Greetings...

Can anyone post some suggestions or information on airbrushing with cocoa butter? I have a bunch of colors from Tomric. I have the badger 250, and the iwata all ready to go. We have used it a couple of times

Our 4 trays of orange and yellow for pumpkin came out fine. I had 4 trays of lips sprayed and only 1 tray came out all shiny and pretty, the other 3.... all bloomish and ugly ugly ugly....

I have been trying to research this online and haven't really found very much information so I thought I would try here.

I looked under an old forum about questions for Norman Love and there were alot of questions regarding this that were not answered....so we are hoping to try this again tomorrow

Giving up is not an option. I will rule the cocoa butter!

updated by @emily-woloszyn: 04/10/15 19:45:23

Anyone.....

emily did you temper your coco butter before using it?

What Omar said... I had the same issues until I started tempering all my cocoa butters. Never happened again.

Weeeelllll..... No I was I guess not tempering the cocoa butter....I have it divided into the badger bottles so I can quick change the colors. When I heat it I put the jars I am going to use in a small pan of water on the stove. ( not up to the lid, no water contact there) and I bring the water to a boil...shake it well and then it cools down a bit while I set the compressor up. So today my hubby used the thing and turns out just fine for him, but he was using only 2 colors. When I spray the lips I use 3 reds and a black... Do I have to let each color dry/set before spraying the next? What else am I doing wrong with this stuff and how can I actually temper the paint?

SO glad you all took the time to reply! Thanks!!!!

To temper the butters we use the turbo-tempering method: in the airbrush container heat to 120 or so in microwave (just the glass, no hardware!), stir very well, put in freezer for 3 minutes, stir again and measure temp, put back in for 1-2 more minutes til you get the colors to 79. Back in the microwave (careful with this! it works very quickly!) for 2-3 seconds at a time til it's at 92-93. Stir well, cap and use.

Certain colors do not mix well. The underlying pigments clash with one another and when mixes will turn muddy brown or gray. You can have a red with purple under tones and a red with yellow/green undertone that when mixed together will give you ghastly results. Do not mix complimentary colors unless you are trying to dull a color down, but do use them side by side to made your colors pop, like yellow next to purple. Get a color wheel at the art store, it will be of great help. If you want to take it further, a small watercolor set will show you what different colors do when mixed or sit next to each other. It is quite a science and one we normally do not pay too much attention to. Over time color mixing just becomes second nature.

When a color is translucent and is laid over another translucent color, it is the same as mixing colors.

I don't know if this is at all part of your problem, but this information might help you in your use of color. It does not matter if it is an oil painting or a chocolate bonbon, all the same.

Thank you! The colors weren't muddy, the paint was not adhereing to the chocolate at all. I sprayed two shades of red very lightly and then a tiny bit of black and got bloomed chocolate from it, which I am guessing is because the butter was not in temper....

I try to be very subtle about layering the colors...but I love the idea of a color wheel so I think I will get one