Video: Black Panther Design Balloon Video by Michelle Marvel

May 17, 2019

Line Work Balloon Designs with Michelle Marvel, Chicago’s Balloon Twister on Clownantics.

Black Panther is a popular design! Until they come out with a printed face, this design is quick and impressive. When I do this design I'm often at a birthday party, I don't typically do this design at a public event unless it's a slow event. I then typically do a black panther face painting to accompany this fun action hero balloon. Even if and when they do make a printed Black Panther face, this design, when created with a Black Panther face paint will be what makes every parent at the party stop and grab your card.

If you do decide to create a superhero at an outdoor event, I always recommend not giving the superhero abs, and then you can make the child punch their fist through the middle, where the abs are, and they can wear it like bracelet. Parents also LOVE that, and that is another great way to get parents to grab your card.

I have had a lot of people asking me about my Black Panther design, so I'm going to make a little demonstration of it right now.

I'm going to start with three black balloons (260s), one chrome silver (260). Usually, I just use these four balloons, but I got one of these today, and it is a metallic graphite balloon, so I think I'm going to make his abs out of metallic graphite. I don't like the color for the whole body - it's too see-through, but it might be a cool ab choice!

Ok let's blow up our balloons! We start with our three black balloons and they're all about four and a half fingers uninflated.

We're going to start with the head. This is a Pokemon design that I sort of swaped around. We're going to do one ear, which is about 2 fingers, and one pinch twist. Then take the other balloon, 2 fingers, one pinch twist. You've now got 2 balloons and 2 ears. Push some of the air out. Now we're going to make the top of the head. You're going to twist that into a pinch twist, and another pinch twist. So now you have two ears, two pinch twists. We're going to make a triangle, and this is going to be the side of the head - they're about 4 fingers in length.

Twist that about three times just to make sure it stays. If you have a balloon that has more air in it, we're going to use that to fill in the face. You don't have to do this part, but it really does add something to the balloon. So that's about three fingers, twist, and you're going to push that through the head. Then you're going to three finger, twist, you're going to bring that back down to the neck. Now you have his face and his ears. Now we're going to do his shoulders. That's about two fingers, and a pinch twist. Next, two fingers, and a pinch twist.

Next up, is the torso. That's about four fingers, and try to match them up. The biggest thing about balloon twisting that some people fail to think about, is that every single design, including your simple designs, like a dog balloon, if they don't have the same size legs or if their neck is really weirdly long, it looks bad. Even if the people don't know what you're talking about, or don't really know why it looks bad, it still looks bad! It looks a lot cuter if it's proportionate. So always think about that when you're making a design, any design!

Next we're going to do two quick pinch twists to make the butt and the crotch area. So that's about two fingers. Now I do my double pinch twists really fast. Some people do them individual, but that takes extra time, so learn how to do it this way to save time. So I make a two finger bubble, then I pinch them at the same time. And then you can sort of push the legs in there.

Let's make some legs now! Four fingers length, pinch them together. Now you should have enough at the end here to make a tiny bubble and a petal twist, and that'll make the foot. You're going to get rid of that little extra on the other end, and then make a petal twist. I also let a little air out so the feet are the same size.

He's almost done! He just needs his arms. Now take your third black balloon, and I have about four fingers of uninflated. We're going to do a very small petal twist with a pinch twist. You're going to make his forearm about two fingers and a pinch twist. You're going to make his bicep two fingers, twist it, and you're going to add that to his shoulder.

Then you're going to take it across his chest, twist it first, which makes it easier to get into the shoulder if you twist it first. Stick it around that shoulder, and try not to turn the pinch twist with the attachment, because that puts a lot of stress on this balloon. If you start twisting a pinch twist too much, it's already a tiny balloon.

Then we're going to do a bicep, and that's two fingers, pinch twist. Two finger forearm, pinch twist. and a small petal.

We're going to make his eyes first. You're going to take the nozzle of the silver balloon. The silver balloon has about four and a half fingers at the end. You don't need a ton of air in this balloon, especially since the chrome balloons don't have a lot of give. You are going to wrap the nozzle around the head of the pinch twist, you're going to make a two finger bubble, twist it, take it down to the front of his face, make another two finger bubble, and wrap it around that second ear. Break off the excess.

Now, if I weren't trying to make this extra fancy for the video, I would just take the rest of this silver balloon, and make the abs. But I'm going to try something new!

We're going to take one of these graphites and make some abs. It's about four fingers uninflated, and it doesn't need to be huge because it's just abs. So we're going to take the nozzle, and wrap it around the shoulder blade. You're going to take a three finger bubble, twist, and a two finger bubble, and twist. You're going to take this next part and wrap it around his crotch. You're now going to do another two finger bubble, and you're going to wrap these two around each other. So you have to finesse this a bit. I just had to push up on the balloon, to give myself some space. We do a three finger bubble, take it back up to the next shoulder, and get rid of the excess.

Now as you can see, I already drew his face on, not because I didn't want to show you, but because my camera was being silly. We've got our Black Panther design.

If you're wondering what marker I used, I used a silver Sharpie. This design up here (on top of his head), is what really makes the Black Panther. If you miss those lines, it just looks like a black mask.

Thanks for watching!