Just bought an airbrush and painted my first deer head. WOW! I need lots of work. I went from light colors to dark but I think I should have let my "off White" dry before putting on the "dark Brown". It looked o.k. at first but when it dryed it turned a grey color. I tryed to paint over it an it looks even worse now. Looks like the grey tape around the eye. Finally (sorry) can I strip the paint and start over. I used water based paints. Thanks for any response. I'm feeling pretty bad about screwing it up.
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Dan, I have been in the same boat. I used a wet rag and managed to get the water-based paints removed. I started over and was happier the second time. I haven't tried any of the others, but I know it can be done with the water-based paint such as you have used. Good luck, Patrick
Follow this method and you will be happy, it came from Bill Yox and I have used it for 2 years now with outstanding results. Paint the inner ear and upper eyelid with off-white-lightly. I mean very lightly. Next paint the ears, all bare skin around the eye,the nose pad ad inner nose with flesh. Paint the eye skin very light. Next paint the bare eye skin with cocoa brown again very very lightly. Darken the colr as you reach the eyelids. High light the upper and lower eyelid with Rich Brown also paint the lower part of the nose pad. Use this color very sparingly! Paint the nose pad and darken the eyelid with dark brown. This schedule is altered a little from Bill's schedule but it works great. Bill just judged a deer head of mine at the Illinois show and all colors and painting recieved no bad marks from Bill in the advanced Division. Hope this long winded version helps.
If youve ever seen Eric's deer work, youll know you can trust what he says to do, he does beautiful whitetail work. I usually do my brown values first, then highlight with the second "black" application. Also, I dont spray brown on my nosepads. Try the method that Eric describes first and see how you like it, before you go with my "adjustments" though...
Thanks for the help. I'm going to try and strip the old paint first.
Eric this looks like a good paint schedule, would you mind letting me know what kind of paints and are they water base? thanks
I use lifetone waterbase paints. After you paint your deer you can easily wipe any over spray from the hair with a Q-tip dipped in acetone, rubbing alcohol laquer thinner etc. Wipe the eyelashes, nose hairs etc. It will come right off. E-mail me if you have any questions or need help. I will explain in detail.