DIY tail upgrades? - Fins & Painting

[Mermaid Lexie]

I have just purchased my first silicone tail (dragonskin) - It's a basic tail with no fancy bits n' bobs (because funds or lack thereof) but I'm considering if I can eventually give it some upgrades myself. Specifically attaching some of my own hip and/or ankle fins, and perhaps painting some iridescent highlights or patterns. Obviously not going to attempt this if there's a risk of damaging the tail. Has anyone ever attempted this before? If so, was it achievable? Was it a complex process? Which materials would you suggest? (paint/adhesive etc)

Xxx Thanks mers!

[Ashe]

I haven't worked with silicone, but I know that one of the easiest bits that you can do would be a new paint job. Even if you don't trust in your own artistic skills, simply adding an iridescent sheen would look nice. Silicone can't just be painted with any paint, as nothing sticks to real silicone except for silicone! You would have to buy more dragonskin and probably a thinner as well, then mix it with pigments. Some people with individual scales paint each one by hand, and people with scale sheet tails usually use an airbrush. I won't get too into it as I don't want to give you any misinformation, but there's definitely people on here who can answer your questions better than I :)

[Lili]

If you're wanting to do things like that, make sure there aren't any special layers on top of the tail of a different material, maybe contact your tailmaker, if it's pure silicone you can buy silicone and make fins or highlights or whatever with it, dragonskin silicone sticks only to silicone, silicone caulking sticks to a lot of surfaces but it isn't necessarily the safest material to work with, I hope that helps you, if you aren't sure whether something might fail, do tests, it's always good to test beforehand

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[mermaidrobynn]

Silicone caulk isn't super dangerous to work with either (working with it for my new tail and wearing gloves I haven't had any problems) it just stinks to high hell xd you could always experiment with that because I think it will stick to the silicone?

[Mermaid Wesley]

Caulk should stick to the silicone if it is 100% silicone caulking. Painting already made tails can be tricky, you have to clean it very very thoroughly or the paint layer will peel off. It is definitely possible and people have done it, but there is always a risk that it will fail. I am a bit neurotic and would never try to do that, myself, but i bet you could if you really wanted to!