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What are you favorite, and least favorite, colors from the GW Contrast paints range?
(I know AP Speed Paint is good, but I don't like the dropper bottles, so I'm seeking further Contrast recommends.)

So far for me:

Wildwood
Snakebite Leather
Skeleton Horde
Guillamen Flesh
Ultramarines blue,
Vol Pink
most of the purples,
and the Gryph - Orange

Least:

Agarros Dunes
Magma Flames
Pillar Glacier -- I cannot get any of these to work well

let's chat and maybe help new painters.

Really like the new Imperial Fist, though it doesn't really act how contrast was originally sold to us. Wyldwood, Guilliman Flesh and Skeleton Horde are great, too, but you've already mentioned those. I absolutely love Flesh Tearers Red as a final glaze over red, particularly on things like robes/cloth etc.

I've struggled to get good results with Apothecary White, which is odd as lots of people seem to like that one.

I really like Apothecary white, Kroxigor Scales, Baal Red and Talassar Blue.

Pylar Glacier is great for canopy glass.



Least favourite are the black and grey. I keep trying them, but I just can't get them to a finish I like.

I love Agarros Dunes, as a pale wood color or to add some depth to basing.
Pylar Glacier: Just use Frostheart instead. Same color, but much better coverage. Apply thinly to get the effect you'd expect from Pylar Glacier.
Magmadroth Flame: There was an article on how to use this to do plasma effects. Apply a yellow contrast, then apply this in the recesses, then dampen the brush with contrast medium and wipe over the raised areas to remove most of the paint back to white. Great effect, and quick. I did add a fair bit of contrast medium to my Magmadroth Flame, which helps it work more like a regular contrast.

My Favorites:
Akhelian Green, Sigvald Burgundy, Aeldari Emerald, Kroxigor Scales: Just very nice saturated contrast paints. The colors are rich and cover exactly as they should.
Stormfiend: I use this for deep water/Pacific bases for Dystopian Wars.
Space Wolves Grey: Great for darkening down an area with a blue tint.
Leviathan Purple: I thinned this heavily to a tone similar to luxion purple, but I like it better.

Dislikes:
Gryphhound Orange: It's not a very nice shade of orange, though it applies well.
Nighthaunt Gloom: Very thin, not impressed with the coverage.

Guiliman flesh I use all the time. It’s replaced my old chestnut ink. Nice warm brown that not only does amazing work as actual flesh, but bones, parchment, golds. Very versatile.

Apothecary White is nice to add a little depth to white armor, which is otherwise a massive PITA to work with.

Is use blood angel red. It’s fine. Can’t say I love or hate it, but it gets the job done.

Shyish purple is not good. Way to dark. If I hadn’t already painted half my army before they came out with leviathan purple, I’d be using that.

Least fav(but also one of my favorites) Apothecary White.


Great as a "wash" but if you don't use it for a couple months it's basically toast.


Favorite:
Skeleton Horde - excellent way to age/wear stuff
Akhelian Green - excellent over metallics for power/plasma effects

I've only just tried Pylar Glacier and I rather like it. A coat of that over a grey-white zenithal prime is great for ghosts:



I'm also very much liking Warp Lightning for easy Salamanders marines. Ork Flesh is great for, well, ork flesh...

My favorite is easily Baal Red. Such a smooth red in just one coat! I'm also a big fan of Apothecary White and Skeleton Horde, even though I don't really use them much. Gore Grunta Fur is also great for doing leather.

Garaghak's Sewer(!) is amazing, also big shouts out to Sigvald Burgundy, Flesh Tearer red & Guilliman Flesh.

Basilicanum grey is awesome too

Black Templar is bad but Black Legion is great. That's my only opinion

Gulliman flesh is my new route for doing exposed skin - literally no other way i'm willing to do faces now.
Talassar blue over boltgun metal basecoat is real nice.
Shylish purple and gore-grunta fur did exactly what i wanted for some SoS robes

Haven't found any 'bad' variants from what i got

I have...


Did a comparison servitor so i could gauge the finished colours after drying with my normal painting results and it was basically the same.
More subtle shading with normal paint but when i really need to cut time and get something on the table quick-snap then contrast paint is the only sensible option for me.

 SirDonlad wrote:
Gulliman flesh is my new route for doing exposed skin - literally no other way i'm willing to do faces now.
Talassar blue over boltgun metal basecoat is real nice.
Shylish purple and gore-grunta fur did exactly what i wanted for some SoS robes

Haven't found any 'bad' variants from what i got

I have...

Spoiler:

apothecary white
black templar
basilicanum grey
blood angels red
flesh-tearers red
gore-grunta fur
gryph-hound orange
guilliman flesh
iyanden yellow
shylish purple
talassar blue
terradon turquoise
wyldwood

Did a comparison servitor so i could gauge the finished colours after drying with my normal painting results and it was basically the same.
More subtle shading with normal paint but when i really need to cut time and get something on the table quick-snap then contrast paint is the only sensible option for me.

ooh i'm going to try the Talassar blue over Leadbelcher. Thanks.

I've been using Agarros Dunes over zandri dust spray base for my Cadian fatigues, followed by a quick Zandri Dust dry brush and it makes batch painting so much easier.

The Dark Angels green is a bit too washed out for the armour though and I've gone back to good old Castellan Green.

Use Black Templar over Lead Belcher to add some different tones to metallics on Knights and such to stop things becoming a "wall of silver"

Ball Red is great for everything from banners to blood effects too

Talassar blue is definitely one of my favourites. I'm using it on my eagle warriors and used it on my OPR mummified undead army.



The white on the marines is apothecary white, but I wasn't too cracked with it.

Struggled with Blood Angels red and Gryphhound orange, both come out dirty looking for me.

_Si_ wrote:
Talassar blue is definitely one of my favourites. I'm using it on my eagle warriors and used it on my OPR mummified undead army.



The white on the marines is apothecary white, but I wasn't too cracked with it.

Struggled with Blood Angels red and Gryphhound orange, both come out dirty looking for me.

Apothecary white does seem to have a very specific use. Some people I know dry brush acrylic white over it after application, which is a method but defeats the time-saving purpose.

This is a really good idea! When I try some new paint range I never buy the full box with 100000 paints.
I usually try 2-3 paints, so I always look for places like this to find out what people like and why they like it. We should have threads like this for other ranges too, like AK 3rd Gen, or the new Vallejo Game Colors, that I want to try, and maybe in a month or two for the new Xpress colors too.

So here is my list:
Flesh Tearers Red is a really nice color but it is a little glossy so i don't use it for cloth that much. I do use it over a silver for my khorne armor
Guilliman Flesh is my go to for flesh although most times i mist a little Reikland Fleshshade or some other shade with it to change the tome and thin it down a little.
Skeleton Horde is really good for bones but I find it too yellow so i mix a little Agrax Earthshade with it.
Snakebit Leather and Gor-Grunta Fur are really good for Leather.
Aggaros Dunes is nice too. I usually use it over silver to make gold.
Black Legion is really good for boots, belts and stuff.
Black Templar is not as good but still not bad. It's kinda like a stronger Nuln Oil.
Wyldwood is my go to color for wood but you need to shake it a lot. I have added a mixing ball inside too. Probably most contrast colors need one.
Apothecary White is good to shade white.(I have to use the new Soulblight Grey to see if it's better) I have recently start using it as a base to create nice colors for my ghouls by adding a little green or blue washes and it's promising.
I really like Garaghak's Sewer and Ratling Grime but I have not used them much yet.

General comment: unless otherwhise mentioned all refer to their appearance on Wraithbone base coat.

Favorites
Blood angels red - I love to use it for regions where I either can't get in to do multiple layers properly (inside of mouths for example), or don't really enjoy doing it (lots of feathers on a feathered dinosaur for example). In general just a really good working red.
Gore Grunta Fur - I really like to use these for everything leathery. Gore Grunta also makes for excellent wooden rifle stocks I think. Also works very well for a warm dark skin tone
Snakebite leather - I didn't like it at first but with time I really appreciate it to give more nuance to leathery parts, like two different types of leather (in combination with Gore Grunta) or to do leather things in models where I already used Gore Grunta for the skin
Luxion purple/Tallasar blue: both make nicely vibrant blues and purples. I like to use them for fabrics, clothing, scales on reptiles, turbans/shemags/barrets
Doomfire Magenta - I use it for the bases of an Admech force from a rad-saturated forge world. Looks pretty cool especially in combination with GSW fluo paints for an effect like glowing radioactive sludges
Darkoath Flesh - very nice for a good skin tone without much work
Plyar Glacier/Apothecary white - finally gave me an easy way to make white fabric I'm satisfied with.

least favorite
These mostly come down to "I have not yet found an area/way of application I'm satisfied with:
Fireslayer flesh - not convinced of the use as skin color
Cygor Brown - tried it for dark leather and wooden parts but wasn't really convinced of the result. At least it had some use as really dark skin tone but barely differed from just using Rhinox hide
Skeleton Horde - it's most likely me not applying it properly but the result always came out a bit too heavy and I prefered just using Seraphim Sepia on Wraithbone

I love Magos purple not using it as an actual contrast paint but more or so on my eldar to show "hey this is magic" with a white base coat (obv) and then magos purple with another color on the bevel of the blade and then retributor armor I diluted heavily so its more or so glitter in water then put that on the whole blade wait for it to dry then ardcoat it that is my copy and past process for eldar blades.

Finally got Pillar glacier to do something -- blue skin on a Mega Gargaunt. I absolutely love the newer black Contrast they released.
As for others, Ratling Grime is fun for all sorts of filth.

I've been using both Aethermatic Blue and Leviadon Blue over Leadbelcher-drybrushed-with-Chrome for my Necrons, and been happy with the results:

 Dysartes wrote:
I've been using both Aethermatic Blue and Leviadon Blue over Leadbelcher-drybrushed-with-Chrome for my Necrons, and been happy with the results:

Yes, those look quite nicely done. A good trick, contrast over silver or leadbelcher.

One of my favorites is Kroxigor Scales. It's a great blue/turquoise for Seraphon. Another really good one is Nazdreg Yellow. Using it over a bright silver gives a really nice gold.

Likes:
Luxion Purple: I love the beautiful bright purple this paint gives, and it's perfect for my Sisters to complement their yellow armor.
Kroxigor Scales: I use this one for my Tyranids' carapaces, and it really is a great color for that.
Apothecary White: To me, this is the perfect way to shade a white area on a model. It gives definition to the area and doesn't create too stark of lines on details.
Iyanden Yellow: I like this color simply for the muted yellow color it provides; much easier than getting a smooth yellow with traditional paint. Of course, I have yet to try Imperial Fist but I've heard it doesn't really do the contrast thing.

Dislikes:
Shyish Purple: This color is way too dark and usually reads as black unless it's thinned fairly aggressively.
Dark Angels Green: Again, it's a bit too dark, and the contrast effect is just not quite good enough. That being said, while I dislike using it AS a contrast paint, it works fine as a sort of glaze on my Dark Angels' armor.

 Flinty wrote:
I really like Apothecary white, Kroxigor Scales, Baal Red and Talassar Blue.

Pylar Glacier is great for canopy glass.



Least favourite are the black and grey. I keep trying them, but I just can't get them to a finish I like.

that is a lovely Mad Cat paintjob you have there. Keep on painting, clannerscum!

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Gryph-Charger grey yet. its quickly becoming a go to colour for me

goundry wrote:
I'm surprised no one has mentioned Gryph-Charger grey yet. its quickly becoming a go to colour for me

That one and Kroxigor Scales are what I've been using on all my Seraphon Saurus Warriors. Gryph-Charger Grey is a really great color. I've also grown quite fond of Flesh-Tearers Red and Magos Purple.