Monday 22 November 2010

Home Made Printing Techniques


For the outer box I wanted to use spot varnish. However because of resources being booked I experimented with products I had at home to try and create the desired effect. I cut out a stencil of a heart from a thick piece of card to act as a template.


I then experimented with PVA, nail varnish and T-shirt transfer. The top heart is made using PVA and the bottom two hearts can just about be made out and are made using black and pink nail varnish.

These techniques weren't working very well. When the PVA glue dried it lost is shine and the glue was hard to spread evenly to create a smooth finish.


When the nail varnishes dried they just absorbed into the material and had no real glossy finish.

I then tried cutting out a heart shape from some left over T-Shirt transfer I had. I thought that the glossy finish that it gives could work on its own to give the desired effect.

The overall effect is good, but I need work with my technique to make sure the lines don't appear on the design. The lines are created because the transfer hasn't fully cooled.

Here is the final design. I think it has worked well.


To label the boxes, I chose not to print directly onto them, but instead print onto ribbon and wrap the ribbon around. This would help keep the boxes looking simple and would help me to explore another print process.

I did this by using T-shirt transfer again. Some worked well and some not so well. It is quite hard to tell when the transfer is ready and I have learnt that waiting until it has fully cooled works well for a smooth. shiny finish.

Ribbon design for the products.


Hate Hearts ribbon band.

Some attempts weren't so successful. For example, in this instance I forgot the reverse the image before printing and therefore when the transfer was printed it read back to front.

Some of the writing was hard to read because the weight wasn't high enough.
Some of the text would bend and twist as the ribbon shrank with the heat from the iron.

Here are my final bands for the products. I think they look really nice. The clear box around the lettering was unavoidable unless I cut out the letters individually, which would be near impossible. However, I think it looks nice with the boxes round, it adds a little 'je ne sais quoi'.

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