corrwip1

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The most recent work to date. All work is now designed in Photoshop on PC. Images are collected from the internet as well as books and magazines. All paper images are scanned and cut out from their background in Photoshop and collaged together on a scaled template. Having learned the basics of Photoshop, the design process is much quicker and any changes to the final design are easier. The client also gets a much clearer idea of the finished job. In the days when I only produced a black and white line drawing of the design I rarely produced colour versions and only told the client what the final colours would be.

The undercoated panels, fitted together in the factory and hung from the wall.800 square feet of white!The bottom panels are drawn out and painted first. When finished, they are taken away and the top panels are lowered to the floor. No more working from scaffolding! (thanks to Matt for that idea!)

Another change since the mid 1990's is that the design is now transfered onto acetate and projected onto the full scale artwork. The design is divided into sections corresponding to the main sections of the backflash. These are enlarged to A4 size and printed out. Acetates are then made from each of these, producing the line drawing you can see enlarged in these photographs. This is then projected onto the area to be painted using a basic overhead projector.

Drawing from the projected design

About six different skin tones are used for the skin, in equal stages from the darkest to the lightest. I now spray the darkest tone first,covering only the areas of darkest skin tone, before working up through the 5 or 6 tones to the lightest.I now use yet another spraygun, a brilliant new Olympos SGA04, which can spray pencil thin lines and wider (up to 5") with no need to change aircaps or nozzles. It has a lovely,smooth action and,in about 4 years of use has prooved incredibly reliable.

Adding more tones until the whole skin area is covered

With all the skin tones sprayed in, the hair is added, again working from dark to light

The basic colours for the hair are blocked in and I start working back through the skin tones, this time from lightest to darkest

Some detail added for the mouth and eyes before the darkest skin tone. The darkest tone is then sprayed, adding definition to the eyes and mouth as well as being taken up into the hair and beginning the folds of the clothes. This seems to tie the skin, hair and clothes together. Some further highlights are then added to the hair

Working very close to the surface to get finer lines I add the final details to the eyes and mouth with white.Spraying slightly further away I add softer highlights to the forehead and nose with some additions to the hair. The clothes are finished too - working from dark to light with no need to go back over the colours as I did with the skin tones. All the other figures are completed in much the same way. Generally speaking, for skin tones I work from dark to light and back to dark: for hair,clothes and other materials I work from dark to light and then just add a few highlights and shadows.

Beginning the central figure. The surrounding figures are masked off to give sharp edges and to help make the central figure stand out even more.

In this case all the figures along the whole of the bottom panels, were painted first. After being lightly rubbed down with a scotch pad they were then masked off and the bright colours of the background were sprayed in, working closely to the printout design.( which can be seen stuck to the panel in the right hand side photo.)

The panels with the masking removed

A lot of attention to detail on the central figure - to help it stand out

The bottom panels completed. Once finished and varnished, these panels are removed and fitted to the main frame of the ride, and the top panels can be lowered to the floor. For this reason I always spray about 6"- 12" onto the top panels so I have some reference to match my projected acetates to when drawing out the top