NMM with Contrast Paint - Stormcast Eternals (hyped for Warcry!) 

👑👑👑 I'm in the midst of releasing my dream miniature brush as well as some wonderfully sculpted miniature busts mid June 2020. It's something I'm really proud of and been working on for the better part of the last year. You can already pre register your interest on my Kickstarter page: bit.ly/3dKjmnz 👑👑👑

Great job, I don’t understand why ppl complain about using normal paints alongside contrast. I think it’s another tool to use

I find that Contrast works best when it is side by side with traditional paint elements. It adds variety to the paint-job, and breaks uniformity of the contrast finish.

I personally love seeing a mix of contrast and regular paints. Seems like a logical way for anyone using contrast paints to dip their toe into more advanced techniques.

Sorry guys haven't uploaded the photo of the stormcasts on my Instagram yet. Will hopefully find time to export and upload once the kids are sleeping :) And again, huge thanks to all people who's been using the amazon affiliate links ❤️❤️

contrast adds time back to my painting... leaving me less burnt out and tired when i get to the details so i'm way less sloppy. not a money grab since it saves me time in the base and shade steps by combining them.

Anything that gives new and younger gamers a chance to be able to field their armies and models fully painted is definitely a good thing. I remember negative comments by certain purists at my local indy games club for having half-unpainted armies. Once they have the pleasure of their armies being painted, they'll be more likely to get the bug really big and want to emulate people like Squidders

Today I rewatched this video and it is really interesting, because it made me realise how much the channel has changed. Production quality obviously increased a lot. Yet I find myself missing the older style of videos, that were more about experiencing and explaining the actual painting, rather than doing huge projects or painting loads of miniatures in a small amount of time. I guess it was necessary to facilitate growth, but sometimes I feel there was something lost along the way.

This was super freaky. The I love the engine part of 2+ tough was playing on my tv when I opened this video and almost synced with the audio when you showed the model!

WOW, you seriously have skill.. I am amazed that something so small has such definition.. great job..

Just ordered 2 brushes. Thanks for the recommendation. Glad to n in ow you get a kick back from Amazon.

One of my favorite things I've done with contrast so far is highlighting the model before applying it. I've done deathwatch, where I've done a zenithal highlight wit grey seer, a white drybrush, then followed that with black templar and then spot highlights of white. I've also done genestealers with priming a dark brown, then a zenithal of a tan/cream, then highlights of eggshell white, followed by magos purple. These are speedier techniques as opposed to competition and it isn't NMM, but when it comes to my painting it's been what really packed a punch.

I'm new to painting so contrast paints are a great start, adding other 'classic' paints now and experimenting. This was useful video

I think you did an amazing job on this figure! Nice skills!

Today I got my first Vallejo sets. Super excited

Another great video! I really need to practice some more to get close to this level of painting.

I've liked Contrast as a blending aid. Like, I use it to get a base tone and usually mess it up, then I add highlights (kinda like you did here) and go back over it and I end up with a decent blend.

Great looking model, very.... Stylistic.

You did that in 90 minutes??? NUTS!!! I couldn't do in days...

Using both Contrasts and normal paints is king. I always endup painting most parts with a contrast first and then I go back and paint details and metal parts with normal paints, Sometimes i use really thin contrasts ontop of metal paint to make it a metal looking contrast paint. Works great.

I agree with more or less the conclusion, that contrast is great, but needs to be used in combination with traditional paints (washes, bases, layers, etc) and contrast. Thanks for the video

Still looks nice. Try using the Space wolves grey in the metal, as I think it would have gotten you a closer metal look.

Mooooore Sylvaneth! Goreguntas Contrast looks awesome on them.

You did a great job.

GW tries to make contrast easier for "out of the block" beginners... But they actually add 2-3 layers to the end game for pros... Not sure Squid managed to get it 100%, but the "out of the block" first try... They are for sure on the right path!

I really liked the armour on the feet and this did look really good. Well done for explaining the frustrations of that particular model and going back to it. I think it did look really nice at the end. A.

apparently putting a tiny bit of dish soap into your contrast mix helps with control. I learned this from a guy that's won like 12 golden demons, so likely legit advice. I'm going to try it when I get my paints next week.

I’m happy with your videos where you paint a space marine with contrast and traditional techniques to achieve NMM effects. This is interesting, and I feel like I learned something, but I think this isn’t the way to go about it.

As someone who enjoys playing the hobby more than painting I love the contrast paint. Makes it faster to paint up my models and if I ever want to make em a little better I’ll do touches here and there down the road. I used to spend 1-2 hrs on a single model doing all that fancy work, like highlighting and layering. nowadays I rather be spending that amount of time I would spend on painting one model by playing the hobby and getting my money worth.

love the videos! keep up the great work! I have never used the contrast paints so maybe a dumb question but does it not apply well in multiple thinner coats?

I think contrast paints are good to tie blends together, on my blood angels i find it really helps avoid yellow, brown and pink issues with highlights and shadows it helps bring everything back into a more red spectrum. It is definitely useful in keeping with uniformity across an army, i would often find that some units would drift more into a pink where as others drift into more of an orange doing a final thin coat of blood angels red contrast paint really knocks everything into line and allows me to be less restrictive in my painting choices. Sometimes i would find my self paralysed from painting due to perceived colour shift or demotivated to start due to personal difficulty with red and yellow. With the contrast paint it lets me work past that with laxity and without so much consideration and anxiety.

I have to say that you did a real great job on capturing the stormcast look. Yet i cant help but wonder that contrast paints are not really meant for stormcast. As i watch the steps and techniques you use, it looks like a lot of work for something that can be achieved a lot faster with regular paints. But i know this is just for demonstration purphose, so job more than succeded. But for my Stormcast army i am sticking with the traditional way of painting, but i will be using some contrast paints to speed certain area's up. That is how i like to use the contrast paints. I combine them with regular and in doing that it realy speeds up bash painting but they still look great on the table ;)

I think that your being to kind regarding your remarks. They are for people who either don't like painting or can't paint. I personally am not a great painter just about average I think but I wouldn't use contrast paints. That's why I like to watch people who can paint. Keep up the good work 👍 PS I've seen people on Utube just using washes which look very good.

Hey mate, great video as always, will use the affiliate link in future, is always nice to support great creators. Would you possibly be able to do a bit of a wet blending tutorial, I am nearly there and have watched every video I could but just cant quite get it. I find your explanations really easy to follow so if possible that would be awesome. Keep up the great work!!

Thank you for the video. It was nice to see how the paint works. I've only been painting for 6 months so I am not an expert in any shape or form. With my limited experience painting, I don't think these paints are marketed to the right group. I get better results with traditional paints, then with the contrasts, I own. I find these work better if I use them like inks to help change the colour of my base coat. They give it some extra depth. But if I was starting out with these paints 6 months ago, I don't know, I think I would have been very frustrated. You need so much brush control! I would recommend strongly to GW to change the marketing scheme. Again. Love your work. Thank you for the video. Cheers.

Thank you for a good and thorough overview of these paints, for the price (st the time of writing) I personally don't think they're worth it for people who are serious about mini painting, they are definitely for those who have little time to paint and who just want to play.

I would gladly let you know if anyone could buy some contrast paints. Still sold out everywhere! Great video. I learned a lot.

For less than 2 hours its honestly very very good. How long did the reference one take?

Im painting my custodes with ironbreaker as a base, and then i have Nazdreg yellow over... its not NMM, but i think it looks really cool. i dont really use contrast to paint faster, i just use it as a tool

I get this impression from contrast paints that they looks a bit like fine cloth. The pooling and matte finish contributes to this. And in this particular case, perhaps one could "save" the model by just lean into that, and look at the blue parts on the shield, scabbard and pauldrons as being layered by velvet.

I use Contrast almost exclusivly as glazes, which works very well. Never done NMM though. Nice tutorial in any case!

Used only contrast colors on my dnd ghost without priming had a pretty cool transparent effect when shined through light contrast is for me is hella hard it just spills everywhere and fucks up my other color 90% of the time

Great video! I was really surprised how well it turned out. Btw any chance you remember which classic colors did you used for the "hammer lady" miniature? I want to try NMM myself and I really like the look of that miniature.

Ive been using contrast paints as a base layer for my minis and then highlighting using traditional methods. I dont understand why theres any hate on them aside from people not liking change or new things. Its been working out pretty well for me. The contrasts as base layers really help with highlight and shadow placement when you start layering/glazing imo. Soometimes when starting a new mini using traditional methods, I dont really know where I want to put my shades/highlights/light source. Contrasts help with that by basically giving you a "preshaded" surface to work from. I just see contrasts as another tool in the box. Great video and Ill def be checking out more from your channel. BTW: just found your channel and this video hands down gets your channel a subscribe from me.

thanks for showing us. For the gold part, did you wait for each layer to dry?

Would love to see someone win a Golden Demon with a “Contrast Only” paint scheme 🥇🏆🥇🏆🥇🏆 Great video too, btw!

I think it wasn’t meant for doing high end techniques. It is great for its target audience, the beginners who want to play now, without spending a lot of time learning to paint.

Great video!! Which imprimation spray did you use? Thank you

Please make a space wolf contrast video. I would really like to see your take on that.

Its really weird watching this as a trained painter. I was taught how to paint with water colours first then moved to acrylics then oils. Water colours are a lot like contrast paints only pooling isn't a problem from the colour but because it degrades the paper. I then got into warhammer and seeing you struggle with something that seems fairly basic to me is really interesting. There's a lot that I struggle and am learning with minis but its the stuff that seems second nature to you but I've never had any issues with pooling of contrast paints when painting details. I'm now a comcept artist and I feel this also really helps give me some insight into contrast paints, when I'm creating an artwork I start with the all the drawings this would be the mini I then use block colour to get the ras colour of each of the objects in the composition. I then do a tonal map. I create a greyscale image of all the shadows and highlights and use the blend mode in photoshop to bring the colour and the tone together. This both saves me time because I'm not having to switch between colours as often and improves the accuracy of my work because the saturation and the hue shouldn't change from highlight to shadow. This is very much like preshading then painting contrast over the top. It keeps all the colours balanced. With NMM you would still need to add reflections in the highlights. I'm not going to tell you that your using it "wrong" but contrast paints aren't designed to be used as a base or layer paint. They build contrast by letting the contrast of the mini shine through the paint. So by all means paint however you wish but bare in mind that when your getting frustrated that the paint doesn't behave as you'd like your not really using it as intended TL;DR contrast paints are great and a really powerful tool but its a different way of working and so it takes practice its not really fair to judge how contrast paints are by comparing your use of them versus something you've been using for years.

I think contrast works best for base colours( bring the first player on and than start doing the usual shading and stuff) and for creating colour changing effects (Like going from green to a yellowe colour). It can be also used to create metalic armours easily and quickly.(base coat metalic and than contrast colour on top of it), and easy stin tones(which is my bane of existance). But you realy should simply use them with your other paints. Think of them as another tool and not as a replacement.

I love using contrast paints (my own blend) to paint miniature with less detail ie Reaper Bones. Otherwise I stick to normal paints for miniatures with better details.

If I were to go at this, the blue looks amazing to me, but the metal looks a little too dull, and this is inspite of Squidmar's best efforts. Personally I would take the contrast technique for the blue, but use conventional techniques for the gold.

Great Contrast miniseries but i am missing one ´topic´ for some starting painters like me.It is use of contrast paints (+your magic layering) for something organic like skin.Is it possible to achieve something similar to warcry hearth eater you did and if yes,which colors (contrast+layers) do you recomend for that?

Oh thank you very much for the spanish amazon link, i know we are a minority in most of these crafts, but this made me suscribe after youtube recomendation

I thought it looked great!

I dont think u should care about comments about using regular layer colors with contrast. Contrast paints are a Tool / technique among others. If u can add it into your Tool box and paint good looking miniatures with it then use that technique.

I love contrast, but I still use normal paints for the metal details

i love your style of making videos, and the tutorials are amazing, have you considered a clasic nmm tutorial?

Man you are creating amazing tutorials, how about Patreon for super secret techniques? Also, will you make tutorial how to paint face nice? Cheers!

Do you have a video for beginners? One to help paint NMN on any type of model?

Very impressive work man.Really good impression on cam. Contrast paint NMM is pretty good. Can you make purple NMM or pink in the future. Wanna try an emperor's children miniature but purple and pink are difficult paints for me. Tanks. (Sorry for my english)

i like your opinion and your videos and i am begging to know what you would think and do with contrast paint and fur (Beastclaw Raider for Example).

What do you think about using contrast paint on the organic parts of miniatures, what I've seen squigs, ghouls and similiar things look great. In a way Contrast paints are not advertised or suggested as the paints you'd use to highlight your miniatures, I think it could be compared to use a L sized brush on an M sized model, you worked against the odds. Perhaps good or great results can be achieved by training - you'd to have to unlearn the light on dark colour rules and so on, but who knows if it'd be worth it.

Honestly think you're being hard on yourself considering this if your first time doing a whole model with contrast NMM. From an outside perspective, considering you took under 2 hours of total painting time to achieve this I'd say it looks pretty goddamned amazing! I think it really is a technique that will appeal to people who have done watercolour painting a lot more than people who haven't. Personally as a watercolour painter, this really makes me want to try this method out and dump some of my money on Contrasts now. great video all round!

Have you seen Juan Hidalgo’s contrast marine videos? That guy has nmm and painting with contrasts down to a science at this point.Check them out of you haven’t seen them

Cool! Do you also have a video where you paint the 'original' stormcast? All the best!

Keep your head where you coming from your fingers will have been positive people think about

does he have a video of the reference one he done?

I think the gold with the high contrast looks better then the non contrast gold NMM. But the blue is better with the original paint.

Do you have to use GW primer for Contrast paints to work? Is there an alternative? Thanks!

I think the people who complain about contrast are people who don't need it, they're already competent painters and focused on a standard higher than can be achieved with contrast "as is". It's great for churning out large numbers of models to a basic standard, and if it means less armies of grey plastic it's a good thing, because it's standard that playing a game is more than acceptable. If some clever people can use it together with traditional paints to cut corners and manage a higher standard, that's not to be looked down on. So while it's kinda cool to make a point by showing just what you can do with contrast alone, I don't really think it's a point that needs to be made, it's just pandering to snobs who don't like that people with far less experience can get good results with less effort.

The GW contrast paints are for beginners not for pros, they are used for painters that are new and dont want a perfekt mini but one that is done neat and fast and one that look okay

How many hours did you finish the figure? Thank you in advance

Funny THing You could have scetched out the Highlights first On a Black Primed mini and THen Carefully Did it With Contrast i found that stuff really help for me

What dropper bottles do you use for your GW paints?

So at first I was not really on board with your video because I am not a proponent of GW's contrast paints *marketing campaign* (I need to stress this). GW spent video after video and social media post after social media post glamorizing Contrast as "for beginners". But I think what your video here is great; it shows is that it isn't really for beginners. Things like brush and paint control are learned skills--they are skills that come with hours and hours--months and months of practice. And even you-someone I think is quite skilled at the hobby--struggled to achieve a pretty decent result. But I also have to wonder why? It took me a few tries to get decent enough at NMM with traditional acrylic paints that I can paint a miniature in NMM bronze or gold in about an hour. And I think it probably comes out to a standard similar to better than what you achieved with Contrast. So sure, it can be done--but only by someone with years of experience and good brush control with a reservoir of knowledge about a lot of miniature-painting-related things. This is all to say that I appreciate your effort. I think you've achieved most of what you wanted to do, and it looks pretty good. But knowing all of this, do you think that Contrast paints are for beginners? Do you think they can replace traditional paints as the marketing campaign was suggesting? I'm not so sure.

I wouldn't use them that way ... not for NMM or anything else. I tried them, but obviously I bought those colors that don't do any effect. I need to try Blood Angels Red on a Bloodletter testminiature. I think they have some use ... but everything I saw just using Contrast Paints looked bad in my eyes.

Hey there's an idea if you need a theme someday: Warcry warband Stormcast Eternals Comic Book Style

But despite being able and he was able and made very happy about that

Hey dude domt go to hard on yourself i think it looks amazing I think i will try this techniqe

I'll be honest: I shouldn't have been eating when I saw this.

holy fuck, here is my sub.

You know, if you Link to the floaid on Amazon, I’ll buy some of that through the channel ...

Why would you try and collect pooled paint with a wet brush? You need it to be pretty dry to absorb the paint.

I personally still use the traditional Citadel metallics, especially when it comes to gold. The contrast paint they deemed for gold just doesn't create the same effect in my mind. I have a large group of Seraphon and I'd much rather have Retributor Gold than trying to make that yellow work on the weapons. Awesome video Squidmar! 👌

Honestly? 1st part looked like a newbie's attempt at regular NMM, but you pulled out a great save in the 2nd part. Maybe starting the gold, not with yellow but white-then-yellow would be a possible hack. But why struggle to do NMM this way when theres already better ways to do it?!

Why are you holding it as you paint it?

Du måste göra en painting video på nya sylvaneth endless modellerna !

1. Most people on the internet who use the term "cash grab" have no idea what they're talking about, and can be pretty much discredited from an intelligent conversation on any subject. 2. GW worked on Contrast paints, as well as the undercoats, for over 5 years. It was even a part of why paint names changed to protect IP. 3. If it were about short-term gains and tricking the public into buying a fraudulent product (the definition of "cash grab", and also illegal), GW wouldn't have spent that much time making them, and they wouldn't keep selling out of stock. If the last few years have taught us anything, it's that GW is just as much about pleasing the consumer as they are about making money. By refocusing on the former, as they have, they've been able to do the latter for themselves and investors. And no, I'm not an employee, beneficiary, or shill.

Why didn't you show us both models side by side? Was waiting for it all video long...

Could you indicate the colors you used in the description ? Thanks a lot anyway!

Well I am sorry to say, but main problem what I see here is that you are thinning with water. Contrast paint rapidly change how it work with water thinning. If you want to thin it, use contrast thinner which is provided by GW too. I had better results with that.

Maybe new painters it will up there game but it looked hard to do some details

This looks like pain, my god

1 hour in? I would only be done base painting the sheild in 1 hour 🙁

I didnt like the use of contrast for the metalics... I think the traditional approach is a bit better (or at least my results were better)... I do like how the shield came across was nice... contrast seems to work for some things... but not others

If you're using Contrast paints, you're trying to save time right? So why not just coat Black Templar or Basilicanum Grey and then dry brush or edge highlight that with an actual metallic paint when it's dry? It's not display quality but I think it actually works pretty well for speed painting. I also think that Contrast paints are just naturally better on skin, leather, or other natural surfaces than big round plates of armor, and they are totally useless on vehicles. You can paint Eldar with Warp Lightning and it looks great but they are much smaller with more details and crevices etc.

is mega

I haven't painted Miniatures in years.. Christ, models have doubled the size since then.