the sime time it does cover as long it has enough density (unlike say water/link which form droplets) so it can be worked into patterns (eg wood grain)

So surface preparation does not matter, you might want to protect the underpaint with top coat if a lot of scrubbing will be needed. The surface oil gets applied on is most likely to be the base colour rather than primer since artist oil should only be used after the main painting is done, rather than as the main colour.

You typically want to top coat the artist oils after painting to protect the paint, as it can be rubbed off no matter how long it dries, preferably a gloss coat followed by a flat one.

You mean woodgrain like this?

The simplest means:

1 - Paint base some sort of tan/brown color. Use an acrylic (I used Tamiya, but you get the idea)

2 - Take a darker brown or red/brown oil (or multiples) - raw umber, burnt sienna, etc - and slather them across the top. You don't need 100% perfect coverage, but you do want the oil pretty much all over.

3 - Take a sponge, and WIPE in one direction. Voila woodgrain. I've found those dense dark gray foam packing sponges work best for me.

4 - To really seal the look of varnished wood, airbrush with 50/50 Tamiya Clear Orange and Clear Yellow. Then gloss coat a couple of times.

I do not want to say that potchip is wrong because on a lot of what he says he is not.  I will say there is more to it than is being said.  i will disagree with a few things though.

Artist oils will dry but it takes a lot longer then modeling paints.  The are additives tat will makes it dry much faster but it is still a longer process.  Whether it is thinned as was pin wash or used straight out of the tube, it needs to be applied over an base hat will not be affected by the oil and its solvents.  Acrylics.  Oils over a fully cured acrylic base can pretty much be completely cleaned away if the you are not happy with the results.  an enamel base coat will come off when artist oils are applied to it.  When I use an enamel I will give it a very good coat of a clear flat acrylic.  By very good coat mean one that the oils will not find a little crevice to soak into.

One of the advantages of this method it how well the oils can be blended. The higher quality oils have such finely ground pigments the gradations that can be achieved are great and some really nice effects can be achieved. 

wing_nut

an enamel base coat will come off when artist oils are applied to it.  When I use an enamel I will give it a very good coat of a clear flat acrylic.  By very good coat mean one that the oils will not find a little crevice to soak into.

Not necessarily. The Mona Lisa Odorless Thinner that I use with artist oils won't harm enamels unless you REALLY scrub. Most of the time when I'm doing oils, I'm using a very light touch anyway, so it's never been a big deal.

This P-47 is half enamel (Ocean Gray, red and yellow) and half Tamiya (RAF dark green), with a raw umber filter wash:

And my Sherman was painted with MM enamels (OD and faded OD), with oils used right on top:

That's good to know but don't the oils themselves soften the enamel?

wing_nut

That's good to know but don't the oils themselves soften the enamel?

Honestly I don't know. Oils seem to behave pretty differently from our bottled paints and I've never had them attack the enamel, but I suppose they could. Makes sense if they're both oil-based.

For woodgrain, I'd certainly heartily recommend acrylics, but filters, washes, streaks and such I've applied over enamels with no problem.

Thanlks for the comments guys, I think I know how to best proceed.  Consensus seems to be careful if using enamels for the base.  I think if I do use enamels, I may clear coat with acrylic clear to seal the enamel prior to applying the artist oils and then reseal with acrylic again once the oils have dried.

I may curse myself later, but am actually looking forward to trying this....

Thanks again!

RODC