Altered Image Transfers
September 14, 2015
Inspirational Art
Over the last year or so, there seems to be some resurgence in image transfer techniques, which is why we did the image transfer tutorial in the 2015 fall issue. It’s also something I had been playing with quite a bit, but not in the direct way we often see it–in perfect replication on a square or other geometric form and hung as a pendant. There is nothing at all wrong with this form, but with all the ways the transfer could be done, there seems like something was missing when the image has not been altered, added to, manipulated or colored in some fashion. The chance to add one’s own bit of expression and highlight why they liked the image is absent. Unless the image is the artist’s own creation, the image transfer–borrowed from some creative commons license imagery or bought from a digital image repository or other supplier–is just highlighting work that belongs to someone else.
I think the reason the unaltered image is so prevalent is because, for one, the images chosen usually look beautiful on their own, but more importantly, there aren’t a lot of examples out there showing what else can be done with them. My explorations in this are, for the most part, not ready for prime time, but there are others out there using image transfer as a means of self-expression or an expression of their aesthetics that I thought might help get the ball rolling for some of you.
This piece is actually a half-dozen years old, but Irene MacKinnon took the image transfers just a couple of steps beyond the simple image pendant by creating a collage of images. Whether she was able to do multiple transfers on the same sheet of clay, used a stack of liquid polymer transfer skins or created the collection of images on the computer so it printed out ready to transfer as one image, I can’t say. The thing we do know is that this composition of images has something to say and to draw us in, making us look past the technique to what the whole piece has to convey.
Irene’s recent work plays more with the form upon which her transfers are used, but there are still quite a few examples where the technique is taken step further than we often see it. Check out her album of photo transfers and see how the altered images pop out of the collection and hold your attention far quicker and longer than the basic pieces she also has there to share.
Like this blog? Lend your support with a purchase of The Polymer Arts magazine and visit our partners:
Keepsake Imagery
July 6, 2013
Inspirational Art
Since image transfer can be used with any kind of imagery, why not use it to memorialize important people, moments, places, and photos that are near and dear to you or your customers?
I just love what Cynthia Tinnapple did with transfers on some of her husband’s turned bowls a few years back. The image transfers were applied to polymer sunk into a channel around the bowl, and all the images were of the women in her family. I believe she quickly and simply turned a beautiful bowl into a priceless heirloom. How many people display their family photos in anything much more than picture frames?
This same approach can be use to add photos to anything you can adhere polymer clay to (which is just about anything). If you want ideas for objects you can start adorning with favorite family photos, take a look at the “Covered Objects” article in the present Summer 2013 issue of The Polymer Arts. Also check out the article on collaboration to read more about how Cynthia and her husband combine their crafts.
Also. be sure you have an up to date subscription, because the Fall issue that will be out next month is packed with tons of great stuff, including a review and peek into Cynthia’s new book Polymer Clay Global Concepts, due out July 30th. (But you can pre-order on Amazon if you just can’t wait to see the review. We wouldn’t blame you!)
LPC Sheet Transfers
July 4, 2013
Inspirational Art
Apparently this is going to be a week of building on the post from the day before! Again, if you read yesterday’s post, you might be getting some bright ideas about how to use liquid polymer clay transfers. But wait … there’s more!
In the present Summer 2013 issue of The Polymer Arts, we have an article by Ann and Karen Mitchell on making polymer hats. Within that article are lots of tidbits on working with liquid polymer clay, particularly LPC sheets. These sheets can be made as large as your oven will allow and then can be cut up as needed. Or, if you follow Ann and Karen’s instructions for adding mesh or fabric, you can use it very much like fabric including stitching, punching, and folding as you would a heavy piece of cloth.
These techniques are nothing new to these two ladies or to any of you who have read their wonderful book Liquid Polymer Clay. They have been using this method of embedding fabric and making LPC transfer appliques to create pieces like this purse “comprised of clay fabric, hand drawn transfer elements appliqued onto silk taffeta on the bottom layer and silk organza on the top layer.”
If transfers with LPC have grabbed hold of your imagination, you should really get the Mitchell sisters’ book Liquid Polymer Clay or re-read it if you have it. In the meantime, I am going to go pretend I don’t work on holidays. It’s Independence Day here in the States and friends, barbecues, and fireworks are in store for us later. So I’m going to transfer my attention to something un-polymer. To all my stateside readers and friends, Happy 4th of July. Have a wonderful day and be safe.
Colored Pencil Transfers and More
July 3, 2013
Inspirational Art, Tips and Tricks
Were you intrigued yesterday by the possibilities of using colored pencil? Grab yourself a big box of Prismacolor pencils (or a comparable brand) and start doodling shapes and swirls, flowers and faces, tendrils and textures … anything you can think of. And yes, you can do this even if you don’t have a lot of drawing experience, and you’ll probably do it quite well. When you are playing with colored pencils, you are working primarily with the color (which you already do with polymer, right?) and can let the idea that you must sketch something particular fall away. Just let go and see what you have. Then pick a section of what you’ve drawn, cut it out and transfer it onto polymer. Quick and easy visual texture! From that you can cut, stamp, layer, embed, etc just like you would any other surface treated polymer sheet.
Another way to transfer you colored pencil masterpieces is to float liquid polymer clay (LPC) on the paper, bake or use a heat gun to cure it and then remove the paper from the cured LPC by peeling and using water to remove any that remains. The neat thing about using the LPC is that the image will have translucency wherever the pencil is light or absent. This can be applied to other surface-treated polymer clay sheets for intriguing layering of colors and textures.
Julia Sober used the LPC transfer of a colored pencil drawing laid over silver leaf to create this beautiful box.
The silver leaf does give the colors extra luminescence often associated with enamel work, which is probably why she called her application faux enamel. But other applications such as a pearl clay backing for light colored sketches or black for bright, densely colored drawings could be quite impressive as well. Once you have the LPC transfers done, you can hold them up to all kinds of backgrounds and see what kind of effect you have. Bring out your inner child with the colored pencils, and just play.
Simple, Impactful Transfer Art
July 2, 2013
Inspirational Art
For you viewing pleasure today, we have a simple drawing transferred onto polymer, antiqued and melded into a polymer frame in such a way as to impart a distinct and cohesive atmosphere in the space of this small pendant. The pendant is by a seller on Etsy that simply goes by the name Gabriel.
Like I was saying yesterday, I think when polymer is allowed to show its versatility alongside the engaging image of a transfer, it’s a winning combination. It may seem like the transfer in this piece is dominant, but not really. The simple pencil drawing would be rather static and unimpressive if it weren’t for the antiquing the polymer allows and the organic nature of the texture that surrounds it. Likewise, I don’t think this kind of frame would be anything to get excited about, except that it is enlivened by the lone tree image whose canvas disintegrates into the frame, creating a single cohesive impression.
The other cool thing here … this is Gabriel’s own drawing. Pencil will easily transfer off paper of almost any kind onto polymer. This is true for colored as well as graphite pencils. You can use the same technique used to transfer toner, so there’s no new skill to learn if you have that down. You can make your own unique sketches, doodles, or zentangles, or even use the drawings of your kids, grand-kids, friends, or those of a skilled artist you employ to sketch original work for you. All one needs is pencil and paper!
Transfers: A Treasure Trove of Possibilities
July 1, 2013
Inspirational Art
I have a bit of a love-hate view of transfers as an artistic technique in polymer in particular. On one hand, it’s such a cool, almost magical technique that can turn any bit of clay from flat to fabulous with minimal effort. That’s the beauty of it. However, since most polymer artists aren’t making their own images, the source of their transfers are sometimes copyrighted, which makes sharing or selling some work sticky or even unlawful. I’ve seen some gorgeous work I would have loved to share but I knew the images on the pieces were copyrighted and there was no evidence that the artist had acquired permission.
Then there is work where I have no idea if the images are copyrighted or not, which would be most of the transfer work I find online. Because of that, I’ve been reticent to share work with transfers; but at the same time, I don’t want to ignore what a great technique it can be. So I decided this week to go ahead and fearlessly share some transfer work and talk about some of the different ways you can use it and the variations that allow you to create more unique and personal work with your own imagery or imagery from other talented artists and designers.
Today, I just want to share some work that I personally really enjoy but have been remiss in sharing. Tejae Floyde is a fellow Coloradan with a penchant for hearts. And better yet, many of her hearts have secrets and surprises! I love the metaphorical use of a hidden heart embellished with a butterfly, an icon of flight and freedom, inside a ornately decorated heart case.
I believe the image used here is in the public domain, so reproduction is allowed. But better yet, the transfer is not the primary focus of the piece but rather part of a collective design. I particularly like seeing transfers that are worked into a design, whether they are the artist’s original image or not, because it allows the polymer’s beauty and advantages to come through so that the polymer and the transfer image complements each other. It seems an ideal use of the technique.
If you haven’t experimented much with transfers, this might be the week to play with them. There are many different ways to create transfers, but here are a few to get you started:
A how-to from Tejae: www.tejaesart.com/how-to-polymer-clay-transfers/
If you like videos and are curious about how to create transfers on round of curved surfaces, check out this video by our friends at Polymer Clay Productions: www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvQm45uQSzQ
And as for the copyright question, we’ll be saving that discussion for the end of the week. In the meantime, if you have images you would like to use in transfer and intend to sell it, familiarize yourself with public domain which can offer a multitude of beautiful images for your work. This page has a summary of US copyright and public domain terms you might want to keep bookmarked for future reference: www.unc.edu/~unclng/public-d.htm
Over the last year or so, there seems to be some resurgence in image transfer techniques, which is why we did the image transfer tutorial in the 2015 fall issue. It’s also something I had been playing with quite a bit, but not in the direct way we often see it–in perfect replication on a square or other geometric form and hung as a pendant. There is nothing at all wrong with this form, but with all the ways the transfer could be done, there seems like something was missing when the image has not been altered, added to, manipulated or colored in some fashion. The chance to add one’s own bit of expression and highlight why they liked the image is absent. Unless the image is the artist’s own creation, the image transfer–borrowed from some creative commons license imagery or bought from a digital image repository or other supplier–is just highlighting work that belongs to someone else.
I think the reason the unaltered image is so prevalent is because, for one, the images chosen usually look beautiful on their own, but more importantly, there aren’t a lot of examples out there showing what else can be done with them. My explorations in this are, for the most part, not ready for prime time, but there are others out there using image transfer as a means of self-expression or an expression of their aesthetics that I thought might help get the ball rolling for some of you.
This piece is actually a half-dozen years old, but Irene MacKinnon took the image transfers just a couple of steps beyond the simple image pendant by creating a collage of images. Whether she was able to do multiple transfers on the same sheet of clay, used a stack of liquid polymer transfer skins or created the collection of images on the computer so it printed out ready to transfer as one image, I can’t say. The thing we do know is that this composition of images has something to say and to draw us in, making us look past the technique to what the whole piece has to convey.
Irene’s recent work plays more with the form upon which her transfers are used, but there are still quite a few examples where the technique is taken step further than we often see it. Check out her album of photo transfers and see how the altered images pop out of the collection and hold your attention far quicker and longer than the basic pieces she also has there to share.
Like this blog? Lend your support with a purchase of The Polymer Arts magazine and visit our partners:
Since image transfer can be used with any kind of imagery, why not use it to memorialize important people, moments, places, and photos that are near and dear to you or your customers?
I just love what Cynthia Tinnapple did with transfers on some of her husband’s turned bowls a few years back. The image transfers were applied to polymer sunk into a channel around the bowl, and all the images were of the women in her family. I believe she quickly and simply turned a beautiful bowl into a priceless heirloom. How many people display their family photos in anything much more than picture frames?
This same approach can be use to add photos to anything you can adhere polymer clay to (which is just about anything). If you want ideas for objects you can start adorning with favorite family photos, take a look at the “Covered Objects” article in the present Summer 2013 issue of The Polymer Arts. Also check out the article on collaboration to read more about how Cynthia and her husband combine their crafts.
Also. be sure you have an up to date subscription, because the Fall issue that will be out next month is packed with tons of great stuff, including a review and peek into Cynthia’s new book Polymer Clay Global Concepts, due out July 30th. (But you can pre-order on Amazon if you just can’t wait to see the review. We wouldn’t blame you!)
Apparently this is going to be a week of building on the post from the day before! Again, if you read yesterday’s post, you might be getting some bright ideas about how to use liquid polymer clay transfers. But wait … there’s more!
In the present Summer 2013 issue of The Polymer Arts, we have an article by Ann and Karen Mitchell on making polymer hats. Within that article are lots of tidbits on working with liquid polymer clay, particularly LPC sheets. These sheets can be made as large as your oven will allow and then can be cut up as needed. Or, if you follow Ann and Karen’s instructions for adding mesh or fabric, you can use it very much like fabric including stitching, punching, and folding as you would a heavy piece of cloth.
These techniques are nothing new to these two ladies or to any of you who have read their wonderful book Liquid Polymer Clay. They have been using this method of embedding fabric and making LPC transfer appliques to create pieces like this purse “comprised of clay fabric, hand drawn transfer elements appliqued onto silk taffeta on the bottom layer and silk organza on the top layer.”
If transfers with LPC have grabbed hold of your imagination, you should really get the Mitchell sisters’ book Liquid Polymer Clay or re-read it if you have it. In the meantime, I am going to go pretend I don’t work on holidays. It’s Independence Day here in the States and friends, barbecues, and fireworks are in store for us later. So I’m going to transfer my attention to something un-polymer. To all my stateside readers and friends, Happy 4th of July. Have a wonderful day and be safe.
Were you intrigued yesterday by the possibilities of using colored pencil? Grab yourself a big box of Prismacolor pencils (or a comparable brand) and start doodling shapes and swirls, flowers and faces, tendrils and textures … anything you can think of. And yes, you can do this even if you don’t have a lot of drawing experience, and you’ll probably do it quite well. When you are playing with colored pencils, you are working primarily with the color (which you already do with polymer, right?) and can let the idea that you must sketch something particular fall away. Just let go and see what you have. Then pick a section of what you’ve drawn, cut it out and transfer it onto polymer. Quick and easy visual texture! From that you can cut, stamp, layer, embed, etc just like you would any other surface treated polymer sheet.
Another way to transfer you colored pencil masterpieces is to float liquid polymer clay (LPC) on the paper, bake or use a heat gun to cure it and then remove the paper from the cured LPC by peeling and using water to remove any that remains. The neat thing about using the LPC is that the image will have translucency wherever the pencil is light or absent. This can be applied to other surface-treated polymer clay sheets for intriguing layering of colors and textures.
Julia Sober used the LPC transfer of a colored pencil drawing laid over silver leaf to create this beautiful box.
The silver leaf does give the colors extra luminescence often associated with enamel work, which is probably why she called her application faux enamel. But other applications such as a pearl clay backing for light colored sketches or black for bright, densely colored drawings could be quite impressive as well. Once you have the LPC transfers done, you can hold them up to all kinds of backgrounds and see what kind of effect you have. Bring out your inner child with the colored pencils, and just play.
For you viewing pleasure today, we have a simple drawing transferred onto polymer, antiqued and melded into a polymer frame in such a way as to impart a distinct and cohesive atmosphere in the space of this small pendant. The pendant is by a seller on Etsy that simply goes by the name Gabriel.
Like I was saying yesterday, I think when polymer is allowed to show its versatility alongside the engaging image of a transfer, it’s a winning combination. It may seem like the transfer in this piece is dominant, but not really. The simple pencil drawing would be rather static and unimpressive if it weren’t for the antiquing the polymer allows and the organic nature of the texture that surrounds it. Likewise, I don’t think this kind of frame would be anything to get excited about, except that it is enlivened by the lone tree image whose canvas disintegrates into the frame, creating a single cohesive impression.
The other cool thing here … this is Gabriel’s own drawing. Pencil will easily transfer off paper of almost any kind onto polymer. This is true for colored as well as graphite pencils. You can use the same technique used to transfer toner, so there’s no new skill to learn if you have that down. You can make your own unique sketches, doodles, or zentangles, or even use the drawings of your kids, grand-kids, friends, or those of a skilled artist you employ to sketch original work for you. All one needs is pencil and paper!
I have a bit of a love-hate view of transfers as an artistic technique in polymer in particular. On one hand, it’s such a cool, almost magical technique that can turn any bit of clay from flat to fabulous with minimal effort. That’s the beauty of it. However, since most polymer artists aren’t making their own images, the source of their transfers are sometimes copyrighted, which makes sharing or selling some work sticky or even unlawful. I’ve seen some gorgeous work I would have loved to share but I knew the images on the pieces were copyrighted and there was no evidence that the artist had acquired permission.
Then there is work where I have no idea if the images are copyrighted or not, which would be most of the transfer work I find online. Because of that, I’ve been reticent to share work with transfers; but at the same time, I don’t want to ignore what a great technique it can be. So I decided this week to go ahead and fearlessly share some transfer work and talk about some of the different ways you can use it and the variations that allow you to create more unique and personal work with your own imagery or imagery from other talented artists and designers.
Today, I just want to share some work that I personally really enjoy but have been remiss in sharing. Tejae Floyde is a fellow Coloradan with a penchant for hearts. And better yet, many of her hearts have secrets and surprises! I love the metaphorical use of a hidden heart embellished with a butterfly, an icon of flight and freedom, inside a ornately decorated heart case.
I believe the image used here is in the public domain, so reproduction is allowed. But better yet, the transfer is not the primary focus of the piece but rather part of a collective design. I particularly like seeing transfers that are worked into a design, whether they are the artist’s original image or not, because it allows the polymer’s beauty and advantages to come through so that the polymer and the transfer image complements each other. It seems an ideal use of the technique.
If you haven’t experimented much with transfers, this might be the week to play with them. There are many different ways to create transfers, but here are a few to get you started:
A how-to from Tejae: www.tejaesart.com/how-to-polymer-clay-transfers/
If you like videos and are curious about how to create transfers on round of curved surfaces, check out this video by our friends at Polymer Clay Productions: www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvQm45uQSzQ
And as for the copyright question, we’ll be saving that discussion for the end of the week. In the meantime, if you have images you would like to use in transfer and intend to sell it, familiarize yourself with public domain which can offer a multitude of beautiful images for your work. This page has a summary of US copyright and public domain terms you might want to keep bookmarked for future reference: www.unc.edu/~unclng/public-d.htm
