Picking a Shirt for Airbrushing

Series Summary

The first airbrush machine was a hand operated compressor developed in 1879 by Abner Peeler in Iowa to be used for artistic purposes. The modern airbrush works by passing compressed air through a filter pump, which then creates a reduction in air pressure, or suction, which allows paint to be pulled from a connected reservoir. The high pressure of the air turns the paint into tiny droplets as it passes a very fine paint-metering component. The effect is a very smoothly blended one that mixes a variety of colors in a seamless way. Airbrushing has been used by many artists for photo retouching, murals, makeup application and for detailing cars and motorcycles. In this free video series, learn how to make airbrush art on shirts! Our expert, Mike Royall, has been airbrushing for over thirty years, and he shows all kinds of tricks to make amazing airbrushed shirts! Learn the supplies you need to make these shirts. Also, learn how to pick the shirt, colors, and designs for your custom, wearable artwork. If you are just starting to airbrush, Mike shows you some tips for making letters, dots, and designs. Also, learn how to finalize your shirt so that it is washable. So, what are you waiting for? Learn how to make airbrushed shirts today!

Video Transcript

"Welcome back, I'm Mike. Hopefully you've been following my first series of videos on "How To Get Started To Airbrush." This here, I'm going to show you how to get started on something that can actually be fun, you can wear it home. T-shirt, go to Wal-Mart, any of your local clothing store, find a blank T-shirt. Start off with a white or a light gray, something like because when you get into the darker colors, it makes it a little harder and there's a lot more advanced steps to go to, to be able to airbrush on those colors. With the T-shirt, you're going to need something to put the T-shirt on. You can't just hold it up here and try to paint it at the same time you need something that will hold your shirt for you. Take your shirt, get cheap shirts too. If you go into the lingerie section or the underwear section, you can get packages of two or three. Yes, they are pretty thin. This is a thicker five ounce shirt, six ounce shirt. Stretch it over the board. You want to pull it, so there's no wrinkles in it because everywhere there's a wrinkle, like this right here, whenever there's over spray get close to it, it'll catch on this edge and it'll just make it look like somebody eating raw liver. You want to pull it back or clothes pin it back."