new drawing; image transfer update

9x12" on hot press watercolor paper.

I thought I would try incorporating a little of the looser watercolor feel of those little paintings into a full drawing. This is kind of similar to how I was using the watercolor in the plant paintings I was doing a while back. It's nice to mix it up a little - I think I was getting a little rigid with the gouache and sometimes I need to just splash out some watercolor and not worry too much if it might ruin the painting :)

And here's some transfers on the last painting I did. I don't really do image transfers because it seems like you always have to have a laser printer or a copy machine for the usual methods (I don't). Also, one of my friends at school used to do them with acrylic medium and I saw how long it takes to soak and rub off the paper when it's done...I'm not always that patient.

So I got an email from Daniel Smith (local art supply store and maker of awesome paints) that said they were carrying an iron-on transfer paper that works with inkjet prints. Hey, I have an inkjet printer! And an iron! It's called Transfer Artist Paper and apparently you can iron it onto most anything. And you can use it as a drawing surface and then iron that onto something, too. So I went down and bought some and printed up a couple sheets. I ironed little samples onto gesso, fabric, different papers, and acrylic medium on paper.

I thought I worked out how to use it pretty well (by wrecking a few of the samples, naturally) so I put two transfers onto the acrylic medium that's on the top of this little painting. The first one - the handwriting - went on perfectly. The second - the diagram? Not really. :P I ended up having to do the full soak-it-and-rub-like-mad to get the paper backing off. So annoying. It fused the whole thing together so I think I need to start with a much shorter time with the iron before I check if it will peel. So chalk that up to the learning curve, I guess. I do like the effect though so I'll keep trying.