DIY Spray Paint Art in 5 Minutes

Although I studied art in school and painted with oil paints for many years, when I saw some street artists making spray paint art at super natural speeds, my forgotten dream of painting a galaxy was awakened.

I was so excited by some of the cool techniques and the possibilities of spray paint art, which would allow one to achieve in minutes what would have take days and weeks.

And the big bonus, no art training required! Everyone can make spray paint art with just a little practice!

how to spray paint art galaxy

In a week or two I will share a more complicated spray painting, you can see small portions of it above, and throughout.

spray paints
spray paint art galaxy painting

But to start, let”s make a warm-up painting in just 5 minutes using only a few colors, how’s that?

cans and pots

 

Tools and Materials to make spray paint art:

( Some of the helpful resources are affiliate links. Full disclosure here. )

  • respirator mask for painting – If you plan to do a lot of spray painting or other types of finishing, it’s very important to use a mask!!
  • Spray paints: I used Rust-Oleum Painter’s Touch, and Metallic Blue which is widely available. In this painting I used black, white, yellow, pink,  orange, and metallic blue, but you can pick any colors, such as green and purple, which we will use in the next one!
  • Poster Boards: Make sure to use the glossy side for painting this!
  • plastic pots, cans, lids, of various sizes, anything with a round shape and a raised or hollow side so it does not touch the paint when placed over the painting
  • newspaper, and a small piece of thick paper such as magazine cover
  • gloves
respirator mask for painting

First we will start with the simple steps of creating a floating planet.

Step 1: spray paint shapes of some planets

Place some of the circular objects where you want the planets to be, and gently spray a little black paint to mark them.

spray paint shapes of some planets
spray paint planets

Step 2: add colors and textures to your spray paint art

Start with the first planet, use 3-4 colors, and start with either the lightest color, in this case yellow, and quickly go to the next shade – orange, then, blue, and the darkest – black, overlapping the adjacent colors. don’t be concerned about staying within the planet makings. You can also go from dark to light colors, which creates a lighter planet.

spray paint art technique: how to create textures of planets and galaxy

While the paint is wet, quickly crumble a piece of newspaper, open it, and lay it on top of the painted planet area, very gently run your fingers on top of the paper. This will lift some of the paints and create a cool texture on the planets. Lift the paper and here we have the start of a planet!

Here is another sequence of the steps with different colors – After all the planet areas are painted, we will cover them with those cans and lids, and create the space around them.

add colors and textures to your spray paint art

Step 3: spray paint the background details

Starting from one corner using dark colors of black and blue, then progress to lighter colors of orange, yellow and pink. This creates a feeling of light moving through space.

make stars and planets spray paint art

Now we can lift the covers, and move on to the final and super fun steps: stars! Spray some white paint onto a small piece of thick paper, there should be enough paint yet not too much that it drips. Face the paper down where you would like to have the stars, and tap with your fingers on the back of the paper to create clusters of stars.

And those comets! They are the easiest – just place the can upside down, face the nozzle toward the direction of the comet, and give a quick tap on the bottom of the can.

paint comets

Here’s our 5 minute painting! Next time I will share a painting which uses different colors and a few additional techniques to create a galaxy, plus some tips and tricks!

Have fun and happy spray painting!

spray paint planet

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56 Comments

  1. Mine didn’t turn out so nice 🙁 The paper trick ended up making deep grooves instead of making a nice color blend and pattern. Was disappointed! I’m going to try some different things and see if I can get the texture you have!

  4. I made one for me, one for my best friend, and when my mom saw them she had me make two for her! I’m giving it as a birthday present to my friend tomorrow! Thanks so much for posting this! Very easy and fun!

  6. This is an older post but I just saw it and love it. I gasped as I saw how it was done. So cool. I will get to this project next Summer. I want to be outside when I use spray paint. Thank you for wowing my day. I can’t wait to find out what else you have done. Thank you for sharing.

  7. This has to be one of THE most amazing tutorials I’ve seen – so unique and absolutely beautiful! Though I have a feeling mine wouldn’t look nearly as awesome as yours 😉 xoxo

  33. that looks so awesome! though i don’t know that i would be able to pull it off. we see these guys on fremont street in vegas all the time making art with spray paint. it’s really fascinating!!

  35. Wow! That’s is so crazy! I’ve always wanted to do something like this but thought it was so much harder than it actually is! Thanks for the tutorial!

  40. Whoa! I remember watching someone doing that in New York, and wondered if I could do it. Love this tutorial so much. I am going to try this!

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