All About Image Transfers with Jane Davila - My Favorites

The Potomac Fiber Arts Guild hosts speakers at our monthly guild meetings.  This month it was Jane Davila who gave a great talk on the elements of design.   I was only in town for one of her workshops, but happily "All about Image Transfers" was the most useful for my grant work.   Here's the class description:   

  "Learn direct and indirect transfer methods to add images to your projects. Transfer Artist Paper (TAP), acrylic paint, solvent and medium transfers, plus direct printing on a variety of fabrics, will be covered. Students transfer images from their own photos."

I used the B&W and color images below taken from the Sandy Spring Museum archives as my test samples.

Illustration from "Indians of Early Maryland" by Harold Manakee (not sweating copyright issues because the sketch was created in the 1600's and reprinted by Mr. Manakee)

Homeopathic medicine kit bottles

We used Transfer Artist Paper (TAP) in class.  The directions were simple.   I goofed on my first TAP transfer anyway...   Being impatient, I peeked after a bit of ironing, then continued to iron.   I pulled the TAP off half way, but got distracted talking to a friend.   The TAP cooled down and didn't transfer well.   I tried again *following the directions* with excellent results.   This process was more involved than directly printing an image on prepared fabric sheets, but the image can be transferred onto fabric, paper, wood, glass, canvas, metal and more according to packaging making it more versatile process.  I think that this will be the easiest transfer process to integrate into my work.   I'm looking forward to spending time with TAP!   I hope I remember to reverse the images before printing them as this indirect method produces a mirror image.

TAP test - Top left photo of fabric is first attempt with timing issues and top right is TAP paper after transfer showing how much ink wasn't transferred.    Bottom left shows second attempt on fabric with the TAP paper at it's right almost completely transferred.  Only a shadow of ink remains untransferred.  

Direct printing onto Jacquard Inkjet Fabric Sheets worked just as well as TAP.  We tried out silk and cotton.  I missed out on trying the ExtravOrganza Digital Textile sheets, but knew I had squirreled some away in my stash to test at home.   Jane Davila advised us to use an Epson printer with Durabrite ink for best results, so I've added one to my artist tool kit.   The trick will be figuring out how to integrate these fabrics as another layer of the surface design.

Jacquard Inkjet Fabric Sheets - cotton on top and silk on the bottom

The final method that I want to use is a laser toner copy and acrylic paint transfer method.  Once again, it was quick to do and the results were great.   Once again, the question is how to integrate the image as a layer in the composition.   This is an indirect transfer method, so the image printed in reverse.  I loved this method because I already have the necessary supplies at home.

Laser toner copy and acrylic paint transfer method

Image transfer techniques have come a long way since I experimented with Bubble Jet Set in early 2000.   It was great to have Jane Davila walk us through a variety of  methods showing us the various effects that we could expect.   A sample speaks a thousand words...   Some artists in the class preferred methods that gave less perfect results.  The partial transfers lend themselves to softened, mysterious and aged looking images.  I loved the processes that gave complete transfers.   I cut down on my own experimentation time dramatically thanks to Jane's tips and tricks.  I recommend the class and Jane Davila as an instructor if  you're interested in doing image transfers.