Photo 1: The rear fender before the dragon was airbrushed

Here we will go through the airbrushing of an orange dragon that was rendered as part of the artwork on the rear fender of the Medieval Celtic Armored Triumph Rocket III project.
Photo 1 shows the fender ready for the dragon artwork.


Design and Create the Stencil
My next step is to plan how the dragon will look inside the overall design, so I make a quick pencil sketch on paper to help me with the composition.

Photo 2: A sketch of the dragon is used as the basis for the stencil and help compose it with the design

Photo 2 shows the sketch overlaid on the rear fender's blue portal after it was scanned into the computer. This digital composition helps free me in many ways.

First, I can use pencil and paper to sketch, which I find more natural, faster, and easier than sketching with the computer. Second, I can make my original pencil sketch to any scale I wish, so long as it can be scanned or photographed into the computer later. Third and most importantly, once the sketch is in the computer I can scale and rotate it in any way I want to compose it with the rest of the design. I will often print out a design, quickly cut it out and place/compose it on the object to be painted to see how it fits. If it does not fit right, I can go back to the computer, make some quick changes and print another sketch for composition. This makes accurate positioning and scaling of design elements much faster than sketching and re-sketching directly on the surface to be painted.

To make my stencil, I simply print the sketch at the appropriate scale onto a piece of thick paper. You will want to use a heavier weight paper or transparency film so the stencil will hold its shape after cutting. Yet you do not want to use paper that is too thick because you will want the stencil to bend without breaking or developing creases. Transparency film works very well for this. Using transparency film also has other benefits, as we will see later.

Next, I cut out the stencil from the printout. At this point, I only cut the outer most features (its silhouette), and I am careful to follow the features closely as this will define the dragon.

Airbrushing with the Stencil

	Now we are ready to begin the airbrushing process. First, I apply clear frisket film over the portal area and mask off the edges with tape to keep overspray off the rest of the background art. Next, I use my cut out stencil and compose it on the background. When I find a position I like, I use a piece of low tack tape rolled into a loop to stick the stencil in place. Photo 3 shows the frisket masking and stencil in place. Note how I made sure that the frisket lays completely flat in the areas that will be painted. You do not want bubbles or wrinkles in your frisket because they will let your paint bleed into unwanted areas.
Photo 3: Frisket is applied and the stencil is taped on top
	I then use the airbrush to spray a little white around the stencil borders to outline the dragon's silhouette. This gives me an accurate outline that I can cut out.
Photo 4: The dragon's silhouette is outlined with white paint
	Next, I carefully cut out the silhouette using an Xacto knife and remove the frisket that defines the inside of the dragon. Then I spray white base uniformly inside the outline, except for the lower portion, which I fade into the background because the dragon will appear faded into the blue portal. I need this white base to cover the background since I will be using candies (transparent) paints to render the dragon.
Photo 5: White base is used to cover the background
	Going back to the paper stencil, I cut out some of the primary features, such as the border between the neck and fins and the head. I am careful not to fully cut out pieces of the stencil since I want to keep it as a single piece. Leaving cut portions of the stencil hanging by a thread helps things stay in the proper place so I do not have to use extreme care to position separate pieces in relation to each other. I can also flip portions out of the way for spraying when I need to. You may find it easier to completely cut out the pieces of the stencil and use them separated from one another. Some designs may also work better as separate pieces as well. Just use the method you feel will work best for the project. Photo 6 shows how I used my partially cut stencil to spray candy orange and lightly shade some important outlines that define the neck and head.
Photo 6: Orange is used to accent some primary edges
	Next, I use the head portion of the stencil to mask that area off. Then following my accent marks from the last step, I use a darker orange to spray the more shaded portions of the dragon.
Photo 7: Darker orange is used for the darker portions
	At this point, I do not use the stencil, but I keep it close to use as reference for spraying the details in the head - still using the dark shading orange.
Photo 8: The features in the head are free handed
	Now I switch to a yellow/gold candy and spray the fins, the eye and some highlights. The eye was sprayed through the stencil after I cut out the eye portion.
Photo 9: Yellow/gold is used to spray the fins, eye and highlights
	Next, I switch to a very dark yellow to spray the eye pupil and shadow the fins and other areas further. The pupil was masked off with a new piece of clear frisket and cut out for spraying. Using the clear frisket is easier for positioning the pupil if you are using an opaque stencil (like paper) since it is hard to judge the placement if you cannot see through it. This is where a transparent stencil (if you made your stencil with transparency film) would have had some advantages.
Photo 10: Dark yellow is used for the pupil and shadow further
	Here, I switch to white to lightly highlight the fins, back, eye and other features. After that, I lay down another new piece of frisket and cut out the tongue and teeth.
Photo 11: White is used to highlight the fins, eye and other features
	I spray the tongue first using white base and then candy red. Then I spray the teeth with white base and switch to a dark yellow mix to slightly shade the teeth, tongue, eye and mouth.
Photo 12: The tongue, teeth and mouth are sprayed
	At this point, I am satisfied with the dragon, so I remove all the frisket. The last things I do are render the ripples for the portal and fade the dragon into it better. The final touch is adding a shadow for the dragon to give it depth from the background. Photo 14 below shows the finished portal dragon. As you can see, there is a great deal of planning that goes into airbrushing artwork. The custom made stencil in this example helped us recreate our roughly sketched vision quickly and accurately so that we could concentrate on the finer parts of the artwork, such as the shading, colors and details.
Photo 13: After frisket is removed

Photo 14: The finished portal dragon