My friend
is going to Närcon as Sasha Braus from Shingeki no Kyojin, and I had the
opportunity to make her the straps and the jacket. Picture transferring came
handy in the jacket, which has coat of arms in the back, sleeves and left
breast pocket. The first thought was to make the logos in applique, but Dalin
suggested trying out picture transferring technique.
So I
thought I’d bring you this awesome tutorial about picture transfering, which I
think is useful for many cosplay purposes. You can use this technique to paper,
wood, plastic, metal and fabric as long as it has a light-colored base. I used
Powertex’s Laserprint transfer medium. When printing the picture you want, make
sure you use printer that uses laser, otherwise the picture won’t come out of
the paper. You should definitely get some extra prints as well, it took me a
couple times to get it right.
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| The prints |
LIST OF
WHAT YOU WILL NEED
Transfer medium
Picture you want to transfer
The base where you want to transfer
your picture
Some water
Hair dryer
Candle
Scissors
Brush
Pencil
Towel
First, cut
your picture smaller, leaving white paper all over the edges for about 1 cm.
Measure the place in the base with the paper, picture-side down, and mark the
edges of the picture. Now you should
paint even amount of glue to the picture and to the base. Clean the brush after
you are done so you can use it again.
Press the
paper picture-side down to the base where your marks are. Remember to press all
the air bubbles out between the layers. This is very important, because if
there’s any air bubbles left, the risk of picture ripping off when you are
rubbing the paper is definitely higher. I suggest trying out small pictures
first, because it’s much easier to get the air out.
Instruction
says that the next step is to get your hair dryer and dry the picture for about
10 minutes. But because I was so impatient, I only used the hair dryer of 5
minutes and it worked fine. After that let the picture cool down completely.
When the
glue is dry and cooled down, dip your towel to water and gently start rubbing
the paper off. Remember to be extremely gentle getting paper off, the picture
will rip really easily. Keeping the picture a bit wet makes it easier to get
the paper out. When the picture is starting to show and you think you are ready
for the next step, let the picture dry up completely (you can use the hair
dryer to make the process faster). When the picture is wet, it always looks
clearer than it is. When there’s only little paper left, start using your
finger instead of the towel, you can feel the paper better that way and fingers
are gentler than the towel.
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| The picture is starting to show under the paper |
In final
product there are always going to be a little irregularity, and the best way to
make it perfectly clear is to use stearin. So this is when the candle comes
handy, you can use a cheap tea light or any other candle that is white. Use
your hair dryer to soften the stearin a bit, the take some of it to your
fingers and heat it up. Next step is to gently rub it to the picture evenly. If
the stearin is uneven in the picture, use your dryer to heat the stearin up and
gently rub it smooth.
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| Before stearin |
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| After stearin |
- E
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| © Niew Photography |
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