River Boat 'Captain Morgan'

What better Christmas present than having a river boat personalized for you! The owner of the boat is Mr. Dave Morgan, so they call him Captain Morgan when he is at the helm. The theme of the boat is to have Candy Apple Red with a ripped-metal airbrush effect. Captain Morgan loves Poker and Coors Light and we used those ideas integrated into the boat...

So we started by sneaking the boat out of the garage it was being stored in. We did a stealth op' and dragged the boat a few miles away to a shop that would be big enough to work on it. Once we had it nicely tucked in its secret lair, we started to mask off the boat. We did this in two stages.

Stage 1 Masking: We masked off the areas that we will not be clear coating in the end. We try to hide the edges in natural creases and corners so that when the masking is removed, you won't be able to see the edge. Then we sanded the exposed area with grey scotchbright. This is the area that we will finally clear...

Stage 2 Masking: We masked off the second stage where just the art and graphics will be with some transfer tape. The reason for this is that when the graphics are done, we will remove this second stage masking and then clear the remaining exposed area. Once the clear is dry, we will remove the remaining mask.

I sketched out the graphics of the ripped metal and removed this section so we can start spraying the graphics.

First I sprayed down black where the words "Captain Morgan" will be masked off over the bow of the boat. This will remain black when the remaining graphics are laid down and when the boat is cleared with Candy Red.

I used gold for the base color for the Candy Apple Red. It is on the layer that all the graphics will be airbrushed on. Painted all the exposed area gold.

Now I airbrushed the graphics and applied the rice paper. Rice Paper effect is an old-school way of applying very detailed graphics. I printed the entire deck of cards, poker chips, beer lables, Captain Morgan Rum lable, pictures of previous river boats and Dave Morgan's grand-daughter to be applied to the boat. The Captain Morgan captain was freehand airbrushed on the bow.

I next removed the "Captain Morgan" masks from the bow. Next all the rice paper was applied by laying down some clear and sticking the paper to it. Then I sprayed the Candy Apple Red clear over the entire exposed area. The clear seals the rice paper.

Once all the Candy Apple Red was down, I reverse masked the red and airbrushed the metal tear effect, put in the drop shadow and removed the 2nd Stage Masking, leaving the 1st Stage Masking in place. Then cleared the remaining boat, removed the remaining masking and the boat is done!