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Airbrush Tip

Watercolor — An Airbrush Medium

Watercolor was one of the first mediums employed in airbrush technique.  Early on it was used for photographic retouching and illustration, and today it is used in both of these applications as well as fine art painting.  Watercolor is especially good for use in airbrush technique because it’s easily reduced to the correct consistency for spraying.

Both pan watercolors and those in tubes can be thinned quickly with just water.  Pan watercolors can be lathered with a paintbrush and then transferred to the airbrush color cup (or reservoir) for spraying.  Tube watercolors, those most commonly used, can be thinned in a paper cup or jar and then poured into the cup.  These are less likely to be contaminated from one color to another, as watercolors in a pan or block can easily be turned into “mud” when inter-mixing colors.

A few tips follow:

—To enhance the bleeding effect and flowability, add a few droplets of the dispersing agent ox gall to your colors.

—Clean watercolors from the airbrush with just soap and water.

—To make watercolors more water resistant, add a few droplets of acrylic medium to thinned colors.

—To enhance paintbrush watercolor washes, airbrush back into them to fortify the color, e.g., make blues deeper in the sky; or accent detail or develop more three-dimensional space by airbrushing in shadows.  You’ll discover that an airbrushed shadow looks realer than real.

—Establish an intensity of color through a traditional glazing technique by building up transparent layers of color.

—When selecting paper for airbrush technique, remember that rough papers in watercolor technique are used to develop highlights at the high points of the paper and darks at the valleys.  But when you spray onto this surface, the paint tends to mimic the texture of the paper and that texture becomes evident in the artwork.  Experiment on different surfaces of paper:  hot press, cold press and rough.

—And, as with traditional watercolor technique, remember that completed artwork should always be displayed under protective glass or Plexiglas.

Watercolors are great for working with the airbrush—from simplicity of use to discovering new techniques and enhancing your work in ways you probably never thought possible.  And there’s no clogging of the airbrush—another plus!