Nightmare Before Christmas cup

I decided to paint a cup for a Christmas present for my daughter. She is a big nightmare fan so I had a theme. Using One Shot paint I painted the design on the mug. For those that are new to One Shot paint, when you paint on ceramic you must keep the cup away from soaking in hot water. This will take all the paint away. I learned the hard way.

 

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Wet on Wet Pinstriping

I thought I would try a little wet on wet Pinstriping. I found a few good YouTube videos describing the process and wanted to pull out the airbrush and the oneshot paint together.

I dusted off my old paashe VLs for this project. I had not touched these airbrushes since my painting TShirt days at Exhibitions more than 22 years ago.

I wiped them off and the Paashes worked like a charm.

I started by painting orange flames with a brush. When complete I then mixed hardener, oneshot paint and reducer so that it flowed through the airbrush.

I airbrushed the red to create the fades and walked away. Do not worry about overspray. When the work is dry this will easily wipe off.

When completely dry I took a soft rag, wet it with windex and whipped away the overspray. The wet on wet holds the paint and give a great old school effect and the limitations are with your imagination.

Final step was to stripe using Kafka #3 short brush to outline the flames. This is a quick and easy way to create cool effects with Oneshot paint.

 

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Pinstriping on Skate Deck

Spent the morning adding more pinstripes on my longboard. I put red stripes on yesterday and followed up with white. Working on this surface is really easy compared to helmets and rounded surfaces.

I stripped the board down, cleaned off the surface with cleaner and stripped away. The grey and the logo was stock paint on the Landyaughtz longboard. The Pinstriping added a lot of old school character.

Contact me if you are looking to get your ride stripped.

 

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Pinstriping Projects

It's been a while since I picked up my striping brushes in my quest to try and master the art, or at least feel confident in striping. I have been practicing on pretty much anything that moves. I spent a lot of time practicing on panels but found that striping on objects like helmets, tanks and round objects was a whole other animal.

Not only did you have to worry about consistency of your line but you have to deal with having your brush follow the curve without skipping. Not as easy as it sounds.

I stripped an old laptop which was actually one of my first attempts at true fire. Using white I stripped basic lines to create this design. This was very similar to striping on panels.

 

 

I wanted to try painting images with One Shot paint. I normally airbrush all my work but was interested in seeing If I could create custom work using this technique. Using white one shot I painted the skull and then outlined with black. Then I added some stripes.

I am normally used to airbrush work with clearcoat to protect but this takes time. I can see me using this technique for quick projects but at the same time give the customer a custom look without the heavy expense associated with full airbrush work.

 

 

 

Kustompaint.ca

Custom House of Kolor Geiger Bike

This custom paint project is all done and gathers a crowd wherever I go. It came out great and as with every artist I know I could have put more hours tweaking the work. Eventually you have to put the airbrush down and say enough is enough. Here are a few more pictures in random stages of the project.

 

 

 

 

 

All image copyright Digital Air Studios 2012

 

Kustompaint.ca

Custom Geiger Stratoliner Bike Tank

This was a great project and the more I painted the easier the various textures got. When I started this custom paint I was not sure how I was going to tackle some of the features but as I moved forward many of the complex effects were quite simple to create.

As always this bike had to start from scratch. I had to sand out the factory Pinstriping on the Stratoliner. Sprayed high build primer/Surfacer and after sanding it smooth with 600 grit it was ready for basecoat and then clear to protect the surface and lock in the color. I wetsand the clear with 800 grit wet and I was ready for my real passion, airbrushing.

Step one was to mask off the areas I did not want to paint on. Here you can see where I masked the areas that were going to be pipes and the stressed metal effect.

Using House of Kolor white I create the layout of my design and work on building the shadow areas.

 

This picture show the final work before clear. I used House of Kolor black to render the details and all the shadowing. I went over the black with white to enhance the highlights and then with the black to darken any area that required it. By layering the white I was able to created different tones making it look like I used more colors.

The stressed metal and rivets were the final step. I sprayed diluted white over the grey basecoat using Airsick Stencils to create the texture and then came in with black to define the lines and create a aged look.

 

It was off for 4 coats of clear, wetsand with 800 grit and then 3 more coats of clear. Starting with 1000 wet and moving to 1500, 2000 and finally 3000 I was ready for buff an polish.

 

Here is a final shot I took of the tank. I was on a late fall ride and passed a cemetery with a dirt road access. I turned around and came back for a few shots. It was too hard to resist.

 

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Custom Geiger Bike

I am finally getting these photos of the Geiger Theme custom painted motorcycle. The project was a lot of fun and the first time I used House of Kolor for detailed airbrush work.

Once I had my design idea down I started the process. I masked out where I was going to create a rusted metal tube effect. This would keep the area clean until required. Using a paper cutout I lightly sprayed a blueprint of the skulls and other components. For this project i would use leftover House of Kolor paint from another project.

I would create this using only white and black paint. At this point I was not worried about detail. This would give me a good starting point and as with most projects, I would probably modify it as I moved forward.

 

The next step is to start hitting the layout with more detail and start working on the shadowed areas. This is where you start to see the design take shape.

Once I am done with the white I started with House of Kolor Black and started working in the detail. Using masking and Airsick templates for textures I worked on the background features. Airsick stencils have great grunge style templates that work great when creating old rusted metal. I also used the stencils to create textures in the skulls. Airsickstencils.com

 

 

 

Here you can see the tube effect. Once I remove the tape it gave me the base for the tubes and it was just a matter of adding texture and shading.

 

Finally I use white to highlight areas and add the smoke. Then it's off for clear. Below is the completed front fender.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Kustompaint.ca

Custom Stratoliner Saddlebags

Now that I had finally caught up with my projects it was time to finally start on my bike. I had stripped it last fall to paint but paid projects took precedence.

I was planning on a biomechanical theme bike with artwork similar to Geiger. One of Geiger's famous art pieces was the starting point for my design. From there I had no idea where I was going.

The first thing that was for sure was that I wanted to strip the vinyl covering on the saddlebags. The vinyl was getting ratty and I wanted more space to paint. Space that would demonstrate my skills.

 

I had no idea what I getting into and wether I was destroying the bags. I was going to find out.

Stripping the Stratoliner saddle bag was a little more effort than expected but well worth the effort.

With a Xacto knife I first cut the stitches. I was not sure what to expect when I stripped the vinyl. I was expecting glue but to my surprise there was none. The vinyl stripped off fairly easily and within the hour I had the bag stripped.

Once stripped I realized I had work to do. A primer by itself would be enough.

The first step was to sand the surface with 80 grit to give the surface good tooth for the primer.

Here you can see the bag after a good saning. I then cleaned the surface and sprayed the bags with SEM Plastic Adhesion promoter and when ready primed it with SEM Flexible Surfacer. When dry I sanded the surface lightly. I was going to reprime so I was not worried if the surface was smooth. I only wanted to create tooth for the body fill and high build primer.

 

I used SEM No Swell Plastic filler to smooth out the surfaces. The one thing I was not expecting was the stitching holes that had to be filled. The previous owner also screwed a license plate bracket into the bag so I had to fill those holes. I sanded smooth and it was back to the spray booth for more primer. This time I was using Evercoat 2:1 high build. This stuff works great and covers well.

I used 220 grit to sand the primer smooth. I was getting pretty tired of sanding these bags but it would all be worth it. Once cleaned off it was back to to booth for basecoat and clear.

Here you can see the saddle bag ready for artwork. I wetsand the bag with 600 grit to give me a perfect surface. The green tape defines where I will create the ripped metal effect and the biomechanical effect.

 

 

Using House of Kolor white. I start the design. Working from the front to back I airbrush Geigers skull artwork to the bag.

 

Here you can see that I've started to shade and add detail. I am using House of Kolor Black and have slightly over reduced it to give me more detail but you have to be careful not to blow out. I also used Airsick Stencils to create the textures and grunge effects.

 

 

 

I continue with the black until I have painted the entire design. Using House of Kolor white I go back and add highlight to the design.

 

 

 

 

 

Here is the final bag all cleared and on the bike. The work was worth the effort and the bags turned out great. You can check out more pictures at kustompaint.ca or orangepaintfactory.com

I will blog the rest of the bike custom paint process for the entire Geiger Theme Stratoliner Custom House of Kolor Bike.

 

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Graveyard Batwing

Harley Graveyard Batwing

Well I have been really slack with updating my blog. The summer has gone by and I have put by bike away for another winter.

I got a call in June to paint a Harley batwing to match a custom paint that I finished last winter. The design is fairly simple but has a lot of impact.

I really enjoyed this project and have the rear fender to complete. I reused the cemetery stencil to keep the same look.

I used Autoair paint again so that I could match the fire colors. I printed a couple photos to try and match the true fire effect. I forehand the close up skulls and then clear coat the whole project.

 

 

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HOK KANDY PROJECT DONE

Well I finally finished my latest project and got to see the bike today. It is always exciting to see the bike all in one piece after you finish painting it. I must say I was excited when I saw it and it was a sharp looking bike. Above is the photoshop proof and the final pic of the bike.

Other than running out of paint this project was fun and turned out great. The client was happy and this makes for another showpiece.

This was the first time I painted with House of Kolor and I was suitably impressed with the paint.