This is a pre design for another peice of art i did. I thought it would be a fun chrome how to. for begginers/novice airbrushers.
First i started gessoing my canvas , during the process i added some grey createx and water , and smeared it with my brush to get the back ground moving a little. Then i draw out my design with a 2b pencil , since the back ground is dark.
I start by painting the wasp with createx white being very careful to keep the body peices seprate , we dont want to get lost or lose detail, so it takes time to build up without alot of overspray.
Now the white is complete , if you notice the eye is not completely painted white. Reason being , when i lay blue over that section i want it to be a bit darker so it will give me more roundness and a darker color blue, as the blue fades down it will get lighter as it hits the white.
Now to start the chrome. First i mix my createx , 1 to 1 white and phthalo blue , reduced 30% , and start hitting the areas where i want my blue to go, , top to center is how i do it, dont worrie about going down to far, cause later when we add highlights we will fade the white upwards to blend into the blue.
Now to mix the ground color. First i start out with createx grey , and add a few drops of white just to lighten it a tiny little bit. Then i mix that grey with some yellow and a few drops of orange. and you should be a nice yellow/darkgrey color. Reduce that down about 40 - 50 % , you want to get alot of diffrent tones with the ground , so if you spray away from the canvas you want a yellowish color, if you spray close, then you want a dark grey.
Now i use stright black to cut out the wasp ,black is a great color for chrome it really makes it pop out and makes your colors look alot lighter , and brighter !!! Rember to get some black, and over reduce it hard , about 70% , then go in and add some black to your ground areas , to get more tones and effects. !!!!!! Be easy on the black, you only want to do it here and there!!!!!
Now i get stright white and start my highlights, i like it to look like theres some clouds in the sky and also think about how the body of the wasp curves , and adjust that in your effect. This is the time youll want to fix mess ups for the blue , i would recomend not useing any white to touch up the ground color, it can get blurry and we want it to stay sharp.
This peice was the reason i did the pratice 1, i wanted to see how it was going to look, and ive never did chrome before until now. Thanks alot, i hope its helped some begginers/novice airbrushers !! Mike Lang