"Painting with BlackRit v. Dipping"

[Craig Smolin]

I've been experimenting with various dyes and acetone combinations to "paint" with rather than "dip"

Basically, most every color Rit from red through green combined with acetone, resulted in a reasonable color close to what the package promised.

With the exception of black. Every combination I tried resulted in failure. The black would wash away under tap water leaving either a brown or purple spot. The Rit+water+heat combo left a gray spot, which is somewhat better, and would indicate that repeated applications might lead to the desired effect.

But I'm wondering if anyone has stumbled upon a simple, one-time process that leaves a result akin to that of dipping in black. My purpose is to see if I can avoid having to dip and risk edge bleeds.

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A few other random thoughts...

1. Has anyone ever come across an xacto blade with two parallel blades? For cutting borders for example.
2. How do you / What do you use to paint very thin lines? Even the thinnest paint brush is not as exact as a pencil point. Is there a similar tool that painters use?

Thanks,
Craig

[AciDBatH666]

I started off doing the same thing you did. Mixing powder with acetone.
It got me my first dark dark colors with dyes. And I used brushes, and the outlines aren't from contact paper or anything. I used a wax crayon to color in parts that I did not want to dye. It worked ok for a bit.

That was the first 2 dyes I did. The DGR one is blue, and the death star one is black. The black is more of a dark dark brown like what you're describing.

As I did a few more dyes, I found that the brush was just annoying. It just didnt leave the solid colors that I was aiming for. That's when I took up the pan and started with the heat.

1) Yes, I actually have an Xacto blade that's got duel blades around 1/4" apart. It's labeled as "X-ACTO 7747 Foamboard Cutter, Foam Core Cutter"


2)Only way I've done thin thin lines is to just go the Contact paper/vinyl route. ive got some dye work with paper thin lines, but just realize that over time that thin line will fade and blend into the plastic... and not be so clean.

[Craig Smolin]

so basically there is no decent way to paint black on? It's dip or bust?

How do you cut super thin lines? Just make two side by side cuts super close?

[AciDBatH666]

I never said there wasn't a decent way to get black on, I just found the best way was dipping and letting it soak in hot Rit for 5-15 minutes. Im sure you could get black other ways... But if you want an even color it's gonna probably have to be covered in a pool of dye to make sure it gets all of it evenly. Which means it'll possibly run off.

I dont have many images of dye work where I've done thin thin lines, probably because I stay away from em knowing that they wont stay thin for long.
But yeah. All it is is just cutting two lines really close to each other and dying in between. You COULD cover it in contact paper and just cut single lines in the paper. Not pulling any of it off. Dye will seep into EVERY crevice it can find. This image was one of my first dyes for a friend where I put patches of randomly shaped contact paper (Most with square edges) and dyed it. It seeped thru all the crevices and created that marble look. Some places bleed more and created faded lines and stuff. But you get the idea of how thin you can actually create it. Almost as thin as a blade.



Also, see the overcuts from that bottom Triangle shape? Those ones where the points come to meet up? See how there's a line going past the intersection. That was an overcut from the blade. It catches that and dye will seep into it. It sucks. It's the reason I dont like to freehand letters anymore because it's hard to get em to come out perfect.

[Craig Smolin]

Thanks Acid. Pretty much summed up everything that I thought was the case.

[Fritz]

My way is perfect every time, however it takes at least 7 hours.

Glass pie pan, rit + water, float the disc, and come back in the morning. Also premade liquid rit works great as well.

Perfect black crisp lines every time.

[twmccoy]

I've found black RIT powder to be kind of lousy for pure color. Every time I do it it looks kind of brown and is never super dark. Star plastic seems to hold it the best though. Red is by far the darkest and most brilliant color I've used. Blue looks gray. I think blue is worse than black for getting a nice bright color. The yellow is kind of plain too.

[twmccoy]

My way is perfect every time, however it takes at least 7 hours.

Glass pie pan, rit + water, float the disc, and come back in the morning. Also premade liquid rit works great as well.

Perfect black crisp lines every time.

Josh, do you just use contact paper for this method or special vinyl? Contact paper does seem to bleed less when you just use water and not acetone. I may have to try this. Also, do you heat the water or no? Also, how much dye do you mix into the water to make it strong enough to work? All the times I've tried rit + water I got no results. I also didn't soak it overnight.