Anamorphic Street Painting

Julian Beaver and his art

I'm sure you've been passed the email with the 3D sidewalk art. Everyone has seen them.
They have become hugely popular over the last few years and there is a huge desire for 3D effects for corporate and special events.

Kurt Werner and his Absolut painting

I will be attempting my first 3D painting this next weekend in London, Canada. I was asked to be a featured artist for their first ever street painting festival and the requested I do a 3D image. Luckily they are patient with the fact that I haven't painted one before and didn't even really know how. I'd like to walk you through the process I used to design my painting.

The first think I did was a lot of research. I found several websites that discussed the formula but I found most of them a bit confusing as I am just awful with all things 'Math' related.

Here are the ones that I found...
http://www.mathsyear2000.org/explorer/anamorphic/
http://www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/lessons/middle/grid-drawings.htm

Ok. I tried to read through those and make sense of them but couldn't quite wrap my brain around the formulas. Then I found this site...
http://www.bizzarocreations.com/artlessons/3dchalkart.htm
Brilliant!!! It lays it out step by step with images which is exactly what a visual person such as myself really needs. Check them out.

This is the image I designed. I was asked to design something religious because my painting space will be in front of a church. I decided to paint angels. I had some reference of a lovely model I hired that I thought would be perfect. The figures I would have coming out of or at the edge of the opening in the ground had to be viewed from above, so luckily the pictures I had were taken from above. The model was seated on a low couch and I was standing, looking down on her. You can see that with the two seated figures the faces are viewed in 3/4 or profile but you can see the tops of the legs instead of the sides. This is very important. It allowed me to let the bottom half of the legs on the lowest figure hang down into the whole.
The middle figure sits on a ledge in front of the last angel that is standing. Because she is in the back and standing, I could use a regular standing figure. The whole I created is a circle in perspective. It is edged with stone and tapers down to a smaller opening. I drew all of this hoping that it would work properly once I applied the formula.

So my concept was to have the 3 angels looking down upon earth from heaven. So you can see I've added halos, wings, and robes to my 3 models. I added the doves flying up through the whole to add to the effect. The banner at the top will include the title of the festival "Expressions in Chalk". Check in for the actual formula I applied to this design and the final results.

More to come!