In the beginning, I used Tamiya color because it is widely available. After I had a taste on using Mr Color spray paint, I find that Mr Color is much more suitable for a Gundam model kit instead. Why do I say that?
1. Tamiya Acrylic Color (Price: RM 15 per bottle, RM 25 or more for thinner)
The Tamiya Acrylic Color is widely available since there's an authorized Tamiya shop here in Kuala Lumpur that do sell these colors. The finishing result is great, and they do produce some of the very nice metallic color and alternative primer color as well.
However, I find that the color surface is quite sticky, and if not careful, the painted parts can become thicker and would jam up especially the joining. This is what happened to my MG F91, which after applying the Tamiya color, the hand join is stuck inside the arm and I can't move it or to take it out. I resorted to brute force and the consequence of that is a broken join.
Tamiya Acrylic Color has to be thinned with the Tamiya Acrylic Thinner. However, I did saw a video on YouTube recently and found out that the Tamiya Acrylic paint can be mixed with water, but it never shows whether it can be mixed with water for airbrushing because the modeler is mixing it with water for hand painting.
2. Mr Color Acrylic Paint (Price: RM9 per bottle, RM 55 for 400ml leveling thinner)
Mr Color is the reference color for all Gunpla. It is quite hard to find it in Kuala Lumpur, and I heard that it was once banned from export. Now however, I noticed that some local hobbyist shops are still able to import them in.
Mr Color is much more suitable to Gunpla is because the surface is not as sticky as the Tamiya color. Plus, even after painting/spraying/airbrush the Gunpla, the surface is smooth, and the join will not be affected by it. That's the fact why I'd say that Mr Color Acrylic Paint is much suitable as compare to Tamiya Acrylic Color.
Mr Color has to be thinned with the Mr Color Thinner. I used the Leveling Thinner because it is formulated to thin color for airbrushing purpose. Compare to Tamiya Acrylic Color, Mr Color's bottle is smaller, but one bottle is enough to spray on at least 1 to 2 Gunpla (depending on color usage).
Apart from the acrylic color, there are Mr Metal Color and Mr Aqueos Color as well. Mr Metal Color is like the normal acrylic paint, only thing is that it will gives a metallic feeling after polishing the painted surface. I find that Mr Metal Color is hard to deal with because the polishing requires a lot of patient and could possibly scratch the color away. Plus, one of the colors, Burn Iron, would require extra attention in thinning it because if it is not sufficiently thinned for airbrush, it will cloak up the handpiece. Mr Metal Color can be thinned with the same thinner used for Mr Color.
Mr Aqueos color on the other hand is water based paint, which is the reference color for Gunpla, where the instruction manual will always recommend the usage of water based paint for safety reason. For airbrushing however, it has to be thinned with the Aqueos thinner, which is specially formulated in order to give better result for airbrushing purpose. I don't use Mr Aqueos color because the color choice seems to be much lesser as compare to its acrylic counterpart.
3. Tamiya Enamel Color (Price: RM10 per bottle, RM20 for 20ml enamel thinner)
I'm not sure whether this is considered as lacquer paint or not, so I'll use the word enamel instead. I used the Tamiya Enamel Color for the purpose to fill the panel line. It is done by thinning the enamel color with thinner, and then using a fine brush, drop the color onto the panel line and let it flow. The excessive color can be wiped away by using a swab/cotton bud dipped with some enamel thinner.
Applying enamel color for panel line is a very difficult process because sometime I'll get the whole panel line being wiped away as well. So, I'll have to practice some more on it. The enamel thinner will not dissolve the acrylic surface, which I've tasted it. However, it not careful, the color can still be scratched off. Also, Zippo Oil (yes, the matches Zippo) can be used to thin the enamel color in this application. Some modelers would prefer Zippo oil (on YouTube, I came across at least 3 of them, and all are applying it on Gunpla) for the reason that it would give a much better balance result between the panel line color and the base color.
One thing really bothering me is that the authorized Tamiya dealer in Malaysia do not bring in this enamel color. I have to buy this from the shop where I got my Mr Color from.
Conclusion
Apart from the mentioned color, the Japanese modelers are "spoil" with a lot of other color choices that we can't get it here in Kuala Lumpur. I.e. Gaia Note's Gaia Color, which produces a series of acrylic paint that's as good if not better than Mr Color. Then, there's HG Color, which is a series of color that can be mixed with Mr Color.
Although Mr Color is much suitable for Gunpla, that doesn't mean Tamiya Acrylic Color is useless. I do give praise to some of the Tamiya Acrylic color especially the Gold Leaf and the Chrome Silver; somehow for me, these 2 colors are better than the Mr Color Gold and Silver in the finishing result.
