issues with recolours

So I feel like I'm doing something wrong while doing recolours. Darker and lighter horses will change the appearance of the greyscale and I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong :(

Here's the greyscale I'll use to show you - [click]
So I have the greyscale on one layer, and make a new layer on top of it, which I set to overlay. I use a hard pen to paint a light pink colour over it.
[click]

Then I change the light pink to a dark red, and it has wayyyy more contrast - the highlights are very bright and the shadows are really dark.
[click]

I try putting the greyscale on top of the light pink colour (with the colour layer with no blending and the greyscale on overlay).
[click]

Then I change the pink to dark red, and you can hardly see the greyscale at all ;-;
[click]

Is this what everyone else's art looks like and I'm overreacting? Should I use the greyscale on top or the colour? Thanks for reading ♥

Last edited on 2019-09-28 at 12:04:10 by ✧ Io

I always have the greyscale on top and use overlay or soft light. With darker colours maybe duplicate the greyscale and lower the duplicate greyscale opacity. 

Though if you want the most control over the colour outputs try having separate layers for the shading on the greyscale and the highlights and stick the shading on multiply and highlights on overlay and mess around with the opacity to get the colour you’d like. 

Different colours will react differently though so it’s just experimenting with opacity and different blending options so you can get the colour output you’d like, if you have any more questions i’m happy to help you out!

Last edited on 2019-09-28 at 12:24:17 by Altair [Lurking]

I usually just experiment with the blending options. If it looks like crap with overlay, I switch it to hard light. It doesn't show as much shine, but for me, I think it makes my darker recolours look nicer. I hope that helps at least a little XD

Thank you both! I'll try to change opacity/blending layers around more while colouring greyscale!