Ends of Fate

I recently made a discovery… the Liquitex Flow-Aid I bought years ago and thought I was just incompetent in using… was a dud!  Two days ago I made a trip to Michaels and bought a new bottle of Flow-Aid plus a bottle of Golden glazing medium (gloss).  I didn’t really feel all that confident purchasing it, but I still hoped that maybe a fresh bottle would be different.  I know many mediums have a shelf-life, but this bottle does today exactly what it did five years ago when it was brand new… and now I know that it is not how it should behave!

To explain: The first bottle, when used, cause the pigments and polymers to break apart.  Now, this is normal if you over-use the medium… but in my case, it didn’t matter how little or how much!  And, contrary to tutorial videos I watched, I had to vigorously mix the paint into the flow-aid to get it to blend.  Even then, it was watery, diluted looking, and I could never achieve the finest lines I wanted.

Now, the second bottle was vastly different!  When applied to the acrylic paints, the paints bled into the flow-aid with a beautifully smooth, inky quality.  Perhaps a fleck here or there, but nowhere the flaky explosion with the first bottle.  Which led me to the conclusion that it was a bad batch all along.  And I blamed myself all these years! >_<

Good news is, I now have everything I’ve ever needed to complete a beautiful faceup for my BJDs.  Not to mention, the tools for when I paint regular artwork!

I took a small video illustrating the differences for future references.  Remember, the first Flow-aid is old, but produces the same results as when I bought it, therefore, being a bad batch.  This is for reference for anyone who may cross similar results to help them diagnose whether they have a dud or not!