Can you believe that the girls and I created these gorgeous faux sun prints using regular acrylic craft paint? There is no need to buy expensive, light sensitive papers or dyes! I'm calling these faux sun prints because sunlight is not actually needed. This simple technique uses heat and evaporation to create negative images of objects placed on painted fabric. Would you like to learn how?
Materials
- white 100% cotton fabric
- acrylic craft paints (darker colors work best)
- paint brushes
- water
- a tarp or plastic trash bag
- flowers, leaves, etc.
Directions
Gather your supplies and head outdoors on a warm, sunny day. Spread out a tarp or plastic bag to protect your driveway. Wet the fabric, squeezing it out just enough that it no longer drips, and lay it flat on the tarp. Thin the paints about 1:1 with water.
Paint the fabric.
Gather flowers and leaves with interesting silhouettes. Or if you prefer, household items such as washers, keys, toys, office supplies, kitchen utensils, sewing notions, foam shapes, etc. You will get the best results from objects that lie flat and make good contact with the fabric around their edges. For example, a leaf will work well, an acorn will not.
Arrange your items on the fabric and press them lightly into the paint. If you are working with flowers and leaves, press their edges as flat as possible. To get a sharp image, the edges need to make contact with the fabric.
Let the fabric dry completely (this will take several hours). Now comes the fun part... the peel and reveal! There were lots of "oohs and aahs" from my girls as they pulled off the leaves and flowers.
To heat set the paint, tumble your sun prints in the clothes dryer at high temperature for about 45 minutes. At this point you can wash the prints to soften them up.
Here are a few close-ups of our sun prints after they were washed. I think they would be pretty made into a pillow or a bunting.
A few tips...
Don't try this on a windy day. Several of our leaves blew away before the print was complete.
Have a spray bottle of water handy. Mist the fabric lightly if it starts drying before you've arranged the leaves and flowers.
Darker colored paints make the best prints because they give the most contrast with the white fabric.
How does it work?
Water evaporates from the exposed surface of the fabric as it is heated by infrared energy from the sun. The covered areas of the fabric are essentially protected from evaporation, making them wetter than the exposed fabric. Water diffuses from the covered fabric to the drier exposed fabric, pulling the paint pigments along with it. The trick is to start with enough water to pull all the pigment out from under the items being printed. Through a little experimentation, I learned that using wet fabric and watered-down paint gives the sharpest prints.
They are beautiful! I would love them as pillows!
ReplyDeleteThese are so pretty. I am going to have to put this on our to-do list. Also, thanks for the scientific explanation. :)
ReplyDeleteTotally clever idea!! I am pinning this to try sometime.
ReplyDeleteSuper fun idea! Thank you for sharing at our Simply Create Link party!
ReplyDeleteThis is a really neat project and so pretty!
ReplyDeleteWe are definitely giving this a try. It looks like fun. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteThis is awesome! Definitely on my list of things to-do :)
ReplyDeleteInspired Panda
Hello Kirstin,
ReplyDeleteWhat a fun project!
It looks like you all
had a wonderful time
creating.
Thanks for sharing!
Bear Hugs
Carollyn
I so love this idea and want to try it!
ReplyDeleteReally beautiful! Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteso love this idea!!!! gotta pin so everyone can see it!
ReplyDeletexo
Very creative. Thanks for sharing this at Pin It Monday Hop Pinterest Party.
ReplyDeleteJudy
Pursuit Of Functional Home
That is so cool! Thank you- my kids will love this one!
ReplyDelete- Heather R., The Real Leopardstripes
Super neat. Passing along to my daughter who teaches elementary art:) Found your post on Craftomaniac. Stop by http://www.sewsweetvintage.com/2013/06/handkerchief-party-bunting.html
ReplyDeleteFabulous tutorial! I love that you explain the science behind the beautiful result! I think I'll try this with my kids this summer and them make something for them out of the fabric.
ReplyDeleteMGM
What an awesome idea! I bet my mother's group would love to do this with the kids!
ReplyDeleteI hope you link up with us this week!
http://www.sowderingabout.com/2013/06/on-display-monday-linkup-6.html
What a great project! Can't wait to try it. Pinning.
ReplyDeleteThis turned out so beautiful, and how much fun for the kids!!! :) I'm off to pin it now, and I can't wait to try it out this summer.
ReplyDeleteThis is great! My girls will absolutely love this! They are always gathering up nature for me. :) We've been playing with acrylics as well. I'd love for you to see my post on using Glue to make designs on fabric.
ReplyDeletehttp://ginascraftcorner.blogspot.com/2013/06/glue-resist-technique-on-fabric-how-to.html
I'm pinning and following on g+ and twitter.
Gina
Love this! Hope to find some time this summer to give it a try with my girls. Found you on Sugar Bee Crafts.
ReplyDeleteJess
http://organasms.blogspot.com/
Wow, love the flower silhouettes. So pretty.
ReplyDeleteI would love it if you would come link up at Artsy Play Wednesday kids' craft linky.
http://www.babygiveawaysgalore.com/2013/06/artsy-play-wednesday-kids-craft-linky_19.html
Thanks for sharing this with us on Share It Saturday! We are featuring your post on Saturday. They turned out great!!
ReplyDeleteColleen at Sugar Aunts
Featured and PINNED!! Thanks so much!! Linda
ReplyDeletehttp://www.craftsalamode.com/2013/06/what-to-do-weekends-25.html
So beautiful!! I am featuring you tomorrow on Share It Saturday!
ReplyDeleteVery cool! Love the combination of art and science. A wonderful new item to add to our list this summer.
ReplyDeleteHow fun!! I can't wait to try this out :)
ReplyDeleteI've featured you today: http://www.52mantels.com/2013/06/summer-ideas-recipes.html
Amazingly beautiful!!!! I love this post! Thanks for sharing at For the Kids Friday! I am featuring YOU this week!!!
ReplyDeleteVery clever!
ReplyDeleteThis is awesome! I think we will do this today! I always assumed acrylic paint would come out in the wash. These would make great little gifts for the kiddos to give out!
ReplyDeleteWhat a fun project! They would make beautiful pillows. Thanks for stopping by and linking up to Fluster Buster's Creative Muster Party! Looking forward to seeing what you're going to link up next week.
ReplyDeleteRobin @ Fluster Buster
So beautiful. I want to try this idea!
ReplyDeleteit's beautiful!
ReplyDeleteI've made these twice with my boys since I saw this post. Yours are far prettier than ours, but my boys (2 and 4) were far more interested in mixing the paints together than painting blocks of color. :) But the science still held out and they are covered in flower and plant "shadows" now. I intend to use them to trim the bottom of our PVC fort/tent in our back yard.
ReplyDeleteSo happy to hear that your little boys had fun making sun prints! I can relate to the paint mixing...I have to remind my three year old daughter not to make "mud" :) Great idea to use them for trimming your tent!
DeleteHi there! I have acrylic paints. Is this different from acrylic "craft" paint?
ReplyDeleteAny type of acrylic art paint should work. You may need to thin it more if it's the expensive kind with lots of pigment in it. If it's acrylic wall paint, I am not sure if it will work because there may be additives in it.
ReplyDeleteGreat project! Do you think it would work on white t-shirts?
ReplyDeleteReally interesting with such beautiful results! I'll be featuring it on The Crafty Crow :)
ReplyDeleteAmazing! How did you ever think of this? I'm so excited to try this. We recently did this with the sun print material, which was fine, but these are much more beautiful.
ReplyDeleteDo you think it has to be acrylic paint, or could tempera or biocolor be used too?
thank you!
Thank you! In theory it should work. You might want to do some test swatches to figure out how much you need to thin the paint. Also, I don't think you can heat set tempera ( at least the kind I am familiar with). If you try out either one, let me know how it goes!
ReplyDeleteThese are so beautiful! I can't wait to try it. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteGreat idea for a summer time activity. My children are going to LOVE IT! Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeletestunning and brilliant! how did you know the white would appear? i am floored by your creativity. can't wait to try it!
ReplyDeletewonder if i could do the same on paper ?
ReplyDeleteI think it would have to be thick, fibrous paper. I doubt regular printer paper would work. If you try it, let me know how it goes!
DeleteI love this idea. I tried it yesterday morning on some light blue cotton with fabric paint, and it looks beautiful. I bought 3 yards of cotton and acrylic paint and I am trying it with around 5 kids in our building today and then doing it with 40 campers tomorrow. In theory, they will be sukkah decorations.
ReplyDeleteTried it this morning and it worked great!!!! I want to make pillows out of them. However I'm scared of washing it first in the washing machine....won't the paint come off???
ReplyDeleteAcrilyc paint doesn t come off :) until this point I would have say unfortunatelly... but now... I can t wait to try this :)
DeleteMy kids loved doing it!!!
ReplyDeleteThese are Gorgeous! So glad i stopped by!
ReplyDeleteI want to try this with large negatives made on my computer/printer. I used to make these for cyanotype printing. Can't wait to try this technique.
ReplyDeleteI loved the explanation of how and why this works, thanks for including that!! I learned something new today. (I knew how to make these using stencils, this technique is new for me)
ReplyDeleteLove this idea as I have been thinking of doing a cyanotype printing with my lil' students. This would be a fantastic alternative to the cyano idea..THANK YOU very much
ReplyDeletewhat a great idea - will def use at some stage. Thanks so much for sharing. Love the explanation too!
ReplyDeleteCan I dry the cloth peice in sun instead of putting in the machine.
ReplyDeleteWow! Looks sooo beautiful! But what to do if I haven t got a dryer... maybe ironing? What do you think? I love your posts! :)
ReplyDeletewhat if there is no sun...have you tried without sun, maybe an overnight dry?
ReplyDeleteWhat brand of acrylic art paint did you use for these pieces here?
ReplyDelete