by Dean Schimmenti
Reprinted from Airbrush Technique Magazine.
This is a step-by-step article on how to airbrush a motorcycle design onto a white t-shirt. The Motorcycle in question, a Ducati is a work of art to begin with and I did my best to capture this incredible machine on fabric. This shirt was done free hand using only one stencil ( for the "Ducati" lettering ) . This was painted using a Paasche VL airbrush with a #3 tip and needle with Createx acrylic textile paint.
PHOTO #1: The first step is to stretch the shirt over a board of some kind (I use masonite). You may notice that the design is lightly sketched in. This can be done to speed the process along by using a projector to shine the image onto the surface and lightly sketching it in with pencil, fabric marker or disappearing fabric marker. Obviously there are those that think this step is cheating, but for time constraints, it really is quicker and makes sure all the proportions are correct. Always have your reference photo in front of you to compare. Try to see the depth of color in your reference and not just the final color. This will help you figure out the best method for you to paint that piece.
The first paint we lay down is a transparent red with some tinting white added to get a pinkish color. This step is used as a base to show some of the contours and highlights which will appear in the final painting. Since I'm using a white shirt, I will allow the white to show through in places for the highlights. Sorry, I do not have this picture, I think my batteries died right before this shot, and I wasn't aware.
PHOTO #2: Next we start by lightly adding transparent light brown to the darker areas of the bike fairings, and a few other areas where it is required. The brown is also used to mark the lines in the fairings, and to add shading at the vents.
PHOTO #3: After the brown, we hit some areas with transparent yellow. Brake rotors, exhaust pipes, forks, handlebars, etc.
PHOTO #4: Next we start to fade in transparent red over most of the fairings. The brown layer beneath will help give this red coat depth. The lighter red base coat is allowed to show through in some areas where indicated on the reference photo.
PHOTO #5: After the red, we lightly mist the darker areas of the fairings and drop shadow with a mixture of transparent blue, purple and tinting black. Don't get to crazy with this. You can always go darker later, but it is very hard to make it lighter. This mixture is also used on the tires, rims, forks, seat, mirrors and engine area to bring out the features and shading.
PHOTO #6: This next step really starts to bring the image to life. We add a touch of leaf green to the seat, rims, rotors and lights. This just gives more color depth, plus it was evident in the reference photo. As you can tell in the photo, I added some more transparent light brown to the lower fairing, because it just didn't show up the way I wanted it to.
PHOTO #7: The final step is to come in with opaque white for your highlights. Use your reference photo again to see what areas get highlights, and what areas just need some light fades. Remember at the beginning we left areas free of paint to let the white of the shirt show through as highlights. This is the only place where we use a stencil for this painting. I cut out a "Ducati" stencil to use on the fairing. Remember that the word is curved with the fairing, so lightly fade in white from the left, so the letters look like they curve too.
PHOTO #8: If you want, you can add a background to your painting. Here is an example of the background that I painted on a similar shirt, which I happened to be painting at the same time as our subject piece. This background was done quickly to give the piece a racetrack theme.
If you wanted to paint this piece quickly, some of the in between steps could be left out. This shirt took about 2-2.5 hours to complete, mainly because I was painting two at the same time, and taking pictures too. The time frame varies, depending on your skills, but with practice you'll get quicker and have better control using your airbrush.
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