For Science!
Having spent far too long watching YouTube videos showing various techniques, I decided to give it a go with some duplicate paint pots I have accidentally bought over time.
I only bought five dropper bottles (and thought I had bought clear ones, not white ones!) so tested with Macragge Blue, Abaddon Black, Kislev Flesh, Pallid Wych Flesh, Leadbelcher and Balthasar Gold – two bases, two layers, and two metallic bases.
First I tried the Macragge Blue through a stainless steel measuring funnel. Useless. I didn’t waste too much paint, but that was going to take far too long for it all to make it through the funnel.
Next up was the Kislev Flesh which was thick and goopy. I made a lot of mess getting it into the bottle and wasted the most amount out of the six. This time I decided to just pour it directly from bottle to bottle.
Layer paints are supposed to be thinner than bases so for the other paints I added between 10 and 20 drops of Vallejo Thinner Medium to each pot where they had started to goop up, and give them a good shake and a minute or two on the vortex spinner.
This worked well – and I deliberately chose two metallic paints to see how they would behave in comparison to the others. Pouring from bottle to bottle seems to be the best way to do this, and using a cocktail stick to encourage the last of the paint out of the bottle wasn’t as wasteful as I first thought it would be.
The labels are easy to peel off and stick onto the dropper bottles and none of the paints have clogged so far. I plan to let them sit for a few days to let them settle, give them a good shake, and see how they flow. That way I can decide if I buy another ~90 bottles and spend the time transferring the rest of my base and layer paints.
Although there is still a reasonable amount of paint left over in the pot – could I really have got much more from normal use? The pictures aren’t great, but it’s mostly just paint on the walls of the bottle left over – only really the stuff you use if you’ve forgotten to buy a new pot! There’s always going to be left over paint, and I think now that I’ve tweaked the process (by making it simpler: 1. add thinner; 2. pour) I would be happy to spend the time transferring the rest of my collection.