Archive for ‘Airbrush’

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February 20, 2012

Creative Photography and Makeup: Green Man

From Wikipedia:  A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit. Commonly used as a decorative architectural ornament, Green Men are frequently found on carvings in churches and other buildings (both secular and ecclesiastical). “The Green Man” is also a popular name for English public houses and various interpretations of the name appear on inn signs, which sometimes show a full figure rather than just the head.

The Green Man motif has many variations. Found in many cultures around the world, the Green Man is often related to natural vegetative deities springing up in different cultures throughout the ages. Primarily it is interpreted as a symbol of rebirth, or “renaissance,” representing the cycle of growth each spring. Some speculate that the mythology of the Green Man developed independently in the traditions of separate ancient cultures and evolved into the wide variety of examples found throughout history.

I decided to do  a Green Man shoot with my friend Steve, and it was a ton of fun… love the way it turned out!

A few of these images will be on display at Crones Hollow on 2470 South Main Street in SLC next week (March 2nd)!  http://www.croneshollow.com/

 

Green Man

Green Man

The first thing I did was create a wig made out of fake leaves. Once he put the wig on, I started gluing leaves to his face.. and then I airbrushed him with greens and blacks. The final touches were made with a paintbrush… blue lips and plant veins on his cheeks. Steve was super fun to work with, and a fantastic model! Here are some BTS shots (below)…

Here is a before editing (straight out of camera) shot and after shot (processed in Lightroom and Photoshop)….

Here are a few more shots from the series:

Green Man

Green Man

BTW, just wanted to mention that I always use professional body paints and glue, etc when working with people… I used Mehron & krylon brands for this shoot.

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August 14, 2010

Airbrushing: Creative Body Painting Time Lapse Video’s

These are body painting shoots  showing us paint the backgrounds, models and finished images…. I have already shared these video’s on Facebook, etc…  just wanted to make sure they are posted here on my blog. If you haven’t seen them already, enjoy!

*Models are not fully nude, they have underwear and pasties or a bra on.

Time Lapse Swirl Girl Photo Shoot

Time Lapse Jaguar Body-art Photo Shoot

Tree Body Painting and Photo Shoot

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March 17, 2010

Airbrushing: Body Paintings and Photography Feb-May 2010

I have been an artist all my life, and a photographer for about 6 years now… but I am just a beginner at painting people and photographing the live art! I have a ton of ideas for paintings and photos outdoors, but while it is still winter, I have been working in studio. Here are some shots of my body paint/photography work (posted below). Some are airbrushed, and some are hand painted. All sessions have taken me about 3-4 hours to paint.

Above: Dani Jae – Silver Angel. Beauty Makeup by Erin Chaney. 02-2010 We had two set of wings from a previous photo shoot…. they were both hammered and falling apart, so I took the feathers from one and added it to the other “beefing it up” quite a bit. Then I randomly spray painted them with a silver metalic color we had lying around the house. My recent purchase of an airbrush gave me the inspiration to start body painting people, but the metallic body paint powder had to be sponged on and barely mixed with water. I didn’t want the straps to show from the wings, so we hung actually hung them from our chandelier with fishing wire and tied it to a tripod. Dani was painted from head to toe, but most shots are from the waste up because of the tripod.

Above: Becky Rockwood – Checkered Woman 02-2010. I actually airbrushed the background for this shot as well… I cut out a 3″x3″ square from some interfacing and used it as a template. And then I used a 2″x2″ square on her so that they would be about the same size if I had her stand away from the wall. I also like the soft box reflection and think it works out quite well adding to the checkers.

Above: Russ Lyman – Lizard Man 02-2010. I hand painted his face., and his tongue… Enough said. haha

Above: Russ Lyman – The Four Elements.  A few days before this painting, I drew out several ideas on how to divide the four elements… it was hard to kind of meld them together, but I think it worked out. I bought some moss from the store, glued it on his pants and then airbrushed it brown for earth. Yes, it made a huge mess… and made trails wherever Russ walked, haha. I wasn’t sure how I was going to paint wind, but I think the swirl marks worked out. And I really like how the fire looks :) I was really nervous for this painting/shoot… but think was able to pull it off, lol.

Above: Pregnancy portrait of Kristin Forbes: Cherry Blossom Tree. 03-2010. I airbrushed her skin white and then tried to sketch out a tree with an eye liner pencil… my drawing was not working out but then came together later. I airbrushed blues over the original quick sketch and then decided to start again by just going for it, and hand painting the tree outline. I think it definitely worked out the second time.  The cherry blossoms didn’t really stand out until the end when I added the pink highlights. I am kind of wishing that I continued the painting onto her arms, or carried over some flowers… but it still worked out well. I like this way it turned out :)

Above: “Colorful Cubism Man” Model: James Morris.  I got this one published  the front of the Catalyst Magazine in Salt Lake City, Utah (May 2010).  We started out with browns, shot it on a brown background, and then he went under the airbrush for another two hours while I took the whole concept into a new direction with color. I think the yellow background worked out great, and of course James is a great model making the final images a total hit!

Above: Jaguar body painting, Model: Marta Mazzanti. This one was a family group effort with painting the background and model. We were visiting my brother in Seattle and Marta is one of his friends… we were more than happy to set up a body paint session with her while we were there. It would have been nice to take it outside for some orange and blue contrasting colors, but it was cold… so we took apart my brothers kitchen and set up our studio in there. Here is the body painting time lapse video: http://vimeo.com/11318115

Above: Blue Swirl Body Painting. Model: Dani Jae 2010. This one was a lot of fun… here is the time lapse video: http://vimeo.com/11071065

Click here to see my flickr gallery!

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February 2, 2010

Airbrushing: Documenting Progress

Follow my progress on Facebook

I bought a new airbrush (01-28-2010)  and plan to play with it every day. Once I airbrushed my friend Ryann for a photo shoot with a cheap airbrush and can of air, lol.. it turned out pretty cool, but that is all of my experience so far. My goal is to use get good enough to create some super rad artistic body art for my photography. I have a long history of artwork in my background… so hopefully it will come naturally . Ideally, it would be cool to practice and post a photo of my progress every day , but it might end up to be anywhere from 2-3 a week, lol. I will post the number and date on each photo :)

I am pretty much learning on my own, so if any of you experienced airbrushers out there have any good tips for me, feel free to comment!!

^Day #1 – playing with the brush. 01-28-2010. I used Createx paint, which permanent (not to use on people). I actually watered it down a titch because I wanted to use less paint. But come to find out, a little paint goes a long way :)

^Day #2 – I practcied making a sphere, which turned into an eyeball, hehe 01-29-2010. I used Badger Air-Opaque paint. I like it better, and have used this kind on skin before. It is non-toxic, water based, etc.

^Day #3 (01-30-2010) – Blood drips, I was practicing shading and lines, etc. Obviously I did not use any Frisket masking film… Im saving that for later when I am more familiar with the brush. Btw.. I have been using Newsprint paper to practice on. This one is with Badger paint again, which I plan to continue using from now on. It is much more affordable when buying online ($9.99 for pack of 7) rather than my local art store ($26 for the same pack).

^Day #5 (02-01-2010) – I painted the sun metal sculpture that is on our wall in our bedroom. I tried to have more control over the brush, lines and shading this time around.  The paint keeps getting stuck in my brush.. that is why there is a big black blob on the bottom right. I am cleaning it out pretty good, so I am wondering if it is the paint? hmmmm.

… Continue following my progress on Facebook

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