I had this super hero idea that I shot with model Kym a couple months ago, and thought it was time to get to it. It took a little work to make the right pose I wanted (I rarely know what I want at the time of the shoot, so we just free form a set and hope it works; it’s not until I start actually creating the image that I see what is best), but I managed to figure it out. Then I had to design the outfit. She wore a few reference items to help with the form and flow, so it wasn’t too hard to transform that into what I wanted. Then I had to find/build a prop for the background. All this was completed this past weekend (Saturday). I had it drawn on a board Sunday, and began work on it, airbrushing the background, then beginning the outfit. With it being so smooth and simplistic, I figured airbrushing the cape would be best the method for it. No problems there. Then I had the gloves, skirt and boots (all red) to contend with. I don’t often plan ahead for handling areas of a piece, so when I came to this I figured I’d just paint them with acrylics. Well, since the tubes don’t say anything about transparency, I didn’t anticipate the red not to be opaque. Two coats in and I could still see the board beneath, brush strokes showing throughout. Either I paint a half dozen coats, or I go to the airbrush (since the cape looked so good). Fine, but this meant reapplying the masking, which shouldn’t have been a problem. Well, since the cape areas had no paint on their masking, they were clear, and consequently, I couldn’t tell that I had missed a piece. it wasn’t until I completed the airbrushing of the red areas and removed the masking that I noticed half the cape was now sprayed with red (and not evenly, so no chance of just calling the cape purple and airbrush the other half). Frustrated, I threw the board away.
So, with a couple days lost, I began again yesterday, hoping to learn from the previous days’ mistakes and do this one right. To start, here’s the drawing…

model – Kym

As noted above, I airbrushed the background. Since it would be a very light coating, I didn’t bother with any masking at this point. The bottom was covered in a light gray, purposely spattered to give it a sidewalk texture (needs more, which I’ll add later); for the top I used a light blue turquoise. Once dry, I masked the entire piece, then removed the cape areas and airbrushed them with a deep blue. With that completely dry (wouldn’t want any of it to be pulled up later) I returned all the masking to the cape areas, then removed the red areas (gloves, skirt, boots). I airbrushed them in bright to deep reds. I then removed all the masking and reviewed those areas. the red got a little dark, so I used colored pencils to brighten them a bit, as well as adding details (the white highlights were painted with acrylic).
Next, I painted the face and hair with gouache. I also painted the gold pieces of the outfit (belt, cape cord). Then came the painfully slow and boring chore of painting the phone booth. I think I cane count on one hand how many straight-edged objects I’ve ever had in my paintings, and this is why; it’s just tedious. Section by section I went along, most being flat blocks of color, but a few had a bit of gradation from tint to shade. These acrylics are designed to be re-wettable for a while, but become permanent later. Well, seems that timing is longer than I thought, as I had added a second layer to a few areas hours later, and yet the paint pulled up from the board. I know I’ll be using colored pencils on the booth later anyway, so I’ll use them to make these areas a better texture then.
So, here’s the painted phase complete (still needs the textured gesso on the skin yet); the red paint casts a sheen from the camera’s flash, so they don’t look right, but the scanner will get it right in the end…