dmr
Champion Member
Somewhere in Middle America
Posts: 2,221
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Post by dmr on Mar 16, 2018 18:18:20 GMT -5
Well, in reading the other thread here, it looks like I got elected Den Mother of this section. Any other artsy-craftsy types here? If so, please introduce yourselves. I'll start. They call me Annie for short, and I'm currently living in the Omaha area. I'm approaching retirement age. I'm into photography, the graphic arts, I do silkscreening and occasionally things like plaster and paper mache' work. How 'bout you?
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Post by MidnightSun on Mar 19, 2018 14:10:58 GMT -5
Love hiking, photography, and gardening. Have several gardens to spend my summers working in. Since northern NH has a few tons of snow right now and night temps in the minus teens since the w/e, gonna stay mostly indoors and remodel my bathroom. New floor, when completed, will look like this.Carpentry was one of two careers, now a full time hobby. Want to change the indoor scenery at this time. Been looking at it for 25 years. Needs a new point of view. More bio in the near future.
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Post by 67SS396C on Mar 20, 2018 1:49:59 GMT -5
I thought silkscreening took a big set up?
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dmr
Champion Member
Somewhere in Middle America
Posts: 2,221
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Post by dmr on Mar 20, 2018 5:23:56 GMT -5
I thought silkscreening took a big set up? No, just a few supplies that you can get at Dick Blick or other art houses. You can draw with resist, do cut-outs, or even photo resist. The tees you make with silkscreen look much better than those iron-on things that Cafe Press and the like use.
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Post by CampKohler (Sacramento CA) on Mar 20, 2018 21:28:13 GMT -5
On T-shirts:
Once upon a time, a T-shirt shop tossed out a bunch of quart cans of the paint they use on the shirts. The labels said that the paint stayed wet until it was heated to several hundred degrees whereupon it cures. Oh, so that's how they do it. I didn't save any of the cans, because the heating requirement was not very appealing.
On silk screening:
I have a big box of brand new decades-old packages of nylons. Do you think nylon stocking material could be used, when slit open and stretched on a frame, to do silkscreen?
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dmr
Champion Member
Somewhere in Middle America
Posts: 2,221
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Post by dmr on Mar 21, 2018 3:26:23 GMT -5
On T-shirts: Once upon a time, a T-shirt shop tossed out a bunch of quart cans of the paint they use on the shirts. The labels said that the paint stayed wet until it was heated to several hundred degrees whereupon it cures. Oh, so that's how they do it. I didn't save any of the cans, because the heating requirement was not very appealing. On silk screening: I have a big box of brand new decades-old packages of nylons. Do you think nylon stocking material could be used, when slit open and stretched on a frame, to do silkscreen? I've done silkscreening on tees. (Some call it "ink" and others call it "paint", LOL!) You can get the frames at Dick Blick or any of several art houses, and they are inexpensive so making your own is only if you want to do the job the hard way. Back in high school art class we used organdy from a fabric shop and the wood shop guys made the frames for us and it was really too much like work. At Dick Blick (or wherever) you should be able to get silkscreen fabric ink that air dries over several minutes in about any color. Just center the frame properly, pour in a small measure of ink, squeegee it around, carefully lift the frame, put the shirt away to dry without creasing it and ruining the ink, rinse, repeat. Hope this helps.
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Post by CampKohler (Sacramento CA) on Mar 22, 2018 0:35:14 GMT -5
But what about the image? Doesn't it have to be in effect a negative*? Wherever on the screen something is to be printed has to be open to the ink, whereas everywhere there is not to be ink, the screen must be blocked. So how do you block the screen around, say, some writing?
Without googling it, there must be some kind of photosensitive process that allows you to transfer a prepared image to the screen, else you would have to take a blocked screen and carve off the open areas with an Xacto knife. That would be tedious in the extreme unless you were printing some simple design like a happy face.
---- *The exception would be intentionally printing a negative image where the ink is everywhere except where the image is, i.e. the contrasting unprinted cloth would show through.
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Post by MidnightSun on Mar 22, 2018 3:55:03 GMT -5
Used to silkscreen my own tees. The paint used dried at room temp. Pro biz would use drying racks. Basic Silk ScreeningMinimal cost to start up. You need screening paint, frame, often hinged to the work table, silk screen image, a squeegee, spray or thinner to clean the screen, and room for drying. Cats walking on your project come to mind. Learned when touring w/a show that screened their own posters and flyers in multi colors.
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dmr
Champion Member
Somewhere in Middle America
Posts: 2,221
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Post by dmr on Mar 22, 2018 3:58:10 GMT -5
But what about the image? Doesn't it have to be in effect a negative*? Wherever on the screen something is to be printed has to be open to the ink, whereas everywhere there is not to be ink, the screen must be blocked. So how do you block the screen around, say, some writing? Without googling it, there must be some kind of photosensitive process that allows you to transfer a prepared image to the screen, else you would have to take a blocked screen and carve off the open areas with an Xacto knife. That would be tedious in the extreme unless you were printing some simple design like a happy face. ---- *The exception would be intentionally printing a negative image where the ink is everywhere except where the image is, i.e. the contrasting unprinted cloth would show through. You are correct that the finished screen must be permeable to ink where ink will show and vice versa. There are a number of ways to do this. One of the most common ways for lo-res silkscreen work is to take a full-size sketch of what you want to print and paint (trace), using silkscreen resist, on the screen in the areas where you do not want ink to show, using a fine artist brush. You can get silkscreen resist at any art house. Do a google search for "silkscreen resist" and you will drink from a fire hose on this one. If you want to do, say, a tee with a written saying, do a word (or whatever) document with what you want to say in a VERY LARGE and bold typeface using the font you want, and use that as the sketch and paint silkscreen resist where the white areas on your paper are. Another way is to use various papers, films or tapes to make a low(er) res stencil on the silkscreen, again, film/paper/tape will be where you do not want the ink to show. Do a google search for "silkscreen stencil material" and you will get results in abundance. If you want to get really fancy, there are quite a few types of silkscreen photo resist products out there. To use these, you will need a full-size master of the original artwork printed on some kind of film, either photo film (such as Kodalith) or such things as overhead film that you can get (or used to be able to, overheads are an endangered species) at Office Depot/Max and such. Photo resists are used by everyone from hobbyists to professional production houses, so there's quite a range out there. Google "silkscreen photo resist" and you will get lotsa hits. One that I used (quite a few years ago, forget the brand) you could expose in direct sunlight. Photo resist can do a higher res than can stencils or manual resist, but there are some limits. Photo resist has a significant learning curve and a bit of trial and error. Painted resist and stencils are usually more successful for the beginner. Anyway, there are TONS of tutorials and videos and such on the web about how to do basic silkscreening. Google is yer friend here. Also, some art supply shops (see if there's a Blick shop near you) do classes and workshops on silkscreening. Some community colleges and artist co-ops will also have sessions on how to learn silkscreening. Hope this helps.
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Post by dirtgirl (TwinCities,MN) on Mar 24, 2018 22:13:06 GMT -5
Wow that's neat that you do your own silk screening.
I like photography. I haven't invested in a digital camera yet so I still use film but haven't taken a lot of pictures in a while. Darned work gets in the way of most things. lol
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Post by stlhawk on Mar 25, 2018 13:53:49 GMT -5
Also into photography and nearing retirement. My retirement date is April 13, 19 days from now. Recently had 3 pictures chosen as finalists in a contest and won the Architecture section of the event. My main focus though is nature photography which I hope to do much more of starting in 3 weeks.
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Post by MidnightSun on Apr 1, 2018 6:52:45 GMT -5
Bought a Nikon D3400. It takes Big pix at 24 MP That's 6000 x 4000 pixels. Could be a cleaner hobb than screening. No doubt sure don't need as much room.
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dozer
Full Member
Albany, NY
Posts: 105
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Post by dozer on Apr 1, 2018 7:31:08 GMT -5
Good morning, Happy Easter!
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Post by lightbulb1 on Apr 1, 2018 14:18:26 GMT -5
HAPPY EASTER ALL
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Post by Bob Robin on Apr 5, 2018 9:54:49 GMT -5
I hope your Easter weekend was a good one!
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