Express Yourself! Customize your own Headphones with Aerial 7 DIY Tank

21 Aug Express Yourself! Customize your own Headphones with Aerial 7 DIY Tank

I have always encouraged others to customize their gear.  Over the years I have wanted to inspire others to have fun painting their own guitars, shoes and skateboards.

Now, Aerial 7 and I have collaborated on the first ever “DIY Headphone” – a headphone that you can customize yourself.

The Aerial 7 DIY was released last month and already we are receiving photos of customized headphones from people all over the country!

To me, the Tank headphone is a blank canvas that anyone can transform into their own personal design.  The DIY Artist Edition Tank is an over-the-ear headphone with thick ear cushions and a padded, adjustable headband.

There are many different ways you can customize these headphones.  Here’s just a few:  

• Create an abstract painting by dripping paint on it.
• All parts to the DIY Tank can be painted, even the ear cushions.
• Draw black sharpie on the white surface for a black and white effect.
• Tape off areas before painting for clean lines.
• Glue rhinestones or place stickers on them.
• Colored Sharpie Markers and the Sharpie Brush tips work really well on them.
• Spray paint ‘em.
• The possibilities are endless!

Backcountry Crew with their painted Aerial 7 DIY Headphones

AERIAL 7 DIY WORKSHOP AT BACKCOUNTRY.COM: 

In July I was invited to head up a DIY Headphone painting workshop at Backcountry.com Park City, Utah.

There were a dozen Backcountry employees who attended.  Many of them were artists or aspiring to be.

My role was to get everyone started and to show them what’s possible, which is just about anything!  We brought Uni Posca Water-Based Paint Pens for everyone to use, as well as Sharpie Markers.

Some of the artists taped off their headphones and opened up the Uni Poscas and dripped paint for an abstract effect.

Others drew designs with either Poscas or sharpies.  It was awesome to see everyone getting into it!

This was the first time I was able to see a lot of headphones being painted at once, and it was really cool to see how different they all came out.

This type of creativity was exactly what I imagined when Phil of Aerial7 first approached me with the idea of a DIY headphone.

Everyone loves music and has their own style; headphones have become a part of daily life for most people.  For me, I can’t live without them.  I paint with my headphones on every day, listening to music as I work.

I have painted quite a few pairs of the DIY headphones so far, and I used all different techniques to see what works best.

I just finished a pair where I took the headphones completely apart.  I cut the wires so that the speakers could be removed while I painted.  (I would not recommend doing this;  although it allows you to paint more throroughly, it is very technical.  You have to re-sodder the wires to the speaker.  This isn’t easy if you don’t know how!)

Depending on  how ambitious you are, this is a great project to customize your own headphones!

Oh, and the package makes a great gift, too.  You can buy them here in my store or on the backcountry.com website.

When you paint your pair, send photos to diy@aerial7.com and share them with us!

Life is good,  Drew

PS:  Check out the Photo Gallery of the Backcountry.com workshop and paintings