Friday, April 24, 2015

printing onto interfacing did not work!

Well, that was really NOT a good idea.  I printed the image onto the interfacing, allowed it to dry for at least 24 hours and then ran a small piece under water - the colour washed off instantly!

Undaunted, I then tried ironing it, hoping that it might heat set.  Same result.

But I decided if I made it into a wall hanging that would never be washed, it might not matter.  I made a small dragonfly, while practising the new technique for the free motion sewing I was doing with Meredith Woolnough.

I have mounted it onto the interfacing background, which has been ironed on to the left-over piece of foam core board.  It doesn't look too bad, now I just have to leave it in a sunny spot and see if it fades.  At least that shouldn't happen as quickly as the water washed it away.  However, I suspect it won't be colourfast either.

I decided to mount the dragonfly image anyway, it would be good practice in mounting with pins, covering them with bugle beads and bending the backs of the pins down - not an easy thing to do.
Taken with flash, shadows make it look out of focus.

Taken in daylight, dim day, not great shadows. 

I did look up information about the inks in our printer.  It seems as if they may be pigment but I am suspicious as the box does not have the information on it, so I will have to investigate this further. There are too many variables at this stage for me to say why the idea didn't work, I just know that it didn't.

More work needs to be done on various aspects of this idea, but don't hold your breath waiting for me to do it soon. I think I will try the reliable pre-prepared fabrics you can buy, at least I know that they work.

6 comments:

mycamerandme365 said...

Mary, Epson make an ink/dye called DuraBrite. It's waterproof and doesn't fade. I have it in all 3 of my printers and it works well on fabric.

Mary said...

I thought you would have to have an Epson printer. I had seen quite a few online articles that said Epson does pigment ink but didn't follow it up because I have an el cheapo Canon. Do you have all Epson printers or other brands?

mycamerandme365 said...

Just Epson, I'm very happy with them all. I don't think that they are very expensive compared to other brands actually.

theregatha said...

Love the dragon fly. Background looks amazing too, but can understand concerns if it is going to fade over a few months. Looking forward to hearing your progress with experimenting....

Mary said...

Thanks theregatha, I will just leave it for the moment and let time tell its tale.

Mary said...

I don't think I am enamoured enough with the process to go out and buy a printer, even if it is cheap. I think I will stay with the preprepared fabric that you can buy. I don't think it is cheap but I don't want to do much with it at this stage, so it is more economical than buying a printer.