Cry of the Banshee

 Brocas Helm is a severely underrated band, in my opinion.

Yesterday marked a first for my painting journey. More of a second, really. I used a contrast paint. For about a month I had already been using extremely thinned Black Templar as a substitute for my old Nuln Oil which had run mostly dry, since the recipe had changed in the interim. It worked about as well, if a little darker. Last night I went further and used a contrast paint for its intended purpose. May God have mercy on my wretched soul.

For context, I hold what could be described as a stigma against contrast paints. When I got into the hobby in 2017 they had yet to be introduced. I bought my paints, slathered my Tempestus Scions, and grew dissatisfied after a month or so. When I returned to painting in 2021 I found that there were new paints for sale, and I felt both defensive over my previous purchase and afraid that the way I taught myself to paint was being replaced. Over time this has mellowed from a resentment into more of a general snobbish distaste. Contrast paints do, in my opinion, produce a higher baseline of figure quality but with a lower skill ceiling when used as intended. Using them as advanced washes or for arcane techniques is another matter entirely.

With all that said, I think I have found a good use for them. The Silver Bayonet has a scenario requiring two ghosts, so I decided to start with that in terms of supernatural units. I used Hexwraith Flame, functionally a contrast paint even though it is called a technical, and Ulthuan Grey for a drybrush. Details were cleaned up with a heavy Biel-Tan Green wash which was also applied to the hair. Overall painting time was an hour and a half maximum of extremely distracted fiddling and waiting for the paints to dry. I could probably run an assembly line of this style and be done with a force in a single night.

Despite this, I do not know if I would want to continue this monochromatic scheme precisely. I think some greater variation would be good in the future. I do not care for using physical looking weapons or clothing on an otherwise phantasmal figure, but perhaps a variation of shade in the eye sockets could work nicely? There are experiments to be done.

Here is a scale comparison. As you can see, our Frenchman is trying very hard to keep a brave face.