Using Contrast Paints Part 1: Back To Basics

Good morning/afternoon/evening everyone!

It's taken me a while, but I've finally had the chance to sit down and get some work done with the Contrast Paints from GW, have a play with them and see what I think. There's been a lot of discussion about these new paints over the last few weeks. Some love them, some hate them*, some see them as a gimmick, some as an essential new way of doing things, some as an overhyped bit of money for old rope. I see them as a useful tool, with many applications, some less obvious than others.
Whatever your opinion of them, it's undeniable that these new paints have caused a stir and, as there is so much to be said about them, I didn't want to just rush off a quick overview and be done with it so, over the next few weeks, I'll be looking closely at them and, hopefully, providing some useful insights as to what they can be used for.

With that in mind, I thought I'd start at the very basic level. GW have marketed these new paints as a way of banishing the grey hordes and getting your miniatures painted quickly and effectively,  a way for even the world's least proficient painters, or those who really don't enjoy the process, to get armies ready for the tabletop. So I thought I'd put that idea to the test. I grabbed a random selection of miniatures from the deepest, darkest recesses of my Cupboard of Unpainted Wonders and tried to put myself in the position of a complete novice who's bought his first box of miniatures, paints and gubbinz and is launching himself into "The Hobby" for the first time. My goal with these miniatures was to paint them as fast as possible. I wasn't going to worry about tidying up mistakes, worry too much about getting things "within the lines" or care about creating any sort of masterpiece. The goal was to get some figures on the table as fast as possible. I should note, I had an ulterior motive for this. At my FLGS I've been running a few taster sessions to show off these new paints and I knew that some people who would be coming along would never have picked up a paintbrush in their lives before. The models I was going to show them had to be exactly the sort of things people like that could produce and be happy with. Here's the results of my efforts. All these models were painted with a single coat of each colour, over either the Wraithbone or Grey Seer spray primer.



I think you can all agree they look pretty rough and ready and, by my standards, fairly bloody awful. But that's not the point. For a ten-year old, painting their first figures, they're going to look great. On the battlefield, they're going to do just fine. The real point is, though, each one took me less than ten minutes to do. Some of them closer to five. That means that I could bash out a whole unit in an evening. "So what?" I hear you cry, "I can do that with traditional paints." Well, yes, of course you can but I can guarantee you aren't going to get results that look as good as this in the same time using traditional methods. You'd need at least to do a flat basecoat then a wash to get miniatures that look like these and that's going to take you longer. Even just doing a flat basecoat will take longer than these as the way the paint flows goes a long way towards speeding up that process.
There are a couple of issues. Some colours, the really dark ones especially (Black Templar, Cygor Brown) may need thinning slightly with the Contrast Medium to stop them being too opaque. You have to bee quite liberal with the paints and allow them to flow. This can mean getting paint on areas where you don't want it and makes doing small details difficult. Also, you need to use them quite fast and plan out your route across the model, so as to avoid tidemarks forming. Pooling is an issue, too. Obviously, some pooling is required for them to do their job, but care needs to be taken to avoid too much pooling, as this can result in a patchy finish. You also need to look out for tiny air bubbles between details, as these can dry as unpainted patches. Knowing how much to use, and how to use it, comes, like with anything, with practice but even the most inexperienced or cack-handed painter is going to find themselves producing serviceable results in no time.
So, for the beginner, those with more miniatures than time, those who find painting a chore, or those who may not be skilled with a brush, these paints are going to do exactly what their makers have said they will- banish the grey and get those collections painted. But this is just the barest hint of what these paints can be used for. As with any tool, Contrast has many uses and, over the next few weeks, I'll be demonstrating that there's more to ways to make use of these new colours than just slapping them on.
I'd love to have your feedback on this so please feel free to comment. Also, if there's any aspect of painting (with Contrast or without) that you'd like me to cover, please let me know.

Thanks for reading!
-Stu

PS: I'm doing one of the demos of these paints Saturday 6th July from 10am-3pm at That Little Craft Shop in Minehead, where you'll be able to see these figures and try out the paints for yourselves. If you're in the area (unlikely, I know, but you never know) then pop along and see what you think.








*some even managed to hate them before even trying them...fancy that?!!

With A REBBL Yell!

It occured to me that it's been a while since I showed any of my painted miniatures so I thought it was about time I did something about that.

A couple of years ago, the great Darren Latham* got in touch with me and asked me to paint a miniature to use as a trophy for the Blood Bowl league he was involved in, the Reddit Eternal Blood Bowl League (REBBL). Of course I said yes! This first one was the plastic Blood Bowl Troll from GW:



This one seemed to go down quite well and he came back for more for the next trophy. This one was the Forge World Blood Bowl Minotaur.


After that, I was contacted directly by the organizer of REBBL, Stephen Peers. The next one asked me to do was Vinci's Wolf from Greebo Games.


Finally, the most recent one was the Burning Treeman (with his marker familiars), also from Greebo.


I've really quite enjoyed doing these miniatures, and it's given me the opportunity to see a couple of models from a manufacturer I was previously unaware of. I can highly recommend having a look at Greebo Games, particularly if you're a player of Blood Bowl or similar games. There's some great miniatures on their site, and at good prices.

Thanks for reading!
-Stu







*Yeah, yeah, I'm a name-dropper. Well, I don't get to do it very often...

It's a Fresh New Week...

...and, hopefully, normal service will resume.

Good morning/afternoon/evening everybody!
It's 3 of the Monday morning clock as I type this, while listening to my "Feelgood" playlist* on Spotify, and I've just finished a couple of updates to the Die Rolling and Stuff of Legends pages. So, what am I doing up at such an ungodly hour? Well, I'm acclimatising myself to my upcoming new job. In a few weeks I'll be starting work on night shifts, so I'm going to have to get used to working at nights more often. For the forseeable future, many posts will be at some quite antisocial hours (at least for those of you in the UK...)
Meanwhile, in the nearer future, this week should see the start of my new format of news pages, an update to the Conquest er...quest and I'll try to squeeze a couple of other things too.
Once again, my apologies for the lack of content last week. Thank you for those who have stuck by me and continue to follow my ramblings.
Right, I'm off to get something to eat and snatch some snooze. I'll leave you with this picture of something I finished last week (yes, I actually finished a miniature...!)

The BEST thing about Heroquest is...
or:
Big Hans** is back! 

*Some 80's power rock, an extremely eclectic mix of classics from the 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's, and a few more modern curveballs thrown in for good measure...if you're interested, it's here. 
**Get it? It's because he's got big...oh, never mind. 

The Eldar Phantom Titan: The Base

Greetings, all!
So, after some hiatus, it's back on with the big one- the Eldar Phantom Titan. Now, those amongst you with both eagle-eyes and excellent memories may have spotted the legs of the Phantom assembled in my WIP-shelves photo from my Hatcave (really must think of a better name than that*) announcement last summer. So, I thought I'd better bring you all up to speed with how I got the bottom half of the Phantom built. First, though, there's the base to consider.
A big model like this really needs a base to support it, as the last thing you want is to knock it over with some over-zealous dice-rolling and fracture a delicate part. Big bases are commercially available and the client sourced a suitable one from...errr, somewhere. I really must ask him where he got it from.
Anyhoo, the client asked if the Phantom could be posed standing with one foot on a broken-off Imperial Titan weapon (a Melta Cannon), so the first thing to do was to make the provided broken weapon look right, and position it onto the base.
To start with, I raided the bits box to build a piece that would look like the arm joint had sheared off at a pivot point, exposing wire bundles. I also made a couple of plugs to show where a couple of feeds had been pulled out.

Next up I wanted to make the weapon itself look like it had crashed into the ground after being snapped off the Titan. I figured that something so big and heavy, dropping from fifty metres up would not survive intact, so I wanted to add some heavy damage to it. I cut into the gun barrels and then heated them and bent them (judicious application of the required amount of brute force), as if they'd hit the ground tip-first. Some cuts with a knife and clippers added to the effect of damage.

Then I needed to do some damage to the guard that surrounds the gun barrels. I really had some fun with this, cutting and bending (a hairdryer is really helpful with this sort of thing) and I even broke out the mini-drill to make some scuffs and gouges.

Finally all the pieces were assembled (much forcing and swearing and gluing-together of fingers happened...) and attached to the body of the gun, which had also been heavily seen-to with the clippers, knife and mini-drill.

I then needed to paint the gun before it was attached to the base. I needed to do this as a) the barrels would need to be painted before the guards were fixed in place and it made sense to do the whole thing at once, and b) I wanted to be able to get some painting done, to get a feel for the scale of the thing. 

Finally, the gun needed to be fixed into place on the base. I glued it down, and built up some Milliput around it, along with some broken shards of Eldar architecture that the gun landed on.

So that's that. Now I was ready to begin work on positioning the legs. So far, it had been easy and a lot of fun and there was no reason to think it would be any different from now on...

*At the moment, I've using "Edward Shedward" or "Eddie McSheddie McWoo." My head is often an odd place...Please, someone come up with something better...

The Road To Golden Demon 2020

As you will know, if you saw my post about this year's Warhammer Fest, my entry to Golden Demon 2019 was not very successful. I spoke about some of the factors that I believe, lead to my less than stellar performance. One of these was lack of time management on my part. Leaving it until I'd started on my entry for The Masters, I then faffed about on other entries, and thus ended up with a below par Masters figure, and the other entries unfinished. That will not happen this year. This year I will have my other entries ready by the time the Masters figure is announced next year, and so I will be able to devote all my time to it. In order to do this, I'm starting my other entries now. I already have an idea for the Age of Sigmar Single Figure, and I've begun work already on converting the models for the AoS Duel. I also have a diorama, that was begun two years ago (it was supposed to be my entry into the 2017 Winners Competition, but real life stepped in and made sure that wasn't going to happen...) It's a complicated piece (for me) and I'm not sure I'll get it done in a year, so that's going to be of lower priority. I've also got an idea for a 40k Squad.
Working on these through the course of the year will serve another purpose, too...
Practice.
See, I do a lot of painting during the year, mostly commissions and the occasional bit for myself. None of this work is done to a competition standard so, the only time I paint anything to Golden Demon standard is for the Golden Demons themselves. That's like a jogger who does a couple of times around the block every day suddenly deciding, a month before the Olympics, that he's going to compete in the marathon. It's a whole different kettle of mixed metaphors. I need to keep my eye in at a competition level and that means painting more top-tier pieces. Plus, there's other competitions along the way during the year...
The categories for EverChosen have been announced, as has the deadline. July 27th is not that far away so it’s going to be a tough challenge. However, there is one piece to do before then. A standalone competition was organised by Victor Roman over on ‘Eavier Metal, and it’s to paint a model in 30 days. Hence the title, The 30 Day Challenge. The miniature selected (and everybody has to do the same one) is Festus The Leechlord. So, at least if I get this done, I’ll have at least one model to enter for EverChosen…
Also announced, over on ‘Eavier Metal, is this year’s Eadbanger. Now, I’ve never managed to find the time to enter this competition, and it’s gone from strength to strength over the years, becoming one of the most beloved of online competitions and I’d dearly love to have a go at it so, this year, I’m going to give it a shot for sure.
The first step for any competition is to decide which models to enter. The 30 Day Challenge was already decided on, so the next up was a figure for EverChosen.
Even with the maximum 60mm base size there was a lot of scope and I spent quite a while looking through what was available and…frankly, there was too much to choose from. I wanted something that would catch the judges eye, but not be too big, due to the tight time limit. Also, at the moment (as ever) funds are tight do I couldn’t stretch to a £30-£40 model at the moment. So I thought about the Mountain of Unpaintedness and started having a rummage and I found…this. It’s a figure I really like- it’s dynamic, with lots of movement; it’s got a good mix of cloth and armour and it’s got a really expressive face. Lots of scope for a nice paint job. I’m going to mount it on a hero base or maybe even the Dais Arcanum, if I can get hold of one.
Finally, we have ‘Eadbanger (or, to give it’s full title: ‘Eavier Metal Episode V: ‘Eadbanger Stikes Back…)  I'm not sure how many categories I'm going to have the time to enter (I'd like to give one of the larger miniatures categories a shot...) but, in the the Single Figure category, I'm going to enter something I’ve been waiting to paint for a while- a really special miniature that I’ve been saving for a special occasion…
Last November I went up to Nottingham to go to the 40k Vigilus Weekender where my Ork Kommando Boss won me a finalist’s pin. While in Nottingham I caught up with an old friend, the great Kev White, sculptor and driving force behind Hasslefree Miniatures. He gave me a truly wonderful gift- one of the few resin castings he had done of Mariku Yuri, a Van Saar gang leader he made as a personal project.

I’ve been itching to paint it ever since but I wanted to be able to give it the due time to get it right. It needed a special occasion. ‘Eadbanger V is just such an occasion. If I only get one model done for it, it has to be that one and at least I can be sure it won't be painted by loads of other people...!
So, there we have it. Minis chosen and ready to go (at least they will be when Festus gets here). Three competitions to enter is an ambitious task, but I really want to give all three the best shot I can. Watch this space for further updates…

What I Did Over The Weekend, by Stuart Thomas, aged 45¾

So, last weekend was Warhammer Fest. My third time at the Fest, my third time of entering the Golden Demon 'Eavy Metal Masters category, and my second time of coming away empty-handed.
Initially, I was disappointed and somewhat dispirited by not getting any recognition at all. I realised that getting a placing in the top three was going to be really, really hard, with the likes of David Soper and Angelo Di Chello entering, but I had hoped I'd get a Commended Entry or even a Finalists pin, so I have to admit to being a bit knocked back by not getting any result at all. However, having had time to think about it, I have to be positive about it and look at my work objectively. Why did I not get anything? Well, the hard answer is my work simply wasn't good enough but you have to look deeper and think: Why wasn't it good enough?
Well. first off, the most obvious was that, as usual, I didn't give myself enough time to a proper job. Of course, I had as much time to paint the entry as anyone else did (for the uninitiated, the Masters category is based around all entries being the same model, no conversions allowed, and the model is announced a couple of months before the event- this year it was the Isharann Tidecaster) but I didn't manage the allotted time properly. I wanted to enter a few categories this year, and so I spent a lot of time working on other entries instead of the Tidecaster.  As it is I didn't get close to finishing the other entries so all that time was wasted. This left me with too little time to get the Tidecaster done so it was a bit of a rush job.
Secondly, I didn't have a plan for the model, an overall vision as to how it would look. Actually I did, but I ended up deviating from it, and that's where I went wrong. To me, the design of the figure suggested the ornate and beautiful art deco bronze ladies produced by the likes of Tiffany. I decided to base my colour scheme on them- bronze or copper armour, alabaster skin and verdigris-coloured robes. Somehow, along the way, I lost sight of this idea so the colour scheme never turned out the way I wanted it to, leading me to not be satisfied with the look of it. In the end, the colour scheme didn't look too bad, but it wasn't what I had originally pictured in my head and, in those circumstances, it;'s difficult to produce your very best.
Finally, I committed a grave error, and decided to be a bit experimental with the rendering. I wanted to focus on doing different textures and finishes and, in doing so, I used techniques that I wasn't hugely familiar with, or over-confident in (such as the NMM on the armour) and the trial and error used in getting the effect right used up a huge amount of time. The armour, for instance, went through three different versions before I finally realised I was never going to get it how I wanted, and settled with what I had. As YouTuber Trovarion explains well in this video, Golden Demon really isn't the place to be stepping outside your comfort zone and trying something new like that. I should have stuck with what I knew and then I may have produced something that more realistically displayed my skills.
So, there we have it: how not to win a Golden Demon in three easy lessons. The thing is not to get disheartened. There's always next year. All I have to do is remember these lessons and put them into practice next year. In the meantime, I'm very interested indeed to see what Everchosen is...?

My Isharann Tidecaster

So, putting all that aside, how was Warhammer Fest?

Well, I have to say, the event goes from strength to strength, getting better every year. I'm certain it was busier than last year, and there seemed a lot more to see. It's actually getting to the point where I might have to consider going for both days, as there just wasn't enough time to fit everything in, even without going to any of the set seminars.
I'd decided that, this year, I was going to have a proper look around the licensee's areas, and see some of the other stuff that was on offer. I don't play as many games as I probably should, and wanted to have a good look at what was on offer. So, I managed to have a chat with one of the chaps who was demoing the new Blood Bowl Kerrunch 2 app game, which looked a lot of fun (I got a free t-shirt, too, which The Better Half has decided is hers...). I was also shown a demo of Warhammer: Chaos and Conquest, the new strategy game. If you're into worldwide conquest, it looks like the game for you. I also had a play on a level of Warhammer: Chaosbane, a Diablo-like isometric action game. Bloody good fun, that, and certainly something I'll be tempted by when it's out on PS4. There was also stations playing Battlefleet Gothic: Armada, Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus, Underworlds Online, Realm War and Vermintide, but I didn't get the chance to have a close look at those. And that was just the video games!
I had a sit-down demo session with one of the guys from Playfusion, taking me through my first ever game of Age of Sigmar: Champions, which I really enjoyed. I was instantly hooked and The Better Half seems interested in playing too...Unfortunately, I simply didn't have time to check out the rest of the  stuff that was on show, and completely missed having a look at the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay stand. Bugger.
I did, however, get to spend some time in the section devoted to the new Citadel Contrast Paints, and got to hear a lengthy discussion by studio manager Dave Cross on the ins and outs of the new range. I even had a short try out but, without my glasses, I couldn't really tell what the results were like! I have to say I'm very impressed by what I saw, though, and I'm looking forward to getting my hands on them properly, glasses and all... As soon as I do, be sure that I'll be sharing my thoughts on them.
As always, the best part of the day was meeting up with people. Events like this are a great way to touch base with old friends and people who I normally only get to converse with online, and I really must try and get to more of them. As it was, I was able to catch up briefly with John Blanche, Gav Thorpe and Keith Robertson, and have a pint and a chat with Dave Taylor and Jamie Hutber and bumped into Art Steventon just as I'd finished buying the event exclusive Primaris Leiutenant, which may well be a Golden Demon entry for next year...
And that was it for another WHFest for me. There was still so much I didn't get to see, and so many people I'd love to have had a chance to chat to, but there just wasn't time to see and do it all. I really am going to have to give serious thought to going to both days next year. Still, what I did see was as impressive as ever, and I really had a great time.
So, thanks to all the GW staff who go to so much effort to put this event on, congratulations to all the Golden Demon winners and, hopefully, I'll see you all there next year!

Off to a flying start, this 2019 thing...

It's been a difficult couple of months.
I came back from Nottingham on a real high. It had gone well, catching up with some old friends, getting a finalist's pin, a relaxing weekend away...All good. I'd received a real boost to my confidence and I was looking forward to getting back to work and doing lots of new cool stuff.
It didn't happen.
I came down. Hard.
Depression is a horrible thing and it's really difficult to explain properly. It's actually an intensely personal thing, different for everybody it affects and so it's really hard to put across how it feels, so I'm not going to go into a great, deep explanation here today. Maybe one day, but not today. Today I'm feeling good and i don't want to dwell on the bad.
Anyway, suffice it to say I had a totally unproductive December. My head-stuff hit me hard and I just couldn't face anything more than getting up and doing the day jobs, and they were a struggle. What I was looking forward to was the Christmas break. When I'm under the depression thing, one of the worst aspects is the guilt. The feeling that I should be working, that there's nothing wrong with me, that I should man up and get out there and all the while the depression is going "Fuck that. You'll only screw it up. What's the point. Lie on the sofa and eat Haribos." And the days go by, each unproductive one adding to the vicious circle.
That's why I was looking forward to Christmas. I'd convinced myself that Christmas was the time when I could have the time off, guilt-free (after all, doesn't everybody?), enjoy myself, and get back to work, refreshed and happy, in the new year. It wasn't a new year resolution. It wasn't a "In the new year I shall beat the depression. Oh, and I'll lose some weight and go to the gym." It was more that I could enjoy a bit of time off, rather than beating myself up over it.
And it bloody worked.
I had a nice, relaxed Christmas with The Better Half. We socialised a bit, ate and drank far too many bad things, went out on new year's eve, the usual. On January 2nd I started my working week with my first shift in the shop, raring to get started again.
24 hours later I was in hospital with the flu, lying with the windows open and a fan on me as they tried to get my core temperature down from it's just-shy-of-really-fucking-serious level. Thankfully, it worked and they let me home the next day, but I spent the next week being essentially unable to do anything other than sleep. I couldn't even read, my head was so mushed. Facebook was the height of my levels of concentration. After ten days of this, I'd started feeling better so I'd gone back to work over the weekend.
The next day I woke up with a secondary sinus and chest infection, which knocked me out for another week. Strangely enough, through all this, the depression didn't kick in. There was no guilt because there was nothing I could do about it. I was ill, end of. It's weird because I know, intellectually, that having depression is as much "being ill" as having the flu, or a broken leg. You may as well say to a person in a wheelchair, "Stop being silly, get up and walk!" as to say to a person with depression, "Why don't you just, y'know, stop being depressed?" but, psychologically, I still beat myself up over it when I'm in the pit.
Anyway. Rambling.
Here I am, three weeks after falling ill. I'm betterer, but still far from 100%. I've been back at work in the shop for a while now and, though it takes it out of me, it's not knocking me for six any more and today I'm actually out in the shed for a couple of hours. I'm tired and weak and I've got no stamina but I'm feeling a little betterer each day.
Taking it slow, taking it easy. I'm writing off January. I'm going to try to get some hours in, but mostly I'm looking forward to starting February fit and well and raring to go.
I might even lose some weight and go to the gym.