Createx or Trident

fireartist85

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For those that have experience with both Createx (wicked or illustration) and Trident, which do you prefer to use and why? I’ve been using mostly Createx illustration colors and it seems very tough to do the detail work. Either there isn’t enough reducer to get consistent flow, or there is too much and it either blows out or doesn’t cover at all. It’s getting very frustrating to say the least. Never seemed to have these issues when I was using urethane. I have been reading very good things about Trident, and was wondering if it would be worth trying out or just keep messing around with the Createx.


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Moving from extremely fast drying urethane to water based is definitely a challenge. Reducing is a bit of a black art, and different paint to paint. If your paint is already "brush ready" like trident, it doesn't mean it won't spider if you are close enough to the surface or have high enough pressure. My best advice is to try it, maybe pick up a bottle of black and play around with it to see if it works for you.

What works for one person's style doesn't always translate well to another.

If you want to get the best of of Illustration colors or Wicked, my advice is to move to 4013, and thin to the point of runny milk, and then take your pressure down.

When I am doing detail with CI, my pressure is usually between 10 to 12 PSI, and I am painting extremely close to my surface with the tiniest pull back of the needle. I can usually reliably pull hair thin likes less than 1/10 of a mm with that reduction and pressure (cap off) on slick yupo or plastic. It definitely takes practice tho.
 
From what I've read Trident and Etac are both harder to locate in the US so trying to learn Createx may be worth it in the long term.
I've tried Trident, it didn't impress me a great deal and it has a funky smell that worries me for a 'waterbased' paint
Etac EFX on the other hand is brilliant if you can find it.

I have a love/hate relationship with Createx. Some days it all seems to work well, other days its like the airbrush gods have determined nothing is going to work well !
As Kim has already stated, its trial and error for you to find your sweet spot. in my Micron I don't need a lot of reducer at all and rely on transparent base to make light passes to build up colour slowly, minimal reducer just to get it flowing well and low pressure.
 
I got sent some Trident free as a "sorry" for being sent a damaged purchase. Even free, I wouldn't use it again lol. Just wasn't for me. Also worth bearing in mind while you are looking at different paints, that anything that says "airbrush ready" means using a .5 nozzle and higher air pressure.

Im a createx fan. It's well worth taking the time to find the right ratios. The colours are bright, and light fast and the transparents really pop when cleared.
You can get incredible detail, but you do need to get to know it. Not all colours have the same amount of pigment. So If you dialled in black for example which has a heavy amount of pigment, then switched to yellow using the same ratios, you will blow through as yellow needs little to no reduction depending on the pressure/paint effect/coverage needed.

Trident didn't compare for me.
 
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