The Good The Bad And The Ugly

POST 197.....almost to the 200th!!!!

Okay. I'm gonna go with The Bad and The Ugly first. I am crazy for Purell transfers. Yes, that is the hand sanitizer Purell I am talking about, whose main ingredient is what class??? alcohol, you got it.

Purell + injet ink + Apollo transparencies = Kick Ass Transfers.

In order for this equation to work though, you must:

• Use Purell, doesn't matter if it has Aloe in it


• Use Apollo Transparency for Inkjet printers item CG7031S


• Use a substrate that is not sealed with gel medium, otherwise the substrate will not absorb the ink which has been pulled off the transparency by the Purell, (if it works for you sealed let me know please)

Have your substrate ready, mine is usually some type of paper usually scrapbook, my homeade stuff, watercolor paper, book pages or an inkjet image. Pay Attention To This: if you are going to do a transfer onto another ink jet image, the purell is wet, right??? so the ink on the substrate will change colors and may get blurry. At least that's what happens to me. I could be a freak of nature, but that is a subject for another post. teehee. So Bullet 3 says your substrate can't be sealed, right? So what's a girl to do. I'll tell you, after teeth knashing and pulling out of hair, I have discovered THE ANSWER. It's called PYM II. Follow directions. Spray ink jet image. Let dry. Do transfer. Do Happy Dance. Underlying ink is sealed but it will Still Recieve The Transfer. Isn't that a beautiful thing. I have saved you crooked teeth and bald spots. I'm sorry I'm going on and on about this but it is Miraculous to me, when something works!!! Wait, should I be telling you this??? Now my work secrets will be out there in the universe, oh screw it, just don't tell anyone else, ok?? ok. Moving on.....Here are my Bad and Ugly attempts:

Above have either not enough or too much Purell, and too much or not enough burnishing. Print the image you want to transfer on the Apollo transparency. Let dry. Print it on the correct side, dummy. ok. On the substrate, (above samples are inkjet images, so they have been Pym II'd.)Lay 2 layers of Purell. The first one seems to get sucked into the paper. Then go over it again. Trust me if you don't do it twice the ink will not transfer. It seems like too much, but it's not. Unless it is, and then it will look like that middle bottom one. You will get it, just takes A LOT of trial and error. Lay image to be transfered on top of the Purell schmear. Let the Purell start to suck in the ink. There is very LITTLE need to burnish unless a part of the image is not transfering. After about 2 minutes, (if you get up to pee and then get sidetracked by your teenager, you will get the middle top results which means the transparency piece DRIED to the Purell and when I went to lift it up EVERYTHING came off, damn it all to hell, this is a quick process) lift up the transfer a little from an edge and peek. If there is a part not transfering burnish it lightly with your bone folder thingy. Sometimes I have even dabbed a little bit of Purell in a bald spot and been able to save the transfer. Once you are satisfied that all has been transferred lift off transparency piece, which will now be mostly clear of ink. Hopefully, anyway. Let the transfer dry. If you can use a light hand you can wipe off some areas that have Purell but no ink if you were a little sloppy. HERE IS THE BEST TIP EVER!!! I noticed that you can use the Purell like an ERASER, kinda. If some of the ink has blobbed in the wrong place, dab a little Purell on it, and wipe with a tissue. It comes off most of the time. AMAZING. Again, this has saved several of my transfers. You may ask yourself, gee, why doesn't Susan just use gel medium and paper, it's probably cheaper than those Apollo transparencies. Because WAITING and RUBBING all that paper off makes me want to STICK FORKS IN MY EYES. capice??? So here are some successes:

Love these guys! I had about 12 failed attempts the night these 7 turned out. There is a lesson in there somewhere, and I hope it's just not Life Sucks. teehee. Any questions? Feel free to ask and I will pretend to know ALL the answers. I must sign off, heading to MD for those Fred B. Mullet workshops, my treat to myself for 2009. xoSusan

All Things Books

I'm working on a set of ATC's for my arttechniquesATC's group. The subject is "All things Books". You could go in sooooo many directions with this one. I was gonna "do" sarcastic and use a man with a book, LOL, but decided against it. "Men With Books" will come later. Much later.Like Never. teehee.
I am really enjoying participating in swaps this year. It's a creative stretch to work with subjects another artist has chosen. My apologies, I made that sound way too much like exercise, teehee. Anyhoo, I covered both sides of cardboard with text from "Wuthering Heights". I had a very old copy, from my youth, completely falling apart. Did a couple washes of paint. Found an ornate book cover from a purchased collage sheet. (can't remember where, sorry)Printed it to transparency. Did a transfer using Purell, and had success. This was my first transfer using this technique. Lay down some Purell, lay down the transfer, Here is the Trick I learned from Many Failed Attempts, Do Not Move IT, Do NOT BURNISH. Let the Purell suck the ink onto the page. One or two minutes later lift off the transparency. Done. The Purell works far better for me than using an alcohol spray. I'm a convert now. I love how distressed it looks, see for yourself:
Wow, my work surface is about a 6" space. Here is what is left on the transp after transferring. Because I am a total pack rat, I will keep these to use as a layering device on another project.

I used a gold pen for the edges:

Here is the image focal point. I googled people reading or something like that and found her. I chalked her and used a fixative spray.
I have A Lot of copper and black corners. But I want Gold. So I embossed them:
I'm gonna add words. This is far as I got. I decided I couldn't work like this anymore:
What was once Madness and Mayhem,

Becomes clean and orderly.

Pay no attention to that BEER at my computer station.......

Wow, You can actually see the floor!! I give it two weeks. Now what did I do with my BEER?

xoSusan