Happy and healthy 2013!

I wish all a happy and healthy 2013!

Sincerely Yours - CommuniCats

Fiddling with 3D

Lately I've been fiddling around with 3D programs, because I was fed up with the programs I was using that crashed too often which caused a lot of effort to be lost. This is very frustrating so after having the usual crashes in trueSpace, I changed to Hexagon which crashed less often, but enough to annoy the crap out of me. After visiting some friends who I hadn't seen for 8 or 10 years (...) I suddenly remembered that I had the same program - Cinema 4D - that one company I used to work for planned to throw away because they couldn't get it to work. I never gave it much attention until recently.

One of the first tinkerings with C4D - the EFC logo

Very fine and sharp dagger strokes

Here is a trick to take dagger stroking to the next level. Gravity feed airbrushes are particularly suited for this technique, since the paint cup is not in the way when you hold the airbrush at a very sharp angle relative to the surface. The risk of involuntary becomes larger however...., so a lid to close the paint cup would be handy. Or you can use a gun like the Iwata Custom Micron SB which is perfect for the job.

CM SB with paint cup mounted on the 'wrong' side

Inbetween project - Panther

With this portrait I try to see if it is possible to closely approach urethane paint airbrush quality with water-based paint, Holbein Aeroflash. Set-up is follows:

1. Aeroflash thinned to 1 paint : 20 water : 3 drops of Talens Retarder
2. Air pressure just high enough to push out the paint
3. Airbrush CM SB with Aztek paint cup, polished needle. no air cap
4. Dagger strokes while airbrush is at a very sharp angle relative to surface
5. Hansa airbrush paper A4 size
6. Projection method: lightbox that I described in an earlier blog entry
7. 99% freehand (a little erasing here and there)

Newest image on top, older stages below.

Experiment failed

Make Iwata CM SB gravity feed

Testor's Aztek paint cups fit snugly onto the Iwata Custom Micron SB. It is easy to fit the siphon side cup on the Iwata which gives the benefits of a slightly larger volume and a lid that prevents unwanted paint spills plus an excellent balance since the Aztek's plastic side cups are as light as a feather. And best of all, the cup does not block the artist's view on what (s)he is airbrushing, which is kind of nice when sweating on minute details.... To some purists it may feel like mounting a Skoda wheel onto a Ferrari, but for those who will stop at nothing, it works...

Aztek siphon paint cup on Iwata Custom Micron SB

Iwata CM SB cleaner mod

Iwata's are great airbrushes, but they don't fit well in many cleaning pots, because the air duct kind of slopes into the front end that is partly outside of the cylindrical main housing. Most cleaning pots are designed to accommodate cylinder shaped airbrushes that have no protruding parts outside the main housing. There's a simple solution to modify them.

Left side of the Iwata CM SB

Erasers

Erasing is part of many airbrush artist's skills. When spraying with waterborne acrylics, there is a distinction between easily erasable and difficult to erase paints. Easy to erase paints (to my knowledge) are:

1. Holbein Aeroflash
2. Lukas Illu-Color
3. E'tac
4. Createx

A difficult to erase paints are Auto-Air and Wicked. There are also different types of erasers. In this blog entry I will discuss the manual type eraser pencils, which are often used by artists who create detailed fine art.

Meanwhile...

OK, after being stupid to spray uros without precaution I am recovering from inhaling the fumes and / or some kind of flu, I am airbrushing with bloody waterbornes again (for the time being). It is an old project that I postponed several times due to circumstances. This is a double portrait of the parents of a good friend. Here is the reference photograph (which is not really that good).

Reference photograph

DIY Isocyanide extraction system

After starting to spray with Uros again as can be seen in this post, I was having problems with my respiratory system and I am not sure if this is caused by the careless neglect of not using a fume extraction system or by seasonal influences in which humankind is periodically bombarded with pathogenic viruses or both. Just to be sure I am in the process of building an extraction system.

DIY extraction system under construction