Hi Dabeebs!
Turns out 'how to draw my little pony eyes' pulls back loads of search hits, I'm currently planning to use these as my design template
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Got a couple of options with the rollin' papers (we called em skins in my day, does 'skinning up' still mean anything these days?), I'm trying the simpler option 1 first...
Option 1
- Place a skin over Toni's face and mark the centre points for the eyes
- holding centre mark skin to a monitor zoom the eyes template until they are the right distance apart to get the size of the eyes are roughly in proportion
- use a couple of post-it notes to tack the skin over the eyes image, the thin paper (Rizzla blue, but any will probably do) is thin enough to trace the image in pencil
- cut the paper so that each eye is on a narrow strip (much easier than trying to wrap the whole paper round the face in the next step)
- position one eye over the face with the pencilled side touching the face (the image is reversed so I used the right eye image on the left and vice versa, I could've retraced the image onto the other side to avoid reversing the image but couldn't be Rz'd)
- while holding the eye strip stationery pencil over the eye image (no need for care, rough scribbling works well
- the graphite on the paper should transfer to the mini giving guide lines for freehand painting
- position second eye, visually check that the eyea look level and evenly positioned on the face then pencil over the second eye
- swear because it looks like Picasso, (consider leaving the eyes obviously misaligned... but I think it would've jst looked like bad workmanship) use a soft rubber to rub the bad eye off of the mini then repeat (might need to go over the originsl linework in pencil again)
and this is the result...
View attachment 72293
Doesn't look great from front on, but should be enough to be able to recreate the original image (IF my freehand is good enough... and it's mighty rusty!).
This is as far as I've got right now, but if my freehand really lets me down I might paint back to pink and then try option 2...
Option 2:
Same steps as above up to having the paper tacked over the image on a monitor
- freehand paint the eyes onto the paper to finished quality including the whites of the eyes and some skin tone around edges, you want the image to be opaque to avoid skin tone showing through the finished eye. Applying several thin coats will help to create a file layer which will add stability later. A final coat of clear may also help. This is handy for dodgy freehand painters as you can keep trying until you've achieved two acceptable eyes
- with a sharp scalpel on a hard surface cut around the painted eyes (this is why you want pink around the edges so you don't have unpainted bits of paper)
- apply clear acrylic to the area on the mini where you want to add the first eye and be ready to do the next step before it dries
- lay the paper eye over the wet clear and hope that you either get the postion right or can drag the eye into position without damaging it (I haven't tried this with acrylics so can't predict the results)
- over a fairly flat surfaces the damp paper will hopefully have enough flexibilty to bed down smoothly onto the surface (an additional clear coat over the top may help)
- if you haven't already applied clear over the paper, do so to seal it paying particular attention to try to get the edges of the paper to feather down flat
- repeat with second eye paying attention to position, you'll have limited time to get it right before the clear start to dry
- tidy with freehand paint as required
DISCLAIMER
I've not tried this technique with acrylics, it's based on a car spray technique that I have used where the image is given enough coats that it forms a film when dry, after which the backing paper (normal paper rather than fag paper) is soaked with water and rubbed away leaving just the film image which is then placed over a clear wet sprayed car paint surface, and more coats of clear sprayed over the top. This works with car paint because the solvents in the wet paint remelts the film image forming a continuous paint surface, plus you can build further clear coats and then polish smooth. I assume that acrylics won't have the same solvent effect on dried coats hence my hope that fag paper is thin enough to do the same job. If you are going to try Option 2, do bear in mind that it's unverified, so definitely test it on a scrap piece first.
