Thursday, February 28, 2008

Please Let Me Know



I've spent the last two days compiling all of the information received from bloggers on their favorite art supplies.

Yes, that is just a smidge of sarcasm. I got no responses. I know you people are out there. Hope you are happy with your art tools.

I played with my MagicStamp moldable foam stamps (see post below) for a couple of days. Yesterday evening, I went back to my old hand-carved stamps. By the way, I use SpeedBall Speedy-Cut carving blocks. The white stripes on the left side of the photo are done with the carving blocks. The stripes on the right are done with the MagicStamps. The paint is Jacquard Neopaque white. If there are better fabric paints, please let me know.

I assumed that since these foam blocks were so thick that I could get a very deep impression. Yet, it seems that only the top 1/4" will mold. Perhaps I am not heating the block up enough. I got an anonymous post the other day about household heat guns being way too hot. I used mine on low. Didn't seem to destroy anthing (yet, anyway). Perhaps it is an inferior household heat gun. When my husband used it to strip paint, it took three days to remove paint from 10 feet of baseboard. I don't think I need to worry about it getting too hot.

If anyone has any good advice on using the MagicStamps please let me know.

For my last piece, I changed sewing machine needles. I ordered Schmetz Microtex sharp needles. These seem to work far better than those cheap Singer needles I used to buy from that Big Box fabric store. If there are better needles out there, please let me know.

Well, I'm off to sit at the doctor's office for a while. Catch up on Brad and Angelina, or cull recipes from Family Circle. Since I'm going to the gynocologist, at least I don't have to worry about a tall stack of Field and Stream. If there are better magazines out there, please let me know.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've used both the magic stamps and recently started carving after seeing your work and I think that the carved impressions are way better. Of course the beauty of magic stamps is that you can make an impression out of ANYTHING! I love your work and I think you'd be hard pressed to find anything better than what you do :) Do you always use Jacquard paints? I'm having mixed results with paints...clearly white is the best but I can't seem to find consistent results unless I use a stamp pad. Again, I'm new to fabric stamping! Any advise?

p said...

i have no clue what magic stamps are but i like those zebra lines.
i even like your sarcasim.

Kim Hambric said...

Joyce,I definitely like the crisp look of hand-carved stamps over the foam. I'm always looking for new paints to try, but mostly use Jacquard Neopaque. It covers very well, even on black. I have better luck with the paint than the stamp pads - I like a vivid image. However, I wish the Neopaques came in more colors. I generally pour some of the paint into the cap and use a small foam brush to dab the paint on bit by bit. Too much and it glops into the crevices and leaves a blurry print. I get my brushes from the paint store. They are usually of higher quality than most of those in the craft store.

When printing on large amounts of fabric, I mix paint of a sheet of plexiglass (about 11x14") and apply the paint to the stamp with a foam brayer.

I will keep trying out the Magic Stamps. I have 16 of the things now, I'd better get some use out of them.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the tips Kim! Keep on blogging - I enjoy seeing your work!