Erasing and scratching/picking

CHÉRIE

Mac-Valve Maestro!
Hi guys :p

So I am desperately wanting to learn to use my electric eraser and picking tool on my work, especially for hair and fur... But I have NO IDEA WHAT I'M DOING :depressed::thumbsdown: Driving me crazy lol When I try erase on the blending board it doesn't come out, like barely anything, I don't know if it's meant to be that way...

The scratching/picking, I don't understand much of what I am supposed to do... I use wicked paint, if that makes a difference... I have no idea if I'm supposed to have a base colour below the top colour I am going to scratch into, and no idea if I must spray a tiny second at a time, or come in after a big section was spray and dried and scratch then... I don't want to damage my material either...

At the moment I am using blending board, and I have no idea if I can even scratch on that or if it is still too absorbent like paper is... :shock:

Needless to say, I need help before I start throwing things lollol
 
I use this technique in my paintings but I only use Etac Efx and more recently Createx CI, I have erased and scratched on cheap card with the etac but I don't know about wicked for scratching. Also I am not familiar with the blending board your using but you can always do a test on some spare board. I am hoping someone will drop a line who uses wicked.

There are a lot of examples of scratching erasing in the wip section. I watched a video by Mick Neill ( airbrush academy) on youtube the other day where he was painting a beard on a mono portrait. That might be worth a watch and im sure AB dreams has done some vids with scratching erasing.

not much help hopefully something.

Lee
 
I use this technique in my paintings but I only use Etac Efx and more recently Createx CI, I have erased and scratched on cheap card with the etac but I don't know about wicked for scratching. Also I am not familiar with the blending board your using but you can always do a test on some spare board. I am hoping someone will drop a line who uses wicked.

There are a lot of examples of scratching erasing in the wip section. I watched a video by Mick Neill ( airbrush academy) on youtube the other day where he was painting a beard on a mono portrait. That might be worth a watch and im sure AB dreams has done some vids with scratching erasing.

not much help hopefully something.

Lee
Thank you so much :) I will go have a look at those videos :p it will be easier to see it done instead of just guess :)
 
I use WICKED , and Createx Illustration and golden high flow , on many different surface types. But all have a white base,
But how I practice scratching and erasing was to paint a board in any color and then using different shaped blades saw how each one marked the surface.
Super tight lines I use the 30/60 degree blade that come to a sharp point for softer like I use the large curved blade.
Erasing I hardly use for hair and fur mainly cause I have to be doing something wrong LOL I use it more for highlighted areas of the face .
But much like airbrushing I practice a lot trying to see what works for me and what does not.
Oh also on scratching on a practice piece you can get a feel for how hard or soft you need to do it so you do not dig to deep into the material . Metal was the harder one to learn but going through to the metal on a couple of tries did make a cool effect.
 
The best tip I can offer apart from what has already been suggested is to not think of it as ‘scratching’ when you use a blade.
Instead think of ‘stroking’. You will then have a lighter touch with the blade. Your aim is to remove paint, not dig/damage your substrate.
As suggested, lay a light coat of paint and stroke you’re blade across the surface, sometimes the blade will work better in one direction than the other, you can then layer additional paint over the top and ‘stroke’ again, it builds depth. You can make the first layer of ‘stroking’ quite dramatic if your planning on multiple layers, don’t aim for to much detail to soon, otherwise it will get buried under the next few layers and be a waste of time.
 
first thing you need to know if you paint can be erased on the substrate you use , I know the CI cant be erased on paper and I have never worked with the wicked paints .
the trick is like Jack mentioned not to use any forse but let the eraser do the work if you work with a electric eraser there are a few tricks you need to know
1 sharpen your eraser tip by using sanding paper and let the tip spin on it in a 45 degree angle
2 use the soft tip if you want soft lines and make your lines softer with a soft pencil eraser
3 use the hard tip only if need a high light for instance a eye

if you want or need more control over your erasing use pencil erasers or the fiberglass eraser but be careful with the fiberglass eraser it can damage your substrate and it leaves sharp pieces on your substrate you best not remove with your bare hands
 
Cherie, for starters you will need to have paint ON the board in order to erase or scratch. By that I mean if you thin the paint too much it will get absorbed into the fibres and you can not get it out. So either you paint unthinned or if you need transparent paitn you need to use transparent base. Secondly you need a sharp blade and plenty of them. I use to go through 10 to 20 in a single painting. Now I don't use blades anymore and only my battery eraser with an ink eraser tip. But on the other hand, I use E'tac. I'll make a demo with Createx Illustration paint.

Oh and you did not say what you using as an eraser. Some erasers does not work.
 
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Thank you so much for all your advice! You all rock! :whistling::whistling:
I think I realize a lot of where I am going wrong, you guys are referring to scratching with a "blade"
I have a different kind of tool that I am not sure is meant for the same thing anymore lol It has a sharp point, like a pencil but in metal... And I don't think it is sharp enough compared to a blade...
Will give a blade a go and see how it feels and comes out :D

And thank you for the advice on the erasing! :D

I have a lot of playing around to do today! :laugh:
 
Cherie, for starters you will need to have paint ON the board in order to erase or scratch. By that I mean if you thin the paint too much it will get absorbed into the fibres and you can not get it out. So either you paint unthinned or if you need transparent paitn you need to use transparent base. Secondly you need a sharp blade and plenty of them. I use to go through 10 to 20 in a single painting. Now I don't use blades anymore and only my battery eraser with an ink eraser tip. But on the other hand, I use E'tac. I'll make a demo with Createx Illustration paint.

Ohm and you did not say what you using as an eraser. Some erasers does not work.
Ok will remember that, I do have a transparent base as well, so will try put that first... I do have some blades so will have a go with them... The electric eraser I am using is the one you showed on the facebook group from PNA :)
 
Thank you so much for all your advice! You all rock! :whistling::whistling:
I think I realize a lot of where I am going wrong, you guys are referring to scratching with a "blade"
I have a different kind of tool that I am not sure is meant for the same thing anymore lol It has a sharp point, like a pencil but in metal... And I don't think it is sharp enough compared to a blade...
Will give a blade a go and see how it feels and comes out :D

And thank you for the advice on the erasing! :D

I have a lot of playing around to do today! :laugh:
I have tried the Ice pick style scratching , I found you pretty much have to sharping it after a few uses .
I have also tried a pointed wooden dowel like Dru Blair uses .
Mainly it is finding what works best for you .
 
I have sent this to Cherie already but for others that might be interested, here are the results. BTW, the "blending card" in question is a very smooth card stock even smoother than bristol board but still with a slight tooth. It is mainly used in illustration and marker work. Here I used Createx Illustration colours on it.

22539841_1442067662529362_8425703804712749629_n.jpg
 
Also you don't really want the paint to soak into the paper but to sit on top of it That's why most people use yupo or blair paper as it won't let the paint soak in, BUT there is a way you can do it with Board or art type paper and thats to seal the paper with a clear coat or two and then scratch and or erase down to the cleared paper.
 
I have tried the Ice pick style scratching , I found you pretty much have to sharping it after a few uses .
I have also tried a pointed wooden dowel like Dru Blair uses .
Mainly it is finding what works best for you .
I think I will have to get mine sharpened then and try at a later stage to work that one out, I am going to get some wooden dowels as well and have a go with that :)

Just don't hold the blade like a pencil, try to keep the blade as parallel as possible within reason. This is where synthetic papers shine for me at least :)
Thank you! I probably would've held it like a pencil and ended up cutting right through the card lol

Also you don't really want the paint to soak into the paper but to sit on top of it That's why most people use yupo or blair paper as it won't let the paint soak in, BUT there is a way you can do it with Board or art type paper and thats to seal the paper with a clear coat or two and then scratch and or erase down to the cleared paper.
Thank you :D I will definitely try that, Andre also gave me that idea of having a base first, I'm sure that will help a lot! :thumbsup:
 
Also you don't really want the paint to soak into the paper but to sit on top of it That's why most people use yupo or blair paper as it won't let the paint soak in, BUT there is a way you can do it with Board or art type paper and thats to seal the paper with a clear coat or two and then scratch and or erase down to the cleared paper.

I second that, I'm just experimenting with this myself but so far but wicked color seems to stick pretty agressively. The only way I've been able to get a clean scratch with it has been by using a pretty hard clear first. It didnt work over 4004 but worked well putting down some slightly thinned liquitex gloss varnish.
Which dries with a bit of texture so it's not super slick but it is very hard.
 
Just remember that it is a waste of money to buy special paper just to seal it in order to scratch and erase. Think about it. After you've sealed it, you are painting on the sealant and not the paper. So it does not matter what paper you use if you are going to seal it. BUT different papers handles sealants differently. Some might soak it up more than others so you can't just use tissue paper.
 
It would be a waste for me to buy special paper no matter what, LOL , But yes you're right. One other note I've had some luck with the varnish over another color as well so that's an option too if you don't want the substrate color. Also everything i've said applies to posterboard with wicked color. I have not tried anything else yet.
 
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