About 2 years ago I attended an airbrushing demo put on by Craig Fraser. I was all excited about learning how to airbrush and I bought a nice Iwata airbrush and a compressor...but that's where the excitement stopped, at least until yesterday! My wife bought a 1-day workshop with Craig Fraser for me for Valentine's Day this year, she knew that I needed a push to get off my *** a get some paint into the gun. So yesterday I drove up to LA to Coast Airbrush (really a cool place if you're into custom art of any sort) and spent 8 hours learning how to paint realistic flames. I had NEVER sprayed any paint through an airbrush before yesterday so needless to say I was a bit overwhelmed. Here is a pic of the panel I painted, it's not that good but it is a start. By the time the Merc is ready for paint I believe that I will have had enough practice to be able to lay down the type of design that has been floating around my skull bucket without embar***ing myself. I have a new respect for all you artists out there, what you make look so easy is not very easy and comes with years of experience and skill!
I'll take mine in the green if you ever get up near Washington, looks like your off to a great start!
Cool stuff. You're ahead of me on those as I've never painted real flames before. I should give it a go.
You will catch on with lots of practice, looking good so far. Here's a shot of the fella that taught me the true fire technique.
Yeah, Mike Lavallee is the bomb when it comes to true fire...I bet you really learned a lot from him! I have his DVDs and his stencil set, I can't wait to get enough practice under my belt to do it justice. One thing that I do like about some of Fraser's work though is that he keeps some of the ol' skool stylized flame design and incorporates the true fire within them. Craig Fraser speaks very highly of Mike Lavallee, in fact Mike has a 3-day workshop coming up at Coast Airbrush soon...$495!
We had a girl up here in Buffalo do some real flames on our race car. She apprenticed under Lavalle for three years.
Too bad you're on the other side of the country. You could practice on mine. They look good enough already. Nice job!! I saw one of those guys I think on Monster Garage. Made it LOOK easier than taping of and shooting 'conventional' flames. When you're good you can make that hard stuff look easy. Bill
The Jalopy Journal
