This article originally appeared in Pyramid #1

Pyramid Pick

Quick Pick

7000 Series "La Corneille" 18/0 Brush

Produced by Loew-Cornell Company

Review a brush? Why not? It's a great brush.

Some people say that technique is everything in miniature painting . . . that the search for finer and finer brushes is (pardon the expression) pointless. A master can do fine detail with a big brush.

But I need all the help I can get. I've been known to put flecks of paint on the point of a hobby knife in that often-vain attempt to get the color just exactly where I want it. I've been frustrated for years by the apparent lack of any brush finer than 10/0.

So I was delighted when a friend sent me this little 18/0. I never heard of Loew-Cornell. Nobody in gaming ever heard of them. They're an old company, with a big catalog, but all their sales are in crafts. Maybe now that'll change.

This tiny brush is of artificial fiber, with an excellent point, and it's held up through a lot of use. More use, in fact, than you'd normally give it . . . a brush this fine should be reserved for the smallest details, but I've been using it even for the things where a 10/0 would be right, just to see how long it lasted. It's doing well.

The only problem with a brush this fine is that it's slow. It doesn't hold much paint, and what it holds will dry almost instantly. So it's dip, stroke, stroke, stroke . . . dip, stroke, stroke, stroke . . . rinse, clean, start over. If that drives you crazy, use a bigger brush. Otherwise, it's great.

At the GAMA show in Vegas this year, I showed the brush and catalog to several distributors. Loew-Cornell actually makes several in this size, including an interesting one with an offset head, for painting "around corners." Who knows? By the time you read this, you might be able to get an 18/0 at your own hobby shop.

-- Steve Jackson


Article publication date: June 1, 1993

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