Picking Edge Highlight Colors

My fellow kabalites, I'm just getting started on working out my color scheme for my kabalite and I'm stuck on what color to use for the edge highlights on my armor. The theme is going to be black armor, so abbadon black base, while the helmet is ushabti bone with some highlights. I've figured out the colors for the helmet, but I have no idea what to do for the black armor. My only thought is maybe a grey or purple, not sure which one though. Don't want anything too bright, want to stick to the dark armor theme.

Rest of the model will be a darkish flesh for the belt, leadbelcher/ironbreaker for the gun, brass/gold for details of the gun plus maybe the knee plates, and maybe a glowing red/blue for the gun barrel but I'm not sure about that yet, would need to figure out colors for that as well.

Thanks in advance.

Hellow young warrior !

Choosing those colors is an important thing.

First of all

Do test.
Make a couple different miniatures, copy paste them on paint/toshop to get the overall look of a full unit.

Second

You need to think about contrast AND homogeneity.

Will it be a cold color armor or a warm one ?
Using different color can really change the black aspect (ex : blueish grey like dark reaper & fenrisian grey will do a cold black, as the opposite is using eshin grey and administratum grey).

White helmet, neutral/warm metallics. You need a cold armor. Purple will do fine with either red or blue.

(After years of testing & experimenting, I won't recommand ever using a pure chaos black for both base & shades)
I'd start with a base mixed : xereus purple & chaos black (1:1), 2 thin coats
(or maybe Naggaroth Night with a little chaos black (3:1))

Shade with chaos black + lahmia (1:2)

overall highlight : Xereus purple
edge highlight : Genestealer Purple
over the top (for characters) extreme edge highlight : Lucius Lilac or Genestealer mixed with pallid wych flesh (5:2)

I won't recommand the use of druuchi violet as a shade as it tends to warm up the balck (due to the red it contains) and sometime adds some shininess.

Maybe try with a diluted (w. lahmia) drakenhoff nightshade before/after highlighting ?
And wait for it to fully dry before making any judgement call.


Bonus : paint bundle.
Bonus 2 : Don't forget you can test "on paper" before applying any paint.
Templates exists on the internet.

Don't hesitate if you have any question

If you are thinking about paint combinations for edge highlights and the like, check the Citadel Paint app for your phone. It will give suggestions of good combinations of base, shade and highlights, as well as showing examples of those combinations.

I've been checking out the citadel paint app a lot recently, that has helped me articulate my ideas a bit.

@Masmune: wow thanks man that's a lot of advice. Didn't think about mixing paints for the base, haven't really done that a whole lot but I'll give that a try, xereus purple sounds like it will mix well.

I've been experimenting with grey highlights, both lighter and darker greys but it sounds like you are suggesting I use purple highlights. Have you found purple highlights work better than grey for black armor?