Silhouette Painting
One of my all-time favorite pieces of art on our walls is this silhouette painting of our kids that I did. I’ve thought many times about updating it, but I’m not sure I could bring myself to take this one down. I’ve actually taken that same image and used it in different ways because I love it so much. The date stamp on my photos says it was 8 years ago, but it was really just yesterday… right??
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SUPPLIES:
Canvas/paper
Acrylic paint (black plus background colors)
Paint brushes
Printed image to trace
Pencil
Scissors
Tape
Frame
Optional:
Vinyl
I used a 16×20 canvas board with the intention of framing it, and I used a frame that I bought off the shelf at Michaels, but I underestimated the thickness of the canvas. I had to leave the glass out of the frame. It actually looks very nice, but alternatively I could have painted on paper that would have easily fit in the frame with the glass. So keep that in mind when you’re choosing your materials.
The first step is to take a picture that shows off the silhouettes. I had my kids look to the side so that you can see their sweet faces, and I had them stand in front of as neutral a background as possible. As it turned out, that wasn’t very neutral. At all. Fortunately I had someone very talented to help me out. Sorry, Dad.
My dad happens to be amazing with Photoshop. Thankfully, he was able to get a good trace of the image, even though I did not make it easy for him. He was also able to erase some hair and otherwise get a good side profile of each kid. Nowadays there are a whole lot of apps that make it easy to trace an image. I haven’t settled on one that I like better than others, but I’ve downloaded a bunch of free ones from the App Store. I’ve even used my Silhouette Studio software to cut out different images. Of course, it still helps if the background is a solid color.
I had taken the image and turned the silhouettes black, so I sized it the way I wanted to and printed it out on normal printer paper. It took multiple pieces of paper, so after I cut everything out I taped it together to make one big template.
As soon as I was sure this whole thing was actually going to work, I had to prepare my canvas. This was fun, and I wasn’t entirely sure what I was going to do before I started painting. I went with a red/orange/yellow color scheme because I knew it would look good in the spot I was planning to hang it. Once I was happy with the way it looked, I let it dry before moving onto the next step.
I put a few pieces of folded over tape underneath the template to hold it down, and then I traced the outline of the silhouettes onto the canvas with a pencil.
After that I used black acrylic paint to fill it in. I went slowly, particularly around the edges, and painted two coats. I still had to keep going back to fill in any little spots I missed.
That’s really all there is to it. I mentioned above my issues with the frame, but it works and looks beautiful hanging on the wall.
If I had it to do over again, I would use Silhouette Studio to make a stencil out of vinyl or contact paper. Depending on the size, it might still require cutting the stencil in pieces, but I could cut up to a 12×12 image with my Cameo. (As it turns out, my image is just barely too big, but I could easily have sized it down enough.) The advantage of using a sticky stencil is that you can paint without worrying too much about paint bleed. Peel the silhouette out of the stencil and then use the outer part as the stencil.
To avoid paint bleed, you do have to make sure to press down the edges really well so that they seal as much as possible. The other thing I do is paint from the outside in. Start from the very edges of the stencil and paint towards the inside of the image. Or they make paint brushes that are meant specifically for use with stencils. They come in different sizes, but the top is flat and round and meant to keep the paint from seeping underneath the stencil.
I’m feeling inspired to do an updated painting of my kids. Who will you paint a silhouette of?
