Experimentation in miniature

Over the years I have read through many a craft magazine and art book, picking up bits and pieces of ideas and inspiration to be filed away as a project for a "someday" project.

Some day I will paint my own gift wrap.

Some day I will create a crazy-quilted pillow with intricate stitching and beadwork.

Some day I will do an image transfer onto canvas.

As I was recently researching the web for information on the Impossible Project films (sadly finding out that they have no ability to revive the film that I actually have cameras for) my web browsing brought me to a video showing how to do an image transfer from an inkjet transparency.

This video not only reminded me of my desire to transfer images to canvas, but it also reminded me that I bought a packet of Artist Trading Card (or, ATC) blanks a few years ago and never did create any.  I checked my supplies and found an abundance of watercolor paper, artist medium (I used acrylic matte finish) and inkjet transparency paper... and half a hard drive of scanned black and white images to pick from.

All the supplies needed to experiment without one trip to the store... which I believe vindicates my art supply hoarding.  But I digress....

I chose a few images I thought might make for interesting ATC subjects, printed them out (remembering to reverse the image) and began experimenting.  It took a few tries to get a feel for just how much medium to put on the surface, how delicately to place the image, and how hard to press it down.  In my first few attempts I did not have enough medium on the paper, so very little of those images transferred.  In the video (linked above) she uses a brayer to roll her image, but I found that every time I used mine I would smudge a few parts of the image... so just pressing smoothly with my fingers without shifting the image worked the best for me.  Once I had a few successful transfers, I embellished with a few collage items, stamps, ink, acrylic and watercolor paint... 

I also attempted one larger transfer (which didn't have quite enough medium, but I embellished anyway)

This past weekend I decided to experiment with layering transfers, and using color images with gloss gel medium instead of the matte.  I printed a shot of the EMP (Experience Music Project) exterior and a shot of the Space Needle on a blue sky day and transferred them over, EMP first.

I do like the paint effect of how this medium dries.  What I found here is that, although the images appear quite transparent on the transparency sheet, once they are transferred to paper they end up much more solid.  I thought the EMP would come out more behind the blue sky, but it virtually disappears and the darker portions become muddy beneath the Needle.  I think if I want to layer, at least one of the images needs to be mostly white (to end up clear) so that it stands out more.  Or perhaps I could print them both lighter to begin with.  Or maybe I layer a black and white over top of a color image.

The experimentation shall continue