In our basic lessons, we learned how to airbrush a star. Now we are going to use a more complex star shape and use the same techniques you have been practicing.
5 Point Star Template
Now you know how to airbrush stars on t-shirt designs using dagger strokes. You can also use a different technique that uses a star pattern. To do this, you’ll need to print off a star pattern on your computer. You can draw one yourself in an image program like Photoshop or you can download the following design.
Airbrush Supplies Required:
What you’ll need to follow along with this how to article:
- Double action airbrush,
- airbrush ready paints (Com-art, Golden Airbrush Colors, Dr Ph Martins),
- hobby knife.
The air pressure you use with your airbrush depends on the type of airbrush and the brand of paint you are using. Generally speaking, any pressure between 20 and 60 PSI should work fine with a gravity feed airbrush.
How To Airbrush 5 Point Star (Steps)
- The stars I printed above will help you understand how big my stars are. You will need to print two of the same star. It will be clear why later on in this tutorial.
- Now that you have your stars printed, go ahead and cut one of the stars out using a hobby knife. Printer paper works fine for practice, but you might want to use a heavier card board like poster board or even a t-shirt stencil material if this is a design you will be doing often.
- To attach your star to your painting surface, roll some masking tape and place it on the back side of the star.
- Make sure your star is in the right place on your painting surface before you start. Secure it with tape or something else. Then spray around the star with red paint. After that, spray yellow paint just outside of the red. If you point your airbrush into the star template, it will lift the template up and we’ll get over spray under the template. This is not what we want. Keep your airbrush square to the template or directed out away from the template.
- To make a star-shaped design, remove the star template and you will see that the shape of your star is now defined. You can see that there was no over spray under the template, which gives you a clean, sharp outline. If over spray had gotten under the template, the edges of the star would have been fuzzy instead.
- Now go back to the star you printed off. With a pencil and straight edge, divide it into sections as pictured above. With a hobby knife, cut one of the sections out as pictured above.
- Cut out the sections of your star as pictured. Make sure you cut everything out carefully. Then place the star on top of the outline you drew earlier. Make sure it is in the right spot so it looks like the picture.
- I used blue for my third color. You can use any color you want. Spray along the inside edge of the sections you cut out of the star template. Be careful to keep your airbrush square to the template so that you don’t spray too much under the template.
- Take your star template off and add some color to the sections that it covered. I used a blue airbrush to do this. Your star should now look like the one pictured above or even better.
- To make the stars look a bit sharper, I use a business card as a shield and some white. I put the card along the top edge of a star section and add just a touch of white. Then I let the over spray drift down into the star. I do this for each high point before moving on to the next step.
- I added some stars around the outside of the star. I did this by airbrushing a thin layer of blue over the white we added in the step outlined above.
And there you have it another technique to airbrush a star, which can be used on many different surfaces.