Love bird no. 2

After using paint on my last project, I couldn’t let the paint that was already on my palette go to waste… So I used it up on (a couple of) other surfaces!

I really loved the colour combo that emerged here and I was inspired to create something onto it right away. I took one of the laser copies from images found in (a now vintage!) Flow Magazine and cut it into a heart shape, applied it to the canvas with gel medium and let it dry. I was impatient this time around, so I started rubbing away the paper way too soon. My transfer was a terrible state…

I took my canvas to the sink and rinsed and rubbed the mess away. The transfer mishap had left a beautiful washed out heart in the middle of the canvas!

Once the canvas was dry again, I took another laser copy, cut it into a heart shape again and adhered it to the canvas (image side to the canvas) with gel medium. This time I left it to dry overnight, to be really, really sure!

Next day I sprayed the paper with water, let it soak in for a bit and started to rub away the wet paper. I applied a thin layer of Mod Podge over the image to get rid of any white residue.

And once that was dry I used markers to pretty up the edges of the transfer and to just have a little bit of colouring fun!

Materials used: canvas, paint, a laser copy of an illustration found in Flow Magazine, Mod Podge, Letraset Promarkers, Uni Posca markers.

Have you tried gel medium transfers lately? I would love to see what you created, so feel free to link up in the comments below!

Love bird no. 1

I’ve been wanting to try my hand at gel medium transfers again. I came across a couple of images that Harold had laser copied for me from Flow Magazine a long time ago (years?) and as it happens a couple of cool ‘transfered’ projects started to appear in my Instagram feed. I was also commissioned a small mixed media piece… So, in my mind this became a clear case of 1 + 1 + 1!

I started by adhering the crocheted flowers to the canvas board with gel medium. Once that was dry, I covered everything with gesso. Then I took out some modeling paste and applied it to the canvas through a striped stencil. Once that was dry I adhered a couple of strips of washi tape and then I went over everything with a couple of coats of paint. Then, after the paint had dried, I applied my laser copied bird to the canvas with gel medium (good side down) and left that to dry for a couple of hours.

Once the gel medium was completely dry, I sprayed the paper with water, let it soak in for a bit and then rubbed the paper off the canvas with my fingers. I usually get rid of the last white residue by applying a little bit of gel medium on top of the exposed image, but I had heard of people that use Mod Podge for this part, so this time I used Mod Podge.

And then I went on from there: adding stencilling, more paint, adding in details with markers and pencil and finishing off with crystals, letter stickers and drops of india ink:

Materials used: canvas board, gel medium, crochet flowers, gesso, modelling paste, stencils, washi tape, paint, a laser copy of a bird image (Source: Flow Magazine), Mod Podge, a pencil, Uni Posca markers, india ink, Letraset Promarkers, Prima Marketing – Say it with Crystals, letter stickers.