Take a pic of your image, transfer it to your computer, crop, resize, drop the background, and print it on decal paper. Put on your base coat, place the degal, just like you did with models on your tank (hint put 2 or three drops of liquid dish soap in a half cup of warm water, and put it in a spray bottle) then spray the tank with this solution where you want to put the transfer. This will make the decal easier to move to position it exactly where you want it. When dry rinse with water and dry then do your clear coat process.
The way is called decopauge. I don't know if I spelled it correctly. Head over to Hobby Lobby and ask one of the clerks how to do it and what you need to buy. My wife used to do this about 30 years ago. I watched from across the room.
i cut a bunch of pics out of maxum and fhm and stick glued them to the forks of my bike (bmx) then put like 20 coats od krylon clear over them.... worked pretty well
Some old biker at a car show told me how he used to do it. First, he'd pick out a photo in ******* that he liked. He'd cut the whole page out. Then, he'd spray on a couple coats of laquer clearcoat and let it dry. Then, when the clear was dry, he'd get the paper wet so that he could peel the actual paper part of the picture off, leaving just a transparent picture trapped in the clearcoat. Then he cut the picture out along it's border so there was just the nudie girl and no words or other ****. Then he painted the tank with whatever base color he was going to use, laid on a few coats of clear, and stuck his cutout onto the tank while the clear was wet. Then a few more coats of clear over the top to seal it all down. I've always wanted to try it, although laquer clear isn't the easiest thing to get anymore. The guy I talked to specified laquer clear.
Soak the pic. in warm water with a couple drops of dawn. Soak it a good long time, like 30 minutes, maby more. Then lay it on a flat hard surface and roll the paper off with your finger. If you only have a white background it will not show, but words and background color will. You can trim just your image. I used laquer but I feel some of the new clears would work. Can't you get clear spray cans like Krylon might work. It's just a trial and era thing with the new products. Oh yea, the clear is very fragile, roll the paper off with care.
I am running this back to the top because this has also always intrested me. What did jim Jake Jacob do on his car with all the old hot rod magizne. Is it the same thing. any more info on this would be great.
for best results and to keep the sun from fading - use vynly. If you have a shop near you that does car wrap ads go to them and have them print your image on vinyl, then clear over it. Here is a website to check out - they are in dallas. http://skinzautowraps.com/
we put a movie poster of heavy metal on the hood of my torino when i was a freshman in high school bodyshop, we coated the gloss side of the poster with several coats of hot laquer while some one else put a couple hot coats of clear laquer on the already painted hood, with both still wet we laid the poster on the hood, worked out the bubbles with a soft squeegie and a straight pin. let it all dry and the next day rubbed the paper from the hood just like washing the car. after all the paper was off it looked really dull, but with a couple more coats of laquer the colors popped quite nice. the only thing we had to be aware of was the paper stock type. you had to pick a pic that was printed on the cheaper 'pulp' stock. the high gloss stock from say, '*******' wouldnt work that good. or it wouldnt wash off. i tried this for an experiment. take a pic from the same mag. or a corner of the pic you want to use and crumble it around in your hand under running warm water, if it turns to a mushy oat meal state it should work, if it dosent, it probably wont. but hey, dont hold me to this, i was 16 and it was 1980. but it did work for us.
You can do it with the acrylic Gloss Medium & Varnish, from Liquitex. Part of the trick is not putting the first coat on real wet, so it doesn't soak the page and pick up the ink on the other side. Apply 5 or 6 coats,alternating brush stoke directions for each coat. Let dry for a couple days,then soak the paper off the back. To apply,some people use Gold Size,or tacky clear.Just make sure you don't get any airbubbles trapped under your design.
HotRodRon, I think Jim Jacobs simply pasted the pictures he wanted directly to the car without trying to seperate the image from the paper stock. Good old fashioned lick 'em n stick 'em...well, you know what I mean.
My dad has a old Hotrod "Paint and body" magazine from 73, that's how they explained it too. Pretty neat stuff.
Yeah: spray the page with clear, after dry soak it in water & rub off the paper on the back. You'll be left with a layer of clear imprinted with the ink from the page. You'll have to have a white base to put it on, if you want it to look the same/real. Spray a coat of clear over the base, while wet lay the "page" on the clear, & clear over it again. I've only done it with laquer (& it's very tricky), but I don't see why urethanes wouldn't work. ~ Paul aka "Tha Driver" Remember 1/2 of the population is below average.
Whilst we're on the subject of decoupage and ****, can someone tell me how I can macrame some headers for my Packford?
What if you just shot a light coat of white right on the back of the image? Let that dry and then do the stick it to the car with clear thing. How well is this going to work on a compound curved surface? Better for doors, hoods and tailgates I'm guessing.
I heard that you could also use rice paper for image transfer, print an image onto it in black & white, cut it out to shape, lay down a tack coat of clear, stick the image down, and clear over it. I haven't tried it yet becuase rice paper is really available in b.f.e. where I live, but apparently the paper turns transparent and only leaves the image printed on it behind. I really wanna know if this works or not!
Worth a try. Curved surfaces can be problematic. :-D Best to cut out only the image/shape you really want instead of trying to use a whole page. ~ Paul aka "Tha Driver" You talkin' dirty or hep?
What Unkl Ian says. Gloss medium, the more coats the better. The higher the carbon content ie. the glossier the paper the better it will work. Everything that has been said about background is correct, you will lift everything off the paper just like a waterslide decal. I have used this method before with good results. As far as clear coat, I was using laquer when I was doing it but I am betting any good clear medium will work. Just be sure you let the transfer dry really well, I have trapped moisture under the clear when I thought is was dry and it wasn't. Hope that helps. GV
i would like to see some more pics of this type of work. this is very interesting and i have never heard of this type of painting until reading this post
Nope: no way that was done using the technique we're talking about (I'm willing to bet!). ~ Paul aka "Tha Driver" Headline: APATHY RUNS RAMPANT - Nobody cares.
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