Here be dragons........

Good evening friends.
Yes, I actually made it back with another post without a week (or month!) in between.....
Although I may add a few  more details in time I am really happy with how they have turned out.
"How what turned out?" I hear you mutter.
Well, a while ago, while we were in North Wales, I came across these dragons in a gift shop at the top of a pass.

I fell in love with the design of them but wasn't too enamoured with the way they had been painted. The larger dragon was loose so I glued him on to a box  so I now had two boxes.

Then it was time to get rid of that garish silver and tacky gold paint! DecoArt to the rescue.........

 Step one; a thin layer of DecoArt Chalk finish paint scrubbed over everything is the start of the transformation.

Just getting rid of the original colour made me happy. Then when it was dry it was time to add my kind of bling. DecoArt Metallic fluid acrylic in silver and gold; along with Transparent Red Iron Oxide.

To me, This is a fab combo as sometimes the plain gold and silver can be a bit too shiny for my taste but if you add some of the red  as you are working it gives you a wonderful aged and rich depth of colour.

I've added the metallic using a very dry brush to accentuated the gorgeous steampunk style detailing and added more of the paint to the box.

 Then it was time to add some texture. So, I took some talus, which is basically mini gravel which model makers use and mixed it with some Faux Finishing Medium.  I wanted something to bind everything together but it has  to be matte when dry so this is ideal.

Apply to the box with a palette knife working around and under the dragon.

 Some pics of the finished dragons. I'm really chuffed with the way they turned out.

 Once the medium is fully dry, you can't see it so it looks like the dragon is sitting on a gravel bed. I think this creates a lovely contrast between the dragon and the box too.

Definitely a pleasant way to spend the afternoon. It just goes to show that it doesn't really matter what the colour of something is; if you like the design, DecoArt can help you change the colour!

Take care and here's wishing you a great week.