CMU School of Drama


Friday, September 16, 2016

How To Paint a Realistic Rusty, Metal Helmet

Tested: This is a plastic helmet. Urethane plastic, to be exact. It's a resin kit that I got from my pal Allen a while back and I was chomping at the bit to get it painted, but really wanted to make sure that it didn't end up looking like that original plastic. I wanted it to look like an old, weather beaten hunk of battle scarred steel. I wanted it to look like real metal.

6 comments:

Chris Calder said...

This article has come at a good time. In my design for the stage class one of our major projects that we have been assigned is to make a mask that represents a character. For most of us in the class mask making is a foreign craft so seeing step-by-step guilds and ways that break down the process really make for an easier time. I’m not saying that my characters mask is going to require some realistic rusting but there are definitely some processes displayed in this article that might prove to be helpful. From what I can tell in the pictures this process looks very long and time consuming but the final picture makes for a job well done. I look forward to discovering my own methods of building and hope that this project goes off without a hitch. Masks and helmets display a characters emotion and purpose so getting it right is crucial for the productions success.

Tahirah Agbamuche said...

Always a fan of the tested articles! I love seeing design so widely appreciated by a community outside of drama. It's super interesting that in his article the author says the last thing he goes for, is a metalic spray paint. I hadn't thought about it, but that would be my first response too. It seams to make the most sense. What I didn't know before reading this article though, was that metal, when you're painting with it anyways, is multiple pigments. I feel like the artist could really be able to be a great designer, he's very talented, and good at directing people though his steps.

Nick Waddington said...

I really liked this article, not only because i can empathize with the struggle of creating realistic props and costumes, but because as a heavily visual learner, the step by step process with pictures was a great help understanding the way they employed their resources. Due to my lack of experience with painting however, i was truly interested in the multiple pigments, and paints he used to create this effect. part of me is completely daunted by the effort that goes into this, but the other part wants to try to recreate what he did, or employ it in some other fashion.

Jamie Phanekham said...

DIY articles truly give me hope. Here are these beautiful, molded, hand crafted things- and here are the 5 steps it took me to make it. I love that sense of feeling like "Oh yeah I could do this." Because so many times the artistic process seems so daunting. And as Chris mentioned, we are building our masks right now. The entire idea of approaching the ask begins with "Well here's what I want it to look like." The hard part is, "But how will it happen." And sometimes it seems impossible. But with the cheery idea of, "It just takes a few steps," I feel like it won't be too hard. It's just layering, piece by piece, to create a cohesive look in the end. Though I am doing a mask made almost entirely of lace, I still feel like the color layering and assessing how real it needs to look is so helpful.

Zara Bucci said...

I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t think the finished product here looks as realistic as they were going for. I have had so many classes and watched so many videos about how to paint rocks to look natural and how to paint rust to look real and brick and exposed brick. I truly don’t think that there is one way to do any of these things, nor do I believe that any of these can ever be 100% natural. I have tried so many times to make natural rockwork and many people tell my to use the dot method which is to put light and dark paint splashes over a neutral basecoat. I only find this to work if your finished product plans to be over 30 feet from your audience. Otherwise you can tell exactly what it is- dots on a piece of cut up foam. Still searching for ways to make unnatural things look realistic and natural because only then can you fool your audience that you changed your location away from the theatre.

Galen shila said...

This is a neat tutorial. He went for a fantasy look which i believe turned out great but if he was truly going for a realistic look he should have done a few things different. If you where to have a realistic helmet you have to take into consideration that a knight only really had one set of armor "if he was lucky" the people back then took care of their things. now this dose not mean that is is bright and shiny but it certainly didn't look like a rusty manhole cover. Knights would have oiled or waxed their helmets. so if you really wanted a realisitc look you would be better off replicating the look of something that been taken care of.