3D Butterfly Artwork

This 3D Butterfly Artwork was so much fun to create! 

I had rounded up a few similar ideas on Pinterest and then added in my own flair to make it unique. And just in case you'd like to make one for yourself, I documented the whole process in pictures. I hope to give you enough written details to make recreating this painting easy and fun!

Supplies needed:

12x16" Canvas Panel

Painters tape/scotch tape

Cutting board

Exacto Knife 

Spray paint (black)

Paper (for butterflies)

Butterfly stencil 

Scissors 

Iridescent Medium (optional)

Superglue 

Your first task will be laying out the background of your trees and branches. Because some branches will be overlapping, I did this one piece of tape at a time. I would secure the tape at the top and then pull out enough tape to reach the bottom.

Before securing the tape tightly, I placed the cutting board under the tape and then chiseled out the various branches (with my "not so exacto" knife) to whatever shape fit their placement.
Pull the tape then up off of the cutting board (the top should still be secured in place), remove the cutting board, and stick down your newly formed branch outline.

For the smaller branches, I found it easiest to stick a long piece of tape to the cutting board and squiggle my way down the tape with my knife, cutting out about four different strands of jagged edged branches, that could then be cut up into whatever size I needed.

Next came the spray paint! No real science behind the application, just try to hold the spray can at a good angle so that it won't start "spitting" the paint and make the background blotchy. You just want a   pretty, even layer of paint, shot from all sides to make sure the four edges are also painted.

Once dry, you can simply pull off the tape and see what sort of background you've produced!! It makes a neat painting all on its own, don't you think?

Next came the butterflies. I wanted my butterflies to all be hand-painted using the marbling technique seen here. Then I used 3 different shaped butterfly stencils to draw out my butterflies so I could cut them out. I used the Iridescent medium on a few of the butterflies, but not on all of them. If you choose to add the iridescent medium, beware that if you also used the marbling technique, smearing rather than simply glazing over will be an issue...

Placement of the butterflies will be totally up to the artist's eye... However you like it, will make it PERFECT!! I just used superglue to secure the butterflies, but I tried to make sure that every one was on a white part... They may have secured just fine to the black paint, but I didn't want to risk having to do a repair job.;)


The finished 3D product from the side...

I love it! To me it's a beautiful mixture of modern art and fanciful color. :)



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