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Showing posts with label distressed. Show all posts
Showing posts with label distressed. Show all posts

Friday, March 09, 2012

CREATING "FAKE" WOOD FLOORS AND WALLS!

I'm often get ask what kind of surfaces I shoot on or against and thought I would show some of the "Fake" wood floors I have. When I say "Fake" I mean the illusion of a wood floor or wall. I use real wood but distress the wood to look old by using a "Dry Brush Effect". Here is some work for that "Look" from my gallery in a past life(just over 15 years before going full-time as a photographer) as a Decorative Painter!
It doesn't take large pieces of wood to create the look of a floor or wall and it's not hard to put them together. I prefer pine because it's easier to work with so all you have to do is purchase 4 of or 5 pieces and assemble then with smaller strips in back with screws(I like to use drywall screws). You can also use stain to darken the wood then distress to give an antique, well worn look for image themes!
I also use both sides and it's very economical.You can create two different wood surfaces in totally different color tones and techniques! It is limitless what you can create and it can help you be very creative in your future image shoots. Here is another image showing what I mean:
I hope this gives you ideas to create some panels and wood surfaces of your own!
Here are some images using these wood creations:

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

FINALLY TOOK THE PLUNGE!!

I have always wanted a vintage mannequin(dress form). For the last few months I finally decided to look for one on Ebay, Etsy and various online stores to find the best one! Each one I loved was too expensive ($500.00 to $750.00) or they would not ship to Canada.
So last Sunday I took the plunge and bought a brand new dress form that I found on ebay!
It cost me $189.00 USD+ shipping and within 4 days(Thursday) I received my beloved dress form at 2:30 PM in the afternoon, LOL!! It cost me a total of about $300.00 CAD and I think I did a great deal!
When purchasing the the new form I decided to antique and distress it to look like a vintage mannequin.
I plan to use it a lot and have many ideas for this in the future. Thursday night the transformation happened, LOL!!
This is how it looked when purchased.

I brewed a big pot of strong coffee(the aroma was fantastic in my studio) and painted the dress form with a natural bristle brush (acrylic bristle will curl from the hot coffee)...don`t be afraid to wet the form thoroughly.


After I saturated it with coffee I let it dry a little and then began the distressing with a dry brush and a little acrylic paint. I antiqued the stand, skirt cage and finial with some burnt umber, antique bronze and gold.
It took about  three hours to finish and I think it turned out fantastic!!


The next day I took some test shots and here are the final images with my fabulous Vintage dress form.Of course Photoshop helped a little with the final process. I added a couple of vintage textures and voila!I actually like the before image just as much as the vintage one.

Here are some other images from the same series!

Images are available for download at Shutterstock.com, Fotolia.com and Dreamstime.com.
There are more links located on left side.