Contrast Paints

With all of the excitement over the Blues win I did not have a lot of time to hobby this weekend.  I did though get some time using the new contrast paints and I like everyone else on the internet will give my two cents on my opinion of the new paints.

As many point out it is not exactly a wash and not exactly a paint.  This hybrid medium is a bit of a challenge to work with.  Most of the tutorials say that you need to use more of the paint than you expect to be needed. I started out doing this with my first couple of tries.  What I found out was, using the paint this way is messy and can leave a lot of pooling. this can leave a splotchy result if you are not careful.

Once I started to cut back the amount I used I found I liked the result I was getting but the thin nature of the paint was causing another problem.the paint liked to run to other places on the model.  I had to go back and touch up parts of the model that I didn't want to be covered with that pigment.  I don't have the steadiest of had and I had to go back and touch up areas that I had yet to paint.  A related issue was that the base paint that they released was not think enough to cover the mistakes in one go.  If you are trying to speed paint through a big group of models this would really slow me down.

Lastly, I wanted to look at the specific colors and how well they matched my current paint scheme.  Looking at the sister of battle, the yellow came close but turned out to be a bit darker than the glaze I use.  The orange I used didn't really cover as the original but I liked the black better.  My wife like the black gun better than the metal look but said the glossy finish on the black cloth looked better on the older model.  I might go back a n repaint the guns using the new black contrast paint.  I might try to hit the cloth with a wash and see how that turns out before deciding on a method. I did like the skin tone I used and might pick that up that color later on.  The details came through pretty well and less layers the better on that part of a model.

While the base color of the marine was really close I didn't like the way it came out splotchy. Also the purple shoulder did not work at all.  I think I will continue to paint these the old way without using the new colors except for maybe the bolters.  I was painting them black already so using this paint may give them a little more definition.

I think the orange on the tau is my way forward.  I really hate painting orange on my tau.  It never looks complete.  This produced a good color and was pretty easy to work with. I will us the regular colors to hit the other parts of the model so I can be a little more reckless when laying down the base coat of orange.

I also tried Snakebite leather for my Orks.  I think this is also an awesome color that is going to work well.  I still have to try the blue for my Tyranids.  Maybe I can base coat a Genestealer and try it out this week.  I might have a quick post with a result or maybe I will just tweet it out.  

There you have it.  Another voice take on the new paints to add to all the others.  In the end I find that I will use some of these new paints but they will not dominate my paint set.  I am either just to set in my ways or not the right user for these paints.   I hope you found this helpful and is not juat a total waste of your time. Next up Gloomhaven miniatures.

Questions? Comments? happy painting!