Auction ARTwork: Bucky Barnes vs The Winter Soldier

[beelikej]

At the end of June there was a fandom auction to help out a fellow fangirl. For me it's easier to donate than to art, so I usually give money or take the opportunity to bid on an author or artist. But as this was only a tiny corner of fandom, I felt brave enough to experiment with offering my arting-services, figuring if no one would bid, the crowd was small enough not to feel bad.
I was pleasantly surprised people were interested in my offer of paperart:)

What I offered: a paperportrait or a paperpuppetworksheet of the character or celebrity of your choice. (If you're willing to share your address I can send you the original design; if not, I'll make a high res digital image or worksheet)
Samples of my work: my papercuttingart projects
Fandoms: My personal fandoms vary from Supernatural RPF to CSI to Harry Potter to bandom, etc., but your wish is my challenge. However I do reserve the right to refuse suggested characters/people if they make me uncomfortable (see squicks or ask;).
Squicks/Dislikes: Character bashing, smoking, drugs, alcohol, misogyny

The highest bid was made by talitha78 and this is what she asked for: "Art based on either Winter Soldier (Bucky Barnes) or the actor who plays him, Sebastian Stan." - thus giving me a wonderful challenge to take a step outside my own fandoms! I have not even seen any Captain America films - only the Avengers. I did do research of course and -no- the title is not a mistake. :-p

Now that the original artwork arrived in the US, I'm revealing the process behind the scenes and of course pictures of the result. Hope you enjoy it! Comments are always welcome:)


From start to finish
In a regular challenge I would present the artwork first and then explain how I made it. For this special project I'm showing the process in chronological order and I didn't insert short cuts to the end. There are three steps and an interlude, about 40 photos in total. If you're really curious and can't wait to see the result, or don't care about the process, simply scroll down to the bottom :-p

Step 1: Portrait Sebastian Stan
I'm going to let the photos do most of the talking. Don't hesitate to ask questions if you want clarification.

Reference picture + first sketch (hahaha, look at those model eyes;)


Definite cut outs set up in pencil: base portrait on white, shadows in purple


The final cut out of the shadow shape may not look like much.... but....


... as a silhouette it's not half bad;)


Time to start cutting the main portrait...


The highlights in the hair require precision (and a really sharp knife;)


Oooh, the left overs work as a negative shape as well; I so love making puzzles.


Carefully taking out the cut shapes.


Saved the eyes for last. (Don't mind my messy workspace;)


Effect on my light table.


Some idea of the final look I'm trying to create


End of stage 1. Dunndunndunn

It may look like I have a thought out plan; I don't, really. I have a vague idea of where I want to go, but make necessary adjustments while I'm working. The purple shadow turned out not to suit my purpose when I put all the layers together. So after some consideration I ditched it. Well, not quite, but it didn't end up in the final portrait... (I'll show you in the interlude later;)

Step 2: Mask Winter Soldier
After struggling with precision cutting on top of cardboard, I checked the trash at work and discovered an old, but still usable piece of cutting plastic. Besides being not as soft as the cardboard, it's also transparent, so I can use it in combination with my light table. Yay! The random blue and gray print is bleeding from years of use, hence why it was in the trash. ;)


Tracing Bucky's face on darker paper


Using that pencil line for proportions of The Winter Soldier's hair


Filling in the mask and the dark glasses. Using different colours to see the different lines.


Using a "vouwbeen" (bonefolder) on the front to score areas I want to fold later.


More careful cutting; have to pay attention to the lines that should be scored, NOT cut;)


Can you see where I'm going with this?


Yep: it's going to be a functional mask. Checking the size and covered area


Getting there: I added folds to give the mask depth...


... and so you can move the glasses and mouthmask separately:)


Added air holes.


Playing with light...


... and shadows *g*

Interlude: What happened to the purple shape
When the mask was finished it turned out to work best in combination with just the white layer. But I didn't want to waste the purple shadow shape especially since it looked so cool with backlight. So I decided to turn it into a windowhanger.


I laminated it....


... and then cut it in the shape of Sebastian Stan's head:)

Step 3: Touch ups and tadaah
Now that I had decided how to put Bucky and his Winter Soldier alter ego together, it was time for touch ups and cleaning... Since I was going to sent the final piece away, I had to finish it off a lot neater than I usually do *g* No clever photo-angles to cover up mistakes!


Gently cutting away tiny tears and such. See the glitter in the paper? It's really fancy:)


Erasing all the sketch lines, brushing and gently blowing the eraser crumbs away


There was a lot of experimenting with the turtle neck placement to best connect the two layers; this is the one I ended up with.


The white paper shape with a slit below the neck; on the right the mask is folded over the background with the turtle neck. (folded line at the bottom, I added dented stripes to the top)


This is what it looks like folded open; with the white paper on top, the turtle neck is shoved through the slit in that upper layer...


...and so the layers are connected; no glue needed:)


This is what the back looks like. I'm putting a third paper layer inside the frame; turning the background light gray (a colour right in between the white and the dark gray)


Tadaah!


It's of course also possible to use the frame like this or....


...to leave the transparent cover off so the mask can be moved however one desires:)


Aaaaaaaaaaand that's it! I put the cover back in and wrapped the frame in loads of bubblewrap, foam (on the corners) and cardboard (for extra sturdiness) before sending it off. Tracking the package from the Netherlands to the USA was actually the scariest part of this whole project, pfff.
I'm happy to report the artwork made it safely across the ocean, yay!

Materials and sources
Besides the photo of Sebastian Stan that I found on SugarPop.com, I used stills from the film to figure out what the mask of the Winter Soldier looked like. Copyright belongs to Marvel, no harm intended and all that. It's a tribute:)

I used sparkling 300 g/m² paper from the Curious Metallics collection (by Arjo Wiggins) in three different colours:
- Ice Cold (white) for the portrait;
- Ionised (dark gray) for The Winter Soldier;
- Lustre (light gray) for the background.

The purple paper is 160 g/m² Fastprint Color (Butterfly Lila)

I didn't use any glue; the turtle neck is keeping everything together. \o/


Thanks again, talitha78 for bidding on my offer of art and taking a chance by putting your favorite in my hands to play with.

J.

Curious about my other artwork? Check out My masterlist of artsy fiddling;)

Comments

[tmn1966.livejournal.com]

Wow!!! I should stop being amazed at how you're able to do such beautiful and creative art, but I can't help it. Your work is so amazing!!! Just brilliant!!!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*blushes* Thank you <3 I'll treasure this comment the next time I'm fighting my muse;)

[galwithglasses.livejournal.com]

That's a great idea and it came out really well. It's so finely detailed. Thanks for putting up the pictures of the steps you took to create it. There's a ton of work there. Very cool.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you! It was weird fiddling with a guy who's not on my own guilty pleasure list, I'm relieved he turned out okay;)

[sillie]

Oh, that's awesome! :D :D So much work, thanks for showing the process.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you:) I was worried I had spread the work out too much, since I could only play with it during weekends, but all in all the whole process didn't take that long, relatively speaking;)

[cassiopeia7.livejournal.com]

You never fail to amaze me. Never. I have enough trouble visualizing in 2-D, and you create these 3-D masterpieces that work on multiple levels . . . your creativity (and mad skills with a blade!) is just STUNNING.

Brava, bb, brava!!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Wahey, so happy I managed to amaze you, I always feel it's a variation of a theme, even if I explore new techniques with every project;) The mask especially lent itself for fiddling with new tools.

Thanks for your enthusiasm, bb <3

[tanisafan.livejournal.com]

Omg I bet your recipient was thrilled with this, how terrific! I love how perfectly you made this fit, I would probably fail and be a crying mess, lol. Also that silhouette is AMAZING holy moly!

You're so clever and nifty and a crafting genius, sigh! :DDD

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

:) Yes, based on feedback, I dare say the recipient was pleased:) I had sent WIP sneakpeeks, to make sure I was on the right track, but she didn't see the final version until unwrapping. (Oh, the relief that it got there and was satisfying, pfew)

Heehee, I am smart enough to not pick up the camera when I'm having tempertantrums and curse my muse :-p

Thank you so much for your wonderful comment, bb. <3

[geckoholic]

Ohh, that's cool!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you :-)

[whiskygalore.livejournal.com]

That is just incredible! I love your artwork so much. It's always so inventive and original and it's fascinating to see your process.

Thanks for sharing :D

xx

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thanks very much:) Because I was not emotionally invested in the subject of the portrait and I had no set up plan, the process was really the most important part of this project for me. It was very cool to focus on techniques more than content (not that likeness wasn't my goal, but it was different than working on faces I fancy;)

[talitha78.livejournal.com]

It's so wonderful to see all of the process photos put together like this. Once again, thank you so much. You are brilliant!!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*beams* I really loved playing in your fandom:) Thanks for the opportunity and the enthused feedback during the process!

[talitha78.livejournal.com]

Just so you know, I linked to your post here: http://talitha78.livejournal.com/307117.html

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Aha, I wondered where the extra comments came from:) Thanks for promoting me!

[http://users.livejournal.com/_profiterole_/]

Wow, that is gorgeous and so imaginative! :D

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much:)

[gwyn-r.livejournal.com]

That is fucking amazing. Lucky, lucky Talitha! You are really gifted.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Ahw, thank you! I was lucky to have Talitha inspire me to make this:)

[hypertwink.livejournal.com]

This is awesome. Wow.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*beams* Thanks!

[ender24]

wow, i am speechless, here via talitha, and wow, you are like, really dedicated and patient, to create this amazing piece !
i have been a huge winter soldier fan since the movie, so of course, i fully endorse talitha's wish!
great job!! so well done!

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*blushes* Thank you very much for your kind comment:) The compliments mean even more coming from a WinterSolder fan!

[fannishliss.livejournal.com]

So incredible and impressive, and what a beautiful final project!

Next time you offer an art somewhere, people will be knocking down the doors! :)

thanks for sharing your process!

:)

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*beams* Thank you for your wonderful comment! It was quite daunting to do a commission piece, so this may have been a once in a lifetime thing;)

[tmn1966.livejournal.com]

Okay, I can appreciate this ten thousand percent more than I did before since I've now seen the movie. Oh my gosh, J!!!!!!! Like, wowzers!!! You really captured Bucky Barnes and the Winter Soldier. I've been staring and staring and just, gosh, it makes me want to go back and watch both Captain America movies again.

And grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, it also makes me anxious to see the end credits of Ant Man again since I didn't get to see Bucky/the Winter Soldier because of those dang lights at the drive in. I know, I know, safety first, but.... Bucky... and Steve. *pouts* *consoles self by staring at your beautiful art*

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

Ahw, thank you for returning to this old artpost with new enthusiasm. *smishes* Glad it could offer you some comfort in absence of the real thing (only about eight months until the release, you're welcome to hang here until then;)

[twinsarein.livejournal.com]

*whistles appreciatively* Amazing!! Absolutely amazing!!! As always, I enjoyed seeing the process. It looked good right from the start, but then to add so much, and to get so clever with the layers, was inspired. I even know the person who won you art, and she is very, very lucky.

[beelikej.livejournal.com]

*blushes* Thank you. This was the first time I made fanart for a commission and that was a little nervewracking, also because the subject was someone else's idol. I had the basic idea of the layers in my head, but no thought out plan beforehand. The result surprised me too;)