What faces do I need to master?

There are so many variations on a theme...endless possibilities! Are there a set group of full faces/cheek art you'd recommend mastering before venturing out into the public? Either I picture myself having to tell someone I can't do their request, or I try it anyway, and fail miserably (like with my daughter, who now only wants Disney princesses painted on her, and I tried Ariel and look at her reaction!) Oy! Ariel the floozy

I would definitely practice the full face tiger, spiderman, and butterfly. As for cheek art, butterflies, bugs, lizards, baseballs, cars, skulls, and hearts are the most popular requests that I get. You should also learn a half face dinosaur and some eye designs, as well as a princess mask.

Silly farm has some videos for most of these(and more) on their site for free. There are also some great tutorials on youtube if you search for them.

I would say princess crowns, masks, butterflys, eye swirls for girls. For boys I'd say camo face, spider hero, tribals, batman, spider/scorpion. Tigers for either!! I'd say master 4-5 designs for boys and 4-5 for girls and then you will eventually just flow into other things. The key is practice....... practice.

When I first started I painted for free a lot to get better and increase my speed.

I don't do cheek art very much at all..... I only do it if I can't talk them into something else. It takes just as long to do a half face or a simple whole face design. Good luck!!

it is definitely for beginners, but if you can get your hands on the Usborne Face Painting book, it has all the basic face painting designs that you'll need (except for Spiderman). If you start with those and Spiderman, you should be ok. Don't feel bad about saying they have to pick from your selections for now. I only take on special requests if I feel comfortable with it. I often tell them that for tv characters, if I don't have a picture, I'm not comfortable trusting my memory.

earthorange wrote:Are there a set group of full faces/cheek art you'd recommend mastering before venturing out into the public?

I go out in the public w/ any old type of face paint
Seriously, If you had 5 girl faces & 5 boy faces you could do w/ the help of a picture that would be a great start. I had way more than that my 1st time out & had no clue how to do any of them. I lucked out as I'm a pretty good copy cat. Many designs will come easier w/ time & full face designs are generally easier than cheek art unless you are good at cartooning.
For boys: Spiderman, Batman, tiger, skull, & ball(baseball, basketball, football, soccer ball)
For Girls: Princess, kitty, puppy, butterfly, hearts/flowers

don't feel bad saying you don't take requests... it's quality control. tell them you need to practice all your designs first, so you can't do that one right now, but say thanks for their idea and tell them you'll add your idea to your book!

I felt the same as you, I wanted to perfect some basic faces. But I threw myself out there anyway last Saturday at the local farmer's market. I did it totally for free, solely so I could practice. I explained to everyone who sat down that I was learning. I made up a list of faces that I felt I could do (even though some of them I had never done). These were the ones that I thought would be most popular, and I had printed out samples of each that I could refer to if necessary (I kept that binder hidden away, didn't want anyone thinking it was my own work). I am proud to say that I never once looked in the binder!

Here is the list that I used:
[img][/img]

Oh sorry that's really big!!

Hazel, I like it! What program did you use to make that?

Well, I actually used a program called Printmaster, just because I am comfortable with it - but you could easily make it in Word or Word Perfect or any text program. Those are all just fonts I downloaded. Even the puppy was from a dingbat font. I think the crown was the only piece of clipart I used. (Isn't the puppy perfect?!)

I admit, I shamelessly stole the idea from Ashley's signs but I didn't have time (or talent) to draw them so I did this instead.

No one asked for a wild beast...

Thanks guys. I just ordered a mannequin head (from wimex, thanks for the heads-up) and a practice pad. I also have been watching YouTube videos like mad, and then also realized I could just google "face paint puppy" (or princess or batman, etc) under google images and peruse for inspiration...

I love, love, love the pic!!!!!!!

And I love your mermaid, too! Word to the wise... shy away from characters like that. Too hard to replicate, especially on a busy day with a squirmy kid! You can always say "I don't do licensed characters."

The mermaid reminds me of the gal from Who Framed Roger Rabbit... when Eddie is in Toon Town and sees a gal that looks like Jessica Rabbit from behind, but she turns around and says "A Man!" and chases him down trying to kiss him! I love it!

Ha! Her lips were smaller, and my daughter said, bit she doesn't look happy! Her lips need to be smiling more! So I went over them again, and well...

And the pic I was using ariel's hair was floating around in the water...but here it just looks like she used too much hair spray!

I copied a hello kitty on myself last night ad it turned out well, but if I'm going to have a no licensed character rule, doesn't that rule out spiderman and batman, too? Yikes!

Maybe just rule out Disney? Lol...

I'll do it if they have a picture for me to work with.

I'm still learning as I go. I have different faces for different events. It also depends on how many kids are there. If there are more then 20 kids then I try to have mostly cheek art or half faces.

The two things that I do alot are tigers and butterflies. I have several different styles of each.

Hazel wrote:Well, I actually used a program called Printmaster, just because I am comfortable with it - but you could easily make it in Word or Word Perfect or any text program. Those are all just fonts I downloaded. Even the puppy was from a dingbat font. I think the crown was the only piece of clipart I used. (Isn't the puppy perfect?!)

I admit, I shamelessly stole the idea from Ashley's signs but I didn't have time (or talent) to draw them so I did this instead.

No one asked for a wild beast...

are you having any problems with "Printmaster"? I've had mine for years and this is a new computer and it keeps locking up and dumping what ever I was working on, so frustrating!

Shandi, I have not had any problems with it. I am using Printmaster Platinum 12 which is an awfully old version. (Before that I had Printmaster Gold LOL!) Maybe it's the OS - I know that PM Platinum 12 is made for the Windows 2000/XP but I am using it on Vista with no troubles.

That Ariel is actually kinda cool in an offbeat way. You put your own spin on it, nothing wrong with that.

Hazel wrote:I felt the same as you, I wanted to perfect some basic faces. But I threw myself out there anyway last Saturday at the local farmer's market. I did it totally for free, solely so I could practice. I explained to everyone who sat down that I was learning. I made up a list of faces that I felt I could do (even though some of them I had never done). These were the ones that I thought would be most popular, and I had printed out samples of each that I could refer to if necessary (I kept that binder hidden away, didn't want anyone thinking it was my own work). I am proud to say that I never once looked in the binder!

Here is the list that I used:
[img][/img]

Hazel,
May I "borrow" this? I have an event where the clients want me to limit the designs. This would be perfect for it.

Oh of course, feel free to use it! I actually redid it last weekend, I made all the fonts bigger so it was easier to read and added kitty cat. This took it to two pages, but I think they look better. The new ones are in my gallery but they are not fullsized. If you want the fullsized jpg, I could PM them to you.

Or if anyone wants the names of the fonts I used, so you can make a similar one, just let me know.

I really liked this way of doing it, the kids had no preconceptions and I didn't feel concerned that the end result didn't look the same as in a picture.

Hazel, I LOVE your signs!!!!

I will hop on the topic. I love the poster idea. I have done several elementary school events where there could be 50 kids in line. I normally have books for the kids to look at. They get bogged down deciding if they want the blue butterfly or the pink and purple one, or the white dog with brown spots or should they get black spots. With time being so critical, using a sign like this instead would definitely speed things up.

I am definitely going to make up a sign like this. What a great idea. Thanks Hazel. There are plenty of sites out on the web with free fonts. I have downloaded some cool free fonts from this site.

http://www.1001fonts.com