Sheer Lace cont...

Hopefully this pic is clearer. (meh slightly. crappy iPod camera)

I had spent quite a bit of time trying to get all the details of the sheer material. At first I wanted to get the dark lines of the netting. Unable to mask it in black I chose to lay down a black background and the stencil in the holes with opaque white through a piece of screen. That worked I got a nice mesh pattern that looked ...well... symmetrical. Certainly not like the flow of a garment. So I scrapped that idea. The flesh tone didn't lay right either. Anyplace that did not get a heavy area of white looked very muddy.

I then tried to hint at the mesh with first, stamping then pencil. Stamping was worse than the stencil because it was so pronounced. The drawing in was very difficult and didn't offer much.

So I stared at the reference for a while... ;)

I determined that it was more the color that determined it was sheer. The black over the skin made it look a little violet in places. Anywhere the holes were larger, more skin would show and the area looked more peach.

So to make it real easy I just painted the arm like it was naked. I tried to make it dark enough so when I put the lace on top the value would be correct. Long story short I made it too light. Not a problem though.

Now comes the hardest part, or I should say the most tedious part; the liquid frisket. I turned on the projector and lined up the arm with the original. Then using a sandwich stick I dabbed frisket everywhere that wasn't 90-100% darkest value. The sandwich stick is a large toothpick looking thing. I bought them for mixing sticks at the woodworking store. The are too big to pick teeth with and are flat. Sort of like a small tapered Popsicle stick. Whatever, this tool works the best for this task. I tried a paintbrush but it clogged up and I couldn't clean it. I tried a nub I bought with the frisket but that would clog like the brush and also was hard to clean. The stick worked great and is cheap. It also works like a brush. I found that a pointy eraser works like a brush too. You just need something that is soft and wont absorb the frisket.

I had to spend a lot of time dithering the half tones and blocking out the flesh in the large holes. I should have spent more time. I will on the final project. Its best to keep a dim light on while doing this part so you can see what has been done. Start at the top and work systematically down. This keeps you from touching wet frisket. Dry with a