How do you organize your paints?

[Pingo]

I only use about 14 colors when painting...

Oh, me too.

[klarg1]

Organize my what now?

 

 

Aside from using rubber bands to keep triads together, my system is haphazard at best. (Similar color tend to be kind of near each other, but it is not at all consistent.)

[Leader of the Rats]

Triad all the way. Even my cheap craft paints too. Highlight out front, shadows at the back. (no paintcism intended) Metallics on the right, random assortment of paints that can't be grouped on the left.

[Adrift]

 

I use a Kobalt organizer from Lowe's. I know where every color in my palette is and what I want to grab and use when I want to use it. It has sufficient room for brushes, towels, and other little tools I might need. It is easy to take on the go so I can paint wherever I want and easily take my operation on the go.

I have 79 Reaper paints; 6 HD paints, and 73 MS paints.

Kobalt organizer is to vague. Which one are you using?

Very similar to this but I think mine's a bit bigger and the handle is different. But I basically have my paints standing up and three trays in the back open so that I can keep the brushes laying down when they're on the go with me. Because of this set up I can easily just pack up and go in 2 minutes or less. Packing for Reapercon is just as simple as packing to go to paint at Starbucks.

 

http://m.lowes.com/pd/Kobalt-17.7-in-W-x-4.27-in-D-Black-Plastic-Bin/4480615

Edited December 15, 2014 by Adrift

[Matbar]

I have a couple of basic craft organizers, neither of which I can manage to locate on Amazon at the moment to show you.  My system is to group similar shades together because usually I'm looking at a mini thinking "hmmm which green do I want?" so I like to be able to grab all of the similar shades at once.  There are a few exceptions.  On the top tier of one caddy I keep liners, clears, and washes, and I keep the clear coat and both primers in the same area.

 

For me it's less about a strict organization system and more like a "type" of thing I might be looking for should be in the same area.

 

That said, I have more paint coming in soon too and will probably have to move away from that and to a case of some sort. 

[robinh]

I have shelfs above my desk and the paints are ordered by triad skin tones/ then by overall shade light to darke starting with white and working to black.   I keep metallics in thier own area then clear followed by inks.  The last spot on the bottom shelf contains my limited number of HD also sorted by color and hue.

 

Other bottles (glaze medium/thinner/matt medium/primer) are all on the left side of the paint table with the wet pallet.  While brushes/cleaners and clean water is on the right side.

 

 

Of course I will have to look at adding another shelf once my 12 days order comes in and KS II and CAV paints.  Not sure how I am going to get all that on the table.. working on it though.  I 100+ at the moment and these will probably put me over the 150+.

Edited December 15, 2014 by robinh

[Seer of the Pitt]

I've got a couple of racks I made out from  Lowe's 1/4" x 1 1/2" poplar sitting on my desk that hold about 100 paints in dropper bottles. To the right of my desk I have a Sterilite 3 drawer unit that holds about 150 Ral Partha, 30ish Testors acryls and another 100 Reaper MSP's. Scattered about my desktop and shelves I have various larger sized bottles of primers and paint additives. In a fewish GW mail order boxes from the mid 2000's, I have said company's products (along with some random paint as well) slowly drying or have already dried out because their paint pots suck. I actually need to get around to building another paint rack to house the remainder of the MSP's - Then I'll be able to properly organize them all

If i did a count, it'd probably be around 400 individual units of paint with only a few duplicates.
Of those, I'd guess that maybe 300 or so are viable.

Maybe I'll do a paint inventory check around New Years and post "The List"

[Laoke]

Currently I store my paints in a desk drawer - I have about 100 total at this time.  I tend to group by color, and gradiants within that color running from light to dark.  Metallics I seperate out into their own section, and likewise with the Tamiya Clear transparent paints.

 

I've got https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-ultimate-paint-rack-by-massive-voodoo'>The Ultimate Paint Rack by Massive Voodoo arriving at some stage, which will remove the paints from my desk drawer and put them into an easily organised and portable rack:  that's going to be a game changer for me I think.

[Talae]

At nearly 200, all MSP and MSPHD, I have them organized by SKU on two nail polish displays.

[Grimreaper71]

What is this word organization everyone is throwing around?

[CashWiley]

What is this word organization everyone is throwing around?

Paint mafia.

[Flamehawke]

I have a plano box, I think it was for tackle. Not sure as I hunt up tool boxes and tackle boxes to store my minis, paints, and supplies. As for sorting the paint. I gave up on keeping them sorted. It lasts a week at most before I notice it is all mixed up once more. I should count how much paint I have, but that sounds as dull as counting how many dice I have.

 

I should inventory the paint though. With number I have and their order number so I can replace it on demand.

[Heisler]

 

 

I use a Kobalt organizer from Lowe's. I know where every color in my palette is and what I want to grab and use when I want to use it. It has sufficient room for brushes, towels, and other little tools I might need. It is easy to take on the go so I can paint wherever I want and easily take my operation on the go.

I have 79 Reaper paints; 6 HD paints, and 73 MS paints.

Kobalt organizer is to vague. Which one are you using?

Very similar to this but I think mine's a bit bigger and the handle is different. But I basically have my paints standing up and three trays in the back open so that I can keep the brushes laying down when they're on the go with me. Because of this set up I can easily just pack up and go in 2 minutes or less. Packing for Reapercon is just as simple as packing to go to paint at Starbucks.

 

http://m.lowes.com/pd/Kobalt-17.7-in-W-x-4.27-in-D-Black-Plastic-Bin/4480615

 

 

Thanks, I haven't seen that version but then I'm usually over in the tool boxes and sometimes Lowe's has odd thoughts on how to organize things.

[Malynor]

I was trying to sort mine loosely by colour... taking into my bad eyes, and lack of colour knowledge:

I've got more paints than rack space now though, so I need to rethink my process now.

Edited December 16, 2014 by Malynor

[Loim]

I'm currently in the process of building some paint storage racks. I doubt I will be able to fit all my paints, but that's ok.