{"id":1088239,"date":"2026-01-24T05:30:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-24T05:30:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.polygon.com\/?p=503812"},"modified":"2026-01-24T05:30:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-24T05:30:15","slug":"the-best-hobby-paint-for-miniatures-only-requires-two-thin-coats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/the-best-hobby-paint-for-miniatures-only-requires-two-thin-coats\/","title":{"rendered":"The best hobby paint for miniatures only requires Two Thin Coats"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Painting miniatures is a fun and relaxing way to spend time away from your screens, and with the surge of interest in tabletop role-play like Dungeons & Dragons<\/a> and miniatures wargames like Warhammer 40,000<\/a>, the hobby is more popular than ever. As a result, many new lines of paint are making their way into your local hobby stores in 2025. After nearly a full year spent testing out the leading brands, one manufacturer has jumped to the top of my list of recommendations for new and returning painters: Duncan Rhodes<\/a>\u2019 Two Thin Coats<\/a> from Trans Atlantis Games<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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When we award the Polygon Recommends<\/a> badge, it\u2019s because we believe the recipient is uniquely thought-provoking, entertaining, inventive, or fun \u2014 and worth fitting into your schedule. If you want curated lists of our favorite media, check out <\/small><\/em>What to Play<\/small><\/em><\/a> and <\/small><\/em>What to Watch<\/small><\/em><\/a>.<\/small><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Rhodes got his start in the hobby at Games Workshop\u2019s retail storefronts before becoming the company\u2019s primary video presenter for painting tutorials throughout the 2000s and 2010s. His admonition to always use \u201ctwo thin coats\u201d of the multi-billion-dollar company\u2019s Citadel paints became the rallying cry for his first crowdfunding campaign in 2021, which raised more than $1.1 million for the initial line of Trans Atlantis hobby paints. While that first wave of product was a touch slow to reach consumers, manufacturing and fulfillment have firmed up considerably. Trans Atlantis paints are now being distributed here in the United States by none other than Asmodee North America, and after calling stores from coast to coast, it\u2019s clear that they\u2019re in good supply just about everywhere that they\u2019re sold<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But the main reason for my recommendation isn\u2019t because of their availability at your FLGS. It\u2019s because of the consistency I find from pot to pot. <\/p>\n

With other manufacturers, some paints in a given line can be different from the rest. Maybe they dry a different color than you see in the bottle, or they\u2019re too watery to cover a project quickly and easily. Sometimes they simply don\u2019t have enough pigment to even hold together on a wet palette, let alone go into an airbrush<\/a>. That hasn\u2019t been the case for me with Two Thin Coats paint. Every one that I crack open, regardless of the color, has the same general viscosity out of the bottle and the same behavior on the palette and in the brush. Yes, you\u2019ll pay a bit more for these than some other brands, but when you\u2019re simply learning how paint works or trying to redevelop the skills needed to shade or highlight a model quickly and efficiently, it\u2019s nice not to find yourself wasting time. You can open a bottle of Two Thin Coats \u2014 any bottle \u2014 and know that you\u2019re getting the best possible painting experience for your money.<\/p>\n

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Another reason I\u2019m fond of Two Thin Coats is because the paints are packaged inside a dropper bottle rather than an open-topped pot. Citadel paints, which fans of the biggest hobby games on the market will likely already be familiar with, have a wide-mouthed lid with a little spoon built onto the back side of it. That spoon is intended to serve as a reservoir for paint, allowing you to shake it up, crack it open, and get right to work dipping your brush directly into the pot. Not only is that paint too thick to effectively work with right out of the bottle, but the spoon itself gets gummed up with dried paint over time. That leads to more spills, more spoiled paint, and more mostly full pots heading into the garbage before their time. For my money, the dropper bottles are where it\u2019s at. Throw in a stainless steel mixing bead \u2014 which is included in every bottle \u2014 and you\u2019ve got everything you need to be successful.<\/p>\n

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