Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey guys, those new contrast paints are brilliant. Was curious if you think they will be good enough to take over the basing/shading process completely. Or just for use in quick painting miniatures? I know they were built up to get rid of the 'shelves of grey' but the results seem pretty good to be honest.

I’m not planning any major shifts in paint schemes. I’d also like to get some opinions from other painters I trust once they are out in the wild and in use.

There are a few things I’d like to try them on:
Fabrics. Red capes and leather tabards. I think these contrast paints will excel here and save a lot of time mixing/blending.
Flesh. I hate painting faces, and highlighting (at my skill level) always feels rough here. So if these can deliver as advertised, I think I might have a use here.
Undead. I already use a turquoise glaze here. This might be a modern paint with better flow to get the same effect with less worry.

I still use a lot of old GW inks and glazes. These seem to be a modern version, rather then their normal washes. Looking forward to giving them a go.

no, they will not take over proper painting.
no quick fix will ever look better then base, shade, 2-3 layers of highlight/blend.

it is only ment as they have said, to eliminate sprue gray armies and give people who cant paint a way to set move their army of greys into the tabletop quality paint range. (aka 3 colour flat standard)

Nevelon wrote:I’m not planning any major shifts in paint schemes. I’d also like to get some opinions from other painters I trust once they are out in the wild and in use.

There are a few things I’d like to try them on:
Fabrics. Red capes and leather tabards. I think these contrast paints will excel here and save a lot of time mixing/blending.
Flesh. I hate painting faces, and highlighting (at my skill level) always feels rough here. So if these can deliver as advertised, I think I might have a use here.
Undead. I already use a turquoise glaze here. This might be a modern paint with better flow to get the same effect with less worry.

I still use a lot of old GW inks and glazes. These seem to be a modern version, rather then their normal washes. Looking forward to giving them a go.

Interesting ideas. Even only seeing the Skaven model briefly the leather was great, A blessing for horde armies, although given how much you will use, I imagine it may get fairly pricey.

FrozenDwarf wrote:no, they will not take over proper painting.
no quick fix will ever look better then base, shade, 2-3 layers of highlight/blend.

it is only ment as they have said, to eliminate sprue gray armies and give people who cant paint a way to set move their army of greys into the tabletop quality paint range. (aka 3 colour flat standard)

Yes you are probably right, although I am not sold the basing/shade stage may have atleast a contender. Considering I have trouble with a few of the bases within Citadel paint range, it may be a nice alternative.

 FrozenDwarf wrote:
no, they will not take over proper painting.
no quick fix will ever look better then base, shade, 2-3 layers of highlight/blend.

it is only ment as they have said, to eliminate sprue gray armies and give people who cant paint a way to set move their army of greys into the tabletop quality paint range. (aka 3 colour flat standard)

This. It appears to be a slightly better paint-with-washes technique that requires an extra smooth primer coat to work best.

It does have a decently large range of colors, which is definitely a plus.

I’m curious on more detail heavy models. I’m newer to this, but not inexperienced, per say. Do you guys think using these contrast paints would be good for models like Tempestus Scions? If it helps, my models’ pants will be a different color from the carapace armor.

I just wonder if there is a drop-off point for models in which these contrast paints shouldn’t be used.

 Apple Peel wrote:

I just wonder if there is a drop-off point for models in which these contrast paints shouldn’t be used.

well, i would guess high detail level sections where the detail will drown if you use too mutch paint.

but there is a presentation vid on the wh community page wehere you see 3 examples beeing painted at the end of the vid. it realy is perfect for the rookie painters and horde armies, you just have to be neat when you paint.

IMO people are focusing too hard on the idea of just using Contrast and being done, rather than considering it as a starting point for further work.

Sure, an hour of traditional highlighting and shading will probably look better than five minutes to apply Contrast and calling it done. But I suspect that for most models, putting those 55 minutes saved back into further highlights and shadows will ultimately make the Contrasted model the better of the two.

It's not all that different from glazing or 'juicing' over a zenithal prime, which is a technique used by GD winners, not just speed-painting hobbyists.

They definitely have potential uses in advanced painting. The eavy metal demo showed that. I'm going to keep my eye on them.

It's wash-painting but streamlined slightly and the info is being put out on a larger scale. I'm of two-minds about it.

1) I personally won't be using it, as I already have my cheats in place and can paint very quickly/effectively. I also refuse to give GW money for their small amount of paint in a terribly designed pot so that's dead-on-arrival for me.

2) On the other hand, I fully support any product or method that encourages lazy people to actually put paint on their minis and get that on the table. I think the community has swung way too far to the "don't encourage people to paint" side of things and it's not a great place to be. No point in racing to the bottom or setting a sub-par standard as the "goal". So if this means people will actually paint their armies? That's 942% better than unpainted grey gak on the table.

So, not for me, but I approve of the product if it gets people painting.

Aren’t these basically just inks? I’ve been using inks over tamiya primer for years.

Half the stuff in my gallery is painted like that.

Nice to see GW advertising that method, as it’s the best way to get an army painted quickly, though it’s definitely not suited to all armies.

I’m might use it for the fatigues of my Scions, but I will almost definitely put it on my Valkyries and Taurox Primes.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Then I’ll handle the edges and the rivets and such.

Traditional layering/blending will look better but as a quick way to knock out a base/wash/base/layer step I think it'll work out great. Just apply highlights on top and I think the contrast paints will save people a lot of time particularly with cloth and organic shapes. I am quite excited to try it out with my WHFB Empire army.

It's slightly amusing, but I imagine you won't be seeing much of this paint line used on the box art, etc. Probably a lot of how-tos on YouTube and in White Dwarf but you won't be seeing Contrast painted minis in the codex anytime soon (unless used as one minor stage of a full mini). I can see Forgeworld using them for their massive dioramas etc.

 Apple Peel wrote:
I’m might use it for the fatigues of my Scions, but I will almost definitely put it on my Valkyries and Taurox Primes.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Then I’ll handle the edges and the rivets and such.

I think they'll work great on the fatigues, no so sure about vehicles. Anything with large flat surfaces are going to be tricky since you can get pooling and tide marks on the surface.

I'm not a painter, never have been, and I personally cannot wait to give them a try. If they make painting the things that intimidate me easier (basically anything with a lot of skin - Tyranids, Orks) then wonderful.

If they let me do my Hive Fleet colour (red w/yellow carapace, as per the original colour scheme from the RT/Tyranid Attack days) without 15 different layers of yellow, all the better.

Just slopping on a magic paint over primer? Where's the fun in that?

It's quick and convenient.

That's basically it!

Yeah, I can see that is the appeal of it, but isn't it just paint for people who don't like painting?

I'll have to wait and see if there are any other uses for it, but i don't think it's for me, personally.

I wonder what effect it will have on the commission painting market. It won't effect the high end, obviously, but there are a lot of people who hang around in your FLGS and will do a quick and dirty job for £3 a model. Those guys might be out of business if their clientele realise they can paint an army themselves in three hours.

 feltmonkey wrote:


I wonder what effect it will have on the commission painting market. It won't effect the high end, obviously, but there are a lot of people who hang around in your FLGS and will do a quick and dirty job for £3 a model. Those guys might be out of business if their clientele realise they can paint an army themselves in three hours.

prolly not any noticable difference until the marked has been filled with the paints.
one of two things will happend, either everything will remain the same (TT standard for 10 euro for infantry size only the jobs will be done in 1-2 days compared to a week+ as it is now) or the tabletop quality option will be removed from the selections since we now can do the same job better and faster then what the studioes currently do.

I don't know about better. To the same reasonable quality, if you're talking about the guy hanging around the shop I mentioned.

They are certainly interesting, and anything that turns grey plastic into a presentable army is a good thing, definitely! Personally, I paint for the sake of painting and don't actually play the games, so there's not much point for me to be getting armies to tabletop standard if they're never going to see the tabletop.

Any new paint range is inherently interesting though, I'll just wait and see what uses for them emerge beyond what they're advertised as.

They are inks. Like the old inks, only more intense in pigment.

There are uses beyond the easy way to use them. In fact they will make an excellent addition to any tool kit.

You can also get similar results from Artist Acrylic Inks, though they may or may not be toxic pigments, just FYI.

These will be especially good on Yellow models, something that is a challenge even for me. I have my own home brew chapter that is in yellow. I can make it look good w/o too much effort but let's be real. It's a lot more effort than I would put into a base color for any other model.

I intend to try out their yellow by doing a yellow contrast then in certain areas use maybe a mix of the brown and orange or flesh to see the results using them in a more conventional "shade" process.

I'd have to try these out as a variation to washing/zenthil to see how it works

Interested in the browns and darker colors

I’ll give a couple of colours a go, is the spray specially for them?

If they are just inks I will just stick to the good old Coat’d’arms chestnut ink,

 Rybrook wrote:
I’ll give a couple of colours a go, is the spray specially for them?

If they are just inks I will just stick to the good old Coat’d’arms chestnut ink,

Looks like a spray AND a bottle paint as well.

I was playing with some washes today and was able to achieve similar results by playing with different thinning fluids, paints, washes, etc.

What this really does is offer simplicity and consistency. That is key to a good look.

 feltmonkey wrote:
Just slopping on a magic paint over primer? Where's the fun in that?

Because, for some of us, painting is not fun.

Any release date on these? I am basically waiting for all your feed back and maybe a recipe to replicate them with other paint before I decide what if anything I will do with this.

June I think?

 Lance845 wrote:
Any release date on these? I am basically waiting for all your feed back and maybe a recipe to replicate them with other paint before I decide what if anything I will do with this.

From the News & Rumors thread:

 Ghaz wrote:

 Bossk_Hogg wrote:
Did they say when these go on sale?

They look pretty good to me. While Army Shades can be decent, they never quite seemed the same as GW's original Devlan Mud era shades.

From Warhammer Community:

Contrast will be hitting shelves in June!

 Rybrook wrote:
I’ll give a couple of colours a go, is the spray specially for them?

If they are just inks I will just stick to the good old Coat’d’arms chestnut ink,

Think, thick, like Army Painter's Quickshade.. but more pigment intense. As dark as for example the strong tone is, strong tone isn't that "opaque" compared to the "black" contrast being offered.