Building a solid foundation so I can muck it all up later

I'll admit, I'm not a very good shot with a can of spray paint: when trying to prime minis, most of the paint ends up on my hands or in my lungs. This would be fine if I were trying to get high off of the paint fumes, but everyone knows that crystal meth and heroin are my drugs of choice - when I pull out the can of paint, I come to PAINT suckas.

Bearing this in mind, I tried something new today: I actually left the house and picked up a few containers of liquid acrylic gesso. This stuff is normally used to prime canvases for paints, but I've read a few reports which state that it's not too bad for priming minis either. Here's what they looked like after the first coat:

Yes, all of the detail has been completely obscured. No, I'm not panicking. Apparently, that's just how this stuff goes on and it will dry very thinly in 24 hours. That's what they say, anyways. You'd better not be wrong, internet.