by Rayne
In this tutorial, I'm going to show you how to turn a squirt water gun - from, like, Walmart - into a steampunk gun. The first steampunk gun I made was from a tiny one (water gun).
Annie Get Your Gun Supplies
What you're going to need is a squirt gun, which you can get for a dollar at Walmart or even at a dollar store; paintbrushes - I'm using a set I own that I got from Hobby Lobby; paint - metallics work best, because steampunk, obviously, uses metallic (themes). I have silver, copper, gold, black - which you're going to cover the water gun in - and auburn, which I use when I want the gun to be more dingy-looking. Also, for a brush, you're going to want a sponge brush for when you're adding the rust and stuff...Also, you're going to need a container of water. Optional are feathers, which you can have hanging off of the steampunk gun, and little charms, which I got for about $4 at Walmart.
Don't be afraid of the dark
The first thing you're going to do is cover the water gun with paint. Put a little of the black paint on it, and then take your paintbrush and just spread the paint all over...You could spray paint your steampunk gun, but I prefer painting over it with black because when you're "scratching" over it (later), it looks cooler. So I like using black paint better. When the paint has pretty much dried, but there are a few spots that are still wet (2:20), the steampunk gun will be all covered in black paint or black spray paint, whatever you want to do.
The rust is up to you
The next step - you can either do it at the end or the beginning, but I like to do it near the beginning and maybe somewhat at the end if I feel like it - is to apply my Metallic Antique Copper paint from FolkArt to my steampunk gun. You take your spongy brush and put a little of the copper paint on it, like a dot. And either use a finger or a toothpick, whatever, to smear the paint on the sponge...My sponge is a weird color because I used it with white paint and I never washed it, so it still looks white (3:32)...You pretty much take the copper paint sponge and apply paint to random spots, because this is going to be the rust on your steampunk gun, and rust is random. Dab it in spots that you want - you can experiment - pretty much wherever you feel like. Now I've put the copper paint on the gun so it looks like rust (4:09)...When you're putting the rust on, you want to get it in the cracks. And you want to get it on big areas as well as small areas, because steampunk rust is random.
'Punk Metal
Now you take one of your smaller brushes or a toothpick - I'm going to use a paintbrush - and you'll want to take either gold or silver paint, start with whatever color. I'm going to start with gold...This is the point (in this steampunk tutorial) where you can pretty much do whatever you want. You're going to put the paint in certain areas of the gun, and then you're going to put the silver in random places. So put the gold or silver or any metallic color that you want. You don't have to use gold and silver. It's just that those seem to be basic steampunk colors. But you can use any metallic color; you can use metallic red, which would probably look really cool...
"You just got steampunk'd..."
Time to add the finishing touches. My steampunk gun doesn't look good so far because the rust isn't on the brighter areas, so it looks funny (6:13)...So take the paint sponge, and try to follow where you had the rust before. Just go around the gun and do that. And after adding a few touches of the copper, you are done...That's what it looks like now (see above). You can add gems, feathers or charms, which I have around here. But I'm not going to add any on this gun, because I like it the way it is. So that's all there is to this steampunk tutorial. Hope it helped...
Video: A Steampunk Weapon Costume Prop
About the Crafter: Rayne has lots of interests, which include art, music, and maintaining a Tumblr blog for self expression. Make that LOTS of interests.
