Yikes that was a mistake....

Have you ever painted a design and just thought this is terrible?  You want to clean it up quick and start over.  What is the best way/fastest way to clean up a face fast?

been there, done that.

don't act embarrassed, just explain it's not coming out the way you want, and you want to make it look good for them.

wipe off the section or even the whole face with a damp (but not dripping) paper towel, then dry with a dry paper towel, and repaint.

so be sure to have paper towels and clean water on hand

There is nothing that copious amounts of glitter cannot fix!  

LOL! Glitter fixes many things!

Shannon Fennell wrote:There is nothing that copious amounts of glitter cannot fix!  

I lol'ed so hard.

Oh!
Shannon!
That is SO funny...
and
so
true.

xoxo

that is hilarious, shannon

Shannon, you are TOO funny!!!
Someone asked for a fox this summer, which I've never even tried. It was AWFUL!!!!!!!! I wiped it off as I asked the face painter next to me if I could see her example pic. (We're friends) "Much better" I said to the little one when I was done. Went home & practiced some more.

1,000 points to Shannon!!!


p.s. to answer the OP query; When the child is so wiggly that they are actually trying to dodge your brush and the parent has them in a headlock - I like to say this (loud enough for everyone around me to hear) "Ya know, this is definitely not gonna be my best work. So, if anybody asks - make sure you tell them "she" did it... then I nod my head in the direction of the face painter sitting next to me... gets a laugh every time and kinda-sorta lets me off the hook simultaneously.

I was at a Festival in Oct. I was very clearly the face painter to go to if you wanted quality work. All of a sudden every princess crown I saw (that I didn't do) had so many jewels on it the eyebrows were being weighed down.

While I feel like I want to wash it off, I don't. Instead I act like it's totally amazballs because no one can really tell a good design from a bad design anyway. I have painted some of the worst stuff in my mind and still had parents 'ooh and aww' over them and the kids are really happy regardless.

So yeah, slap some glitter on it lol. I also take a photo fo i can look at it later and see what I did wrong. 

If i'm just starting out and I know it's not going well, yeah I some times start over.

going to confess my one and only worst face painting moment. my own fault, too.

when i was starting out and not too bright, i tried painting a rainbow butterfly with white edging for the first time on girl at an event.

i painted the rainbow base and was attempting the white edging, when she caught a glimpse of it in the mirror and broke out WAILING about how bad it looked and she didn't want it, etc.

her mom was standing there and tried to console her, as i quickly offered to wipe it off and start over, but she continued to howl, so her mom whisked her off to the restroom to wash it off.

i composed myself and continued to the next victim, in the long line of kids who had witnessed her meltdown.

note to self - never attempt a design you haven't done before at an event..

oh jlirie, I'm sure you are much too hard on yourself. 

I had the same thing happen with a spider-man years ago. The mom thought it would be fun to grab my mirror and show him what he looked like. I was done the white eyes and just starting on the red when she did so, and this kid freaked out. He started crying and wailing that "it doesn't look like spider-man!!!" as I tried to explain that it wasn't done yet! He thought it was going to look like spider-man right away. He didn't understand that it was a process. And sadly few kids do. I remember as I'm painting something on their hand, a few strokes in "That doesn't look like a frog!" or whatever. Or some times kids watching will do that, while I'm painting something "That doesn't look like a -X-" again only a few strokes in. Little brats think they know everything lol and are VERY vocal about it.

Now I keep the mirror turned face down, and never let the parents grab it. They can take photos while i'm working, but i tell them not to show the kid until after, because that would ruin 'the surprise'.  

I ALWAYS try out completely new stuff at festivals, no issues. Just don't let em see it til it's done, because they are too stupid to figure out it's a process and not a stamp! lol

that's exactly what happened, she caught it mid-process and freaked out.

Hate it when people touch my stuff. Grr

Most of all when parents think they can touch my stuff.

When the parents try to grab my mirror to show the kid before it's done.

I always think of forrestfairys competitors rainbow cat with a beard pic. The kid in that pic is thrilled with their monstrosity of a face paint. If kids can be happy with that, they can be happy with my mess up.

jlirie wrote:going to confess my one and only worst face painting moment. my own fault, too.

when i was starting out and not too bright, i tried painting a rainbow butterfly with white edging for the first time on girl at an event.

i painted the rainbow base and was attempting the white edging, when she caught a glimpse of it in the mirror and broke out WAILING about how bad it looked and she didn't want it, etc.

(Old post, I know, but new to me...)

I think your problem here is letting her get a glimpse of it in the mirror mid-job. Every time I've been painted up by another artist, going back to when I was maybe 6 years old through last month, there was never a mirror to look into mid-job, I had to wait until it was done. (And three of the more recent ones were full face designs where I had to close my eyes at least part of the time, which makes it a bit hard to see a mirror anyway.)

that's partly true, when i'm applying the base coat for a design it often looks like random abstract painting, until you start pulling it together with the details.

although not having practiced it before was a contributing factor