Struggling with contrast painting...

[Neldoreth]

Hello all!

I've been layering up my highlights for years and years. Sometimes I also wash, sometimes I paint the shadows and also the highlights, but mostly I start dark and layer up.

I've tried the contrast painting style a few times, and I just can't get it to look right, or at least, not the way I like it. I ends up looking like a watery mess in the end, like I slapped on some watery paint and that flowed (flew?) into the crevices and is doesn't look like a highlighted miniature...

Is it just me, or do these contrast paints just look different? Is there a way to get the layered look with contrast paints? Any tips appreciated!

Thanks
n.

[Pattus Magnus]

I think you pretty much grasped the nature of contrast paints - they don’t generate an effect equivalent to a layered painting approach. The surface tension’s distribution of pigment doesn’t correspond to where light would create highlights and shadows. I think the variant techniques based on creating a grey scale undercoat, then using contrast paints to tint coloured areas (grisaille, slap-chop, etc) might get closer to layer painting. I have my doubts about whether it will perform as well as your layer painting, though.

[fred]

The method is fundamentally different - starting with a pale base coat and applying what are close to washes.

The Contrast painting approach is very much aimed at speed and volume - rather than high quality. As PM says changing up the base layer can be effective.

The Vallejo Xpress range sounds like it might be more suited to applying in multiple coats - which probably allows some more subtle effects.

But I think if you have the patience and skill to layer up gradually from black then contrast paints will always be a thin alternative.

[voltan]

When they first came out the official advice was along the lines of use it as a basic paint job and if you want to take it up a level then you could paint a highlight on. I've been using the contract paints a lot recently and it's been trial and error finding what each paint is good for, how useless the white is apart from mixing with other contrast paints and what surfaces they work best on. there's still a lot of things I'll paint in a standard way just because contrast doesn't work for it.

[Panzer21]

As an experiment, I tried different approaches with 6 identical 15mm ECW musketeers. Two were primed in white, two in grey and two in black. One each of the white and grey had a black wash with an ink and Future floor polish (AKA "Magic wash"). The black were drybrushed one with grey, one with white.
They were then painted with Contrast paint.
My aim was to see which worked best. Like the original poster, I normally work from a black undercoat.
I've been playing around with Contrast paints to see if I can get a reasonable finish in less time. I have missed the black lining between areas.
The results were mixed. Least impressive was the plain white with just Contrast. Very bright, but garish.
The least colour coverage was on the black figures.
None of them came close to what I'd normally get from layers from black.
I then tried minimal highlights / touch up on areas where the colour was dull or had bled over; this was buff, brown and flesh. This improved them, but again not to normal standards.

After this, I wondered if I'd actually gained any time! In reality, I had. The basic colours went on much faster, I had less eye strain working out which bits to paint which colour, but had lost the precise paint job from black and layered colours, in return for considerably less painting time overall.
Figures are perfectly reasonable, especially for the games table.

Conclusion
They are not going to give you collector standard unless you use some other techniques and normal paint as highlights. There's a YouTube video by an Italian chap on fantasy undead using oil washes etc which are superb, but much depends on what the figure is you are painting.
If you want to speed up painting and finish armies they will do that, but like Army Painter washes / varnish they are not a magic bullet.
You will have to compromise finish for speed. How much you compromise will reduce that speed exponentially.
Neil

[syrinx0]

After the kickstarters I have been painting some BattleTech miniatures for friends using contrast paints. Sometimes with an overall wash to dirty it up and usually with a final light highlight of Ivory or deck tan. Certainly not equal to a layered approach but works for this use case. Some of them require more than one coat to cover which rather defeats the purpose of speed painting.

[Neldoreth]

I think you pretty much grasped the nature of contrast paints - they don’t generate an effect equivalent to a layered painting approach. The surface tension’s distribution of pigment doesn’t correspond to where light would create highlights and shadows. I think the variant techniques based on creating a grey scale undercoat, then using contrast paints to tint coloured areas (grisaille, slap-chop, etc) might get closer to layer painting. I have my doubts about whether it will perform as well as your layer painting, though.

This is a super helpful comment, I hadn't really realized what the problem was... Now I see! Thanks!

I saw some beautifully well executed grisaille figures being painted, but the best ones were basically painted with layering in black-and-white (or off white/brown) first and then tinted, which adds the extra step of contrast painting! I might try it just for fun though...

Thanks!

[Neldoreth]

But I think if you have the patience and skill to layer up gradually from black then contrast paints will always be a thin alternative.

So I guess learning how to paint in contrast paints isn't really necessary... I thought I might have to migrate!

Thanks!

[Neldoreth]

Thanks @Panzer21, @syrinx0 and @voltan, that is helpful!

[fred]

So I guess learning how to paint in contrast paints isn't really necessary... I thought I might have to migrate!

Thanks!

Definitely not necessary. Contrast is a speed painting technique - I’m liking if for speed of painting 10mm armies, but I’m aiming for lots of figures quickly, which look good on the table. Not detail on individual larger figures.