Silhouette Art

 I have loved silhouettes for as long as I can remember. I find them to be simplistic, yet beautiful. In the past, they were mostly seen in cameos or Victorian designs. But lately, they are all over the place. I have been seeing a lot of silhouette artwork people have done of their children on Pinterest lately, and decided it would be the perfect project to finish a gallery wall I have  been working on in the corner of our living room. So here is what I did, step by step.

  My first job was to get profile pictures of Ethan, Joey, and Max.  I knew it would be challenging considering my subjects were a toddler, a dog, and a cat. So I kept my phone handy all day in anticipation of catching them in the perfect position. I got a decent picture of Joey pretty easily, but I had to draw in her tail and ear later because they weren't visible in the picture. Brian had to hold Ethan in place, so I had to crop out Brian's hand later also.

  Once I had the pictures of all three, I edited them to the size I needed for my canvases. The canvas I used for Ethan's silhouette was 11x13 so I sized it to fit almost the entire sheet of paper. For the animals I used canvases that were 6x8 so I sized them to 5x7 when I printed them out. I found that if I converted the pictures to sketch form and darkened them, the edges were easier to see.
  After printing out the photos, I very carefully cut around the edges. This is the point where I added missing tails and cropped out extra hands. I knew that I would be tracing  and cutting these a second time so I was very clear and sharp with the edges.



   Next, I traced around the images onto vinyl paper. I found this in the scrapbooking section of the craft store. It is black vinyl paper with a sticky side that you can peel off , creating a sticker. After tracing, I cut the images out again. It is very easy to lose detail through all of the tracing and cutting. That is why I was very careful to make defined edges, especially around the face and other distinct features.
     I then painted each canvas the color I wanted the silhouette itself to be and applied the stickers I made onto the canvas.

 

  The only thing  left to do was paint over the entire canvas in the colors I wanted as the background. I applied several coats of paint to each canvas then peeled off the stickers to unveil my creations. I was very pleased with the way they turned out. There were a few places that bled slightly around the edges, but it was easy enough to touch up with a small paint brush.  I think they turned out great!

   I love how even though there is no detail, only a shape, you can still tell exactly who these silhouettes are of. I plan to do one of Ethan every year to see how he changes as he grows. Don't you just love his curls?

   The best part is what a great addition they are to my gallery wall. I think they were the perfect thing to finish it off.