Why I love Steemit

I'm inspired by the possibilities of steemit. As someone who has built artist communities from the ground up I know how STUPID HARD it is for creators to get paid. So I love steemit, it gives creatives a real chance to shine.

My Girlfriend doesn't really believe

So I told her I was going to bodypaint her for steemit. It took some convincing, but she went with it.

UPDATE: She's a believer now. She loves you all. Thank you so much!

This was kind of a spur of the moment thing. She didn't believe I was going to do it, and was actually surprised when I brought out the paintbrush and bodypaint supplies that had been sitting in the bottom of a bag ever since I moved to Vietnam. It had been years since I'd used them.

What to do... what to do...

To be honest I really didn't have a clue what I was going to paint. I thought about it for a sec and decided to use the steemit colors (which I luckily had in my smalll supply of options) and do something that was both robotic/cyberpunk and artistic. There were a few missteps and I ended up erasing a few ideas as I went (you'll see in photos below.

Settled on tribal steemit cyborg

Steemit is a bunch of different tribes - art people, writing people, crypto people, and general anarchists - all thrown together sharing and creating.

It's an online burning man

My girlfriend had never been painted before, so it was an experience for her. It was weird at first but by the end she loved it. She wants to do it again.

My dog on the other hand is just confused:

Dog: WTF IS ALL THIS??

Notes from my girlfriend (written by her)

"At the beginning I felt it was a bit scary and weird. Weird to take my clothes off, get painted on, and I'm scared cause I don't know how my skin will react to all the paint. But @rampant said it would be ok. But I threatened to kill him if he was wrong ;)

Originally I didn't like it because it was cold. The AC was on. But then I liked it because it's very intimate and close and it felt very good between us. When it was finished I really liked it.

There is something about being a work of art that's really satisfying."

What I Used

Mostly wolfe and diamond FX brand bodypaint, with a few other brands thrown in. I may do a writeup about all the major brands shortly and what they are good/not good for.

You can use just about any type of paintbrush you want, water color brushes are generally your best bet. I also use sponges, which are used for covering large areas fast and evening out brush strokes. You might notice that the brush strokes here are NOT evened out, because the sponges i had were old and just didn't help.

The other thing is paint brands: Kryolan does a better job of looking "even" than wolfe, but can't get crisp lines. Really making things pop like some of my other work requires having the right blends of different paint types, or a lot more work to make up for it.

Like Bodypainting and art? Follow @rampant

In Process shots from my phone:

Ended up erasing these lower back ideas, just didn't like them compared to clean white.

Pre-texture

Back piece done:

Like Bodypainting and art? Follow @rampant