When I first came up to Brisbane, I had this bright idea to dedicate different works to members of the family. When I started with this quilt, I gave the heroine in the story my niece Lydia's name because it was inspired by her tattoos. These are some of the images from it.
(I managed to do some Rob fish prints and some Darren bike ones, but I have a hell of a lot more family to get through!)
Anyway, some of you have asked me about the techniques I am using in my art. Some of them I have learned on line, some I have been taught, and others I have worked out as I go along. Here are a few that I have been asked for:
Printing on fabric using a home printer:
If you have a photo, drawing, text, or image that you want to print onto fabric. You have a lot of choices. The fabric can't be too thick, but I have printed on cotton, calico, muslin and silk using my ordinary home printer.
You can buy printable fabric sheets from Quilting Shops`and buy T-shirt transfer sheets from stationary stores like Officeworks. I have even got transfer paper from Aldi's occasionally. The nice thing about the commercial methods is that they have instructions and are fairly easy to use. You can print images and photos straight from your computer onto the fabric with the former, or on to special paper with the latter, which you iron onto your fabric. They all vary in the texture of the print that you get on your fabric. The t-shirt prining method tends to be a bit shinier and more plastic in feel.
However, if you are printing a lot of images, these commercial methods can be very pricey. I haven't had much success using Freezer paper which lots of people swear by. Nowadays, I use copier labels ( from stationers, like Officeworks) and take the paper protector off,
I carefully cut round each sheet of paper making sure there are no loose thread to catch in the machine. And I print on it exactly as I would on ordinary paper - either from the computer, or from a photo/drawing/ writing .
The danger of course is that it isn't always colour fast. Sometimes that doesn't matter since I don't intend to wash the piece. But if it is to be washed in future, I seal it with something like Hydrotex Print paste.
Printing leaves
Which brings me to a brilliant way of printing leaves that my friend Elizabeth came up with.
She discovered that if you place your leaves on the screen of the computer and put light watercolour paper into your copier, then print in colour, you get a realistic image and texture to the leaves. Then, you can cut the individual leaves out to use in your art work or simply hang on a wall.
I love the results - you wouldn't believe they weren't real!
I decided to print on fabric using the above method and it was just as good
I think these will be incorporated in my tree quilt.
Hope these instructions are clear!
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