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Howdy, I have been digging in the cupboards & found some really old Citadel Inks of several colours. These inks are in the super-old plastic pots & don't have modern thematic names, they are just called "Red Ink", "Blue Ink", etc.

I have collection of ancient Citadel paints (most are dead now) but don't remember buying these Inks & can't remember anything about them.

Does anyone know what kind of Inks these are (acrylic, alcohol, etc)? If it helps they are from maybe 2008 at the latest.

Also what can these be used for? I seem to remember the Blue was good at producing blueing effects on silvery metallic & Black/ Sepia I imagine would just be used for washes, but I have also Green Ink and Red Ink & can't even think what it may be used for lol. Filtering maybe? Is a red or green wash a thing that would be good to do...?

Thanks!

The inks are still acrylic and super shiny. I still have a bunch. I don't know if it's the drying time or the bolt-shell pots, but they have crazy good shelf life.

They are basically washes but really REALLY shiny ones. I used the purple and magenta ones over white when painting my Daemonettes (almost like slapchop style). I used Chestnut ink over gold for my Iron Warriors. Green got used used in terrain projects featuring stagnant water and the red is still my go-to for gore effects.

EDIT: I may have used blue ink on the Oni in my avatar. It's been so long I don't remember

They act more like a glaze/filter than modern shade washes. Tint the whole surface, with a little extra in the recesses. Pretty high pigment and rich covers.

I wouldn’t say they are super glossy.

I still use the blue ink on my ultras, over a base of mcragge blue to get a richer sapphire blue.

Green I use to bump up the metalic green I use for frag grenades. Also over yellow for the venomous/acid bits on my nids.

Edit: just to reinforce the post above: they are still acrylic paints and can be treated like the rest of the GW range.

Thanks for the replies!

The shelf life is crazy, but to be honest a lot less of the old paints had died than I thought, there is pot of Chaos Black that I know is near 20yrs and it still works lol, and yet some of them are completely cross bonded & ruined. Strange why some are okay and some not.

I looked at some of your pictures & really like the Chestnut over gold, it makes almost copper effect, think I will try with my own. I also like the blue it produces. I used some of the Red Ink to do eyes of my Vindicare - did base layer of orange & put Red Ink on, then wash with Carroburg Crimson, it made much richer deep red than just with Crimson alone & also a little more glassy effect.

I lthink I will get use out of them, but is it still possible to buy these Inks if the old ones run out?

Well, you might be able to find them on e-bay or other such things. I don't think anyone is still producing them.

But you can always head down to the local art store and see if they have art grade inks there. They aren't the same as the old GW inks, but are about as close as I've found.

In theory the old hex pots are coat d’arms, which are still produced.

(from google, not tried personally)
UK:
https://blackhat.co.uk/product-category/coat-darms-paints/

US:
https://herrickgames.com/collections/coat-darms-paint-html?page=2

I also hear that Privateer P3, Instar, and a few other companies have analogs to the old range. Again, YMMV.

I’ve found modern subs for some of what I use, (like guiliman flesh for chestnut wash) and am still running my old pots for others. The new contrast paints actually behave mostly like the old inks, at least how I need them to work.

I have a pot of coat d'arms chestnut ink and its pretty close to the old gw ink so i assume the others will be pretty close as well.

Thanks for more replies! I will look into Coat D'Arms inks, but maybe not for a while because these are nearly full. But good to know I can get more

Also I found one more use for them; using them without thinning as glaze/ filter produces sheen like Hammerite paint. It's not super shiny or metallic but it has that kind of car-paint-style varnished appearance & can make armour plates stand out nicely from other materials. Only problem is you need to take the colour up way lighter than you would normally or else it darkens it too much lol