The best craft paint for miniatures only needs two thin coats
Painting miniatures is a fun and relaxing way to spend time away from your screen, and with the increasing interest in tabletop role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons and miniature war games like Warhammer 40,000, the hobby is more popular than ever. As a result, many new lines of paint will be making their way to your local hobby stores in 2025. After spending almost a full year testing the leading brands, one manufacturer has jumped to the top of my list of recommendations for new and returning painters. : Duncan Rhodes‘ Two thin coats by Trans Atlantis games.
Rhodes got his start in the hobby at Games Workshop stores before becoming the company’s main video presenter for painting classes in the 2000s and 2010s. His admonition to always use “two thin coats” of the multibillion-dollar company’s Citadel paints became the rallying cry for its first crowdfunding campaign of 2021, which raised more than $1.1 million for its first line of Trans Atlantis hobby paints. While the first wave of products was a little slow to reach consumers, production and fulfillment have improved significantly. Trans Atlantis paints are now distributed here in the United States by none other than Asmodee North America, and after calling stores from coast to coast, it’s clear that they are just about available. wherever they are sold.
But the main reason for my recommendation is not because of their availability at your FLGS. It’s the consistency I find from jar to jar.
With other manufacturers, some paints in a certain line may differ from the rest. Maybe they dry a different color than you see in the bottle, or they are too watery to quickly and easily cover a project. Sometimes they simply don’t have enough pigment to even hold together on a wet palette, let alone fit into an airbrush. That hasn’t been the case for me with Two Thin Coats paint. Everyone I crack open, regardless of color, has the same overall viscosity out of the bottle and the same behavior on the palette and in the brush. Yes, you’ll pay a little more for this than some other brands, but if you’re just learning how paint works or trying to redevelop the skills needed to shade or highlight a model quickly and efficiently, it’s nice not to to notice that you are wasting money time. You can open a bottle of Two Thin Coats – any bottle – and know you’re getting the best possible painting experience for your money.
Another reason I love Two Thin Coats is because the paint is packaged in a dropper bottle instead of an open-top jar. Citadel paints, which fans of the biggest hobby games on the market will probably already be familiar with, have a wide mouth lid and a small spoon on the back of it. That spoon is intended as a reservoir for paint, so you can shake it, crack it open and get started right away by dipping your brush directly into the jar. Not only is that paint too thick to work with effectively right out of the bottle, but the spoon itself becomes full of dried paint over time. That leads to more spilled paint, more spoiled paint, and more usually full pots that end up in the trash before their time. For my money, the dropper bottles are where it’s at. Throw in a stainless steel mixing bead – which comes in every bottle – and you have everything you need to be successful.
One caveat, however, is that the Trans Atlantis pots could use a little more friction on those stops. It’s possible for the mixing ball to get stuck in the dropper, which means that when you try to squeeze paint out, you’ll pop the cap off and spill a bunch of product instead. Make it a habit to make sure your mixing ball is free and rattling around in it before you apply paint to your palette.
Duncan Rhodes’ Two Thin Coats is now available at dozens of independent stores across the US and, occasionally, through crowdfunding campaigns where you can buy an entire set at a heavily discounted price. You can find more at the Trans Atlantis website.
Duncan Rhodes’ Two Thin Coats is available at local game stores. The paints were assessed using a retail product from Trans Atlantis Games. Vox Media has affiliate partnerships. These do not influence editorial content, although Vox Media may earn commissions on products purchased through affiliate links. You can find Additional information about Polygon’s ethics policy can be found here.