Pop Art Painting With Lumi Inkodye

So for our Instructables Lumi Build Night, our group decided to create a Pop Art themed piece as a tribute to the founders of BongoHive.

You will need
- A canvas (minimum 20 inch)
- Lumi Inkodye
- Inkowash
- 4 sheets of Lumi Inkofilm (9 inch square)
- Inkjet Printer
- Portraits of your your subjects
- Sunlight or a UV light source
- Insulation or masking tape
- An old rag or lots of tissue
- Sponge, washing brush or old rag

First of all, make sure you're doing this during the day!(Unless you have an artificial UV light source) It doesn't matter how sunny it is because inkodye works even with very little sunlight, it'll just take longer. Also, for the first part, you should be indoors away from sunlight and make sure you don't have any fabric/material nearby that you don't want to stain(eg. furniture, bags, poodles). Be smart with what you're wearing too. Accident's happen so make sure you're wearing clothes you don't mind getting dirty.

First thing you need to do is print your negatives. If you came here from my previous instructable on How to Make Pop Art Negatives for Lumi Inkofilm then you can skip this step.

Make sure your image has a decent resolution, clear lines and all the features on the persons face are clear. To get the painted on look. You can simply grayscale the image, posterize it and invert it in any image editor, even on a smartphone. An easy way to make your Pop Art negative is to go to any image editor, posterize your image and grayscale it. Open the images up in any image editor. Ensure they are 9" by 9" and print them on the sticky side of the inkofilm using an inkjet printer.

Arrange the negatives on your canvas and mark their positions with the insulation tape or masking tape. This will not only make it easy for you to position your negatives, but it will make sure the Lumi Inkodye is applied in a (nearly) perfect square.

Note: I covered up the first square because I had no idea what I was going to put there yet and I didn't want any accidents in that square

Use a paintbrush or roller to spread on an even layer of inkodye. Try as hard as you can not to go beyond the marked tape. If you have different colors, make sure you wash or change your brush between the squares. Wipe of any excess when you're done! This is important because it ensures the print develops evenly and the dye doesn't condense on the negatives

Place your negatives over the squares of inkodye. Make sure the squares are totally filled up by the negatives or you could get accidental borders in some places. When you place them, you can secure them with many different methods.

Pins: Probably the quickest and easiest
More tape: You could secure the prints with more insulation tape or masking tape. This will also help you control the border situation
Staples. Not advisable but it works. I used this method because the stapler was the nearest thing available, but I had to add more tape to some of them because  the staples weren't secure enough. Tape works better.

Now, after you've made sure everything's secure, let your work sit in the sun for the time indicated on the bottle. It's different for each color. It should start to darken right away. But that doesn't mean it's ready yet. 

This is the moment of glory. Making sure you places your negatives correctly and applied the right amount of inkodye. If all goes well, you should have clear and bright colored prints of your proposed pieces that look infinitely better than the negatives.

Neat right? You're not done just yet!

You're probably not going to be throwing this in the washing machine.

Make sure you have you scrubbing brush or old rag handy, and some hot water at hand.

Place your piece in a sink or tub or anywhere you can wash it indoors. Mix about one cup of hot water with one or two capfuls of inkowash. Rinse your canvas with warm or hot water. Next, pour the detergent mix on your canvas and work it into the fabric. Scrub it thoroughly to make sure you get all the excess dye out and prevent any further reactions. Rinse it out and repeat if you feel it is necessary.

Not in that particular order.

And there you have it. A neat, pop art piece you did all by yourself. It would make a great addition to any room. Hang it in a nice place and be prepared to sound all scientific and/or artsy when they ask you how you did it. :)