Basic Airbrush Lesson:
Sphere with Shadow

For this airbrush lesson, I'll show you how to paint the sphere shown above.

The tools you'll need (besides your airbrush equipment) are:

• white paper
• exacto knife
• black paint
• tape
• something round - to trace a circle

The skills we will be focusing on are:

• Shading
• Loose Masks
• Edges

Scroll down when you are ready to get started!

Step 1

On a white piece of paper trace a circle and use the exacto knife to cut the circle out.

Step 2

Place the piece of paper with the hole in it (the positive mask) onto another piece of white paper (which will be your "canvas"). You may want to secure the two pieces of paper down with tape to keep them from moving around.

Step 3

Alright. Time to paint!

Holding the mask (the paper with the hole) in place, use your airbrush to spray black paint lightly at the bottom left edge of the circle, gradually shading up to the top right edge.

Go Slow - this isn't a race.

Sneak a peak under the mask from time to time see how you are progressing. Just be sure to put it back in the right alignment once you've peeked.

Because the paper mask is right against the surface of your "canvas" the edge should be fairly crisp.

Step 4

Continue shading till you are happy with the results.

Make sure that all areas of your circle have at least a little color - otherwise, if you leave the top right of the circle completely free of paint, you will not be able to see where your sphere begins.

Step 5

When you are done shading the circle, remove the mask. It should look something like the photo below.

Step 6

Now it's time to add the shadow... this really brings the sphere to life!

Take your mask and draw an oval shape on the paper where the shadow would be (don't fret if you can't draw, just get the basic shape in there). Next cut that oval out with the exacto knife.

Step 7

Place the mask back onto your work, being careful to align it properly. When you have it in the right place, use some tape to make sure it doesn't move.

Step 8

Now place the circle you cut out in step one over the circle you painted and tape it in place. Placing this circle over your work protects what you have already painted from overspray that make occur in the next steps.

Step 9

Ok... remember the airbrush lesson on edges? Well that's what this step is all about.

If you look at a shadow closely, you will see that the edges of a shadow are sharper or crisper close to the object and get softer or blurry further from the object.

We can achieve this by lifting the far edge (the left edge) of the paper about an inch off the surface of your work.

Now, when you spray, the edge where the paper is far away from the work will be soft and the other side (the right side) where the paper is closer will be crisper.

Lightly spray some paint in the exposed area concentrating your efforts on the area closest to the base of the sphere - just lightly "dust" that areas that are farther away.

The Final Result!

Once you have sprayed in your shadow remove all the masking and you should have something that looks like this...

If it doesn't look like this... don't worry about it.... just try again!

Or... try another airbrush lesson and come back to this airbrush lesson another time : )