Photo fresco - creating the gel

Epoxy and laminate.

Photo Fresco Revived - Don't call it a comeback

This site has never been a successful site for traffic or a consistent diary of my work on photo frescoes, but it is one of the few places I have put anything to text about my endeavor to make durable photos. Over the last month I have dug-in and pushed myself deeper into the chemicals that I use to make my photo fresco prints and found a few new combinations that seem to be working, consistently. Yesterday I set up a batch for the first time that included more than a few test pieces, a bakers dozen to be exact, and I am hopeful that all of them will come out successfully when I release them from the molds later today. It's not a comeback, but a revival of the process of Photo Fresco. The idea of a fresco is that the pigments from paints are absorbed into a wet plaster and is embedded into the hardening substrate. The result is a sort of merging of materials versus a paint on top of a substrate type of approach. The uses of fresco painting historically is greater than my knowledge, but the basic idea of absorption is what I am emulating with my efforts. Fancy gluing is what fresco painting really is, the binder is in the plaster and the absorption of the setting plaster pulls the pigments into a fixed state.

In my case I am using modified plasters, pigment based digital prints and epoxy hardeners to create something that I think is stronger than actual plaster frescos. Plaster itself is subject to deterioration due to moisture into the porous surface of the gypsum based materials. My process includes gypsum based plasters but not as the main binder. My main binder is epoxy, which bonds to the pigments that are printed onto film and then the epoxy is bonded to a plaster to stiffen and hold the epoxy. This could be called fancy gluing, but because each step is done in a wet state it is in this wet state that I feel like the bond is an emulation of the fresco process.

The durability of my fresco prints is coming from the idea that epoxy is my main binder with the pigments on the top surface. I have tried to avoid using a top coat of epoxy so that the pigments are directly facing outward from the print. This may not be a long term solution because some coating or protective layer may need to be put on top of the pigments to truly encapsulate the pigments and seal the image. Any layer on top of the pigments is going to provide a sheen or sense of lamination that I have been trying to avoid.

Until I due some weathering test there is no way to know just how strong my photo fresco prints are. The epoxy prints are potentially enough to call the process photo epoxy gels, epoxrescoes or something like that, but I enjoy using plaster or cement based materials to strengthen the back of the epoxy and can get a really good bond if I work with the materials when they are wet. This final step keeps me in the fresco game and provides a back layer that is strong and potentially durable to some basic weathering.

Another integral step in my process has been to re-use a bunch of screen printing frames that I have from my t-shirt printing business. This involves scraping ink, removing tape, washing on off the 16" X 19" frames and then coating them with a shellac for a somewhat dirt free surface to pour my chemicals in. I can't really put a value on my time, but it doesn't seem profitable to do this except that it is satisfying when I can take a piece of my old work trash and turn it into a new piece. I think I could do this process more effectively if I remove the old screens from the mix, but since this entire process was built around using these old frames it doesn't seem right to do so.

It's been a long time since I bloged and rolled... lemme' get back, lemme' get back!

The only thing that is important here is new work. I've gone around and around with materials and products, but can never decide on the ultimate perfect item that can serve a purpose, be resistant to weathering and that people may want. I've built structures and frames, magnetic hats and Christmas tree ornaments, but nothing seems to stick for a long period of time. Metallic finishes are great, but I can get those out of the bottle or spray can, so I have had to abandon the cold casting methods that require sanding and oxidation in favor of spray on colors. One thing seems to be consistent and that is the need for more than one color in a final piece. This became apparent when I used some of my molds to make Breaking Bad Candy in the shape of the Heisenberg head, it looked good up close, but when I put a sticker behind the candy and the black on the sticker came through the translucent hard candy it made a big difference.

Mugshot wall of shame

Hollywood celebrity mugshot coffee mugs at yque.

New shoes on wire los Angeles designs

Yque front window

Satoshi Goes to the Mint; 1e-8 Bitcoin Value

The first generation of a duplicate product carries the most detail. In developing my mold making techniques based on screen printing I have eliminated the need for silicon to make my original molds, but my molds are not as durable and easy to use as silicone molds would be. I have rationalized the benefits of my on-the-fly molds by assuming that a first generation mold, even if it is not as durable, should provide more detail and a higher resolution product than a silicon mold that would force me to make a 2nd generation product. This logic seems undeniable, but I like the production characteristics of silicon that allow me to make many products with a wide range of materials without much damage to the mold.

My first project with these quickee molds was to make a Satoshi. What is a Satoshi you say? Well, a Satoshi is a unit of measure used in bitcoin to represent the smallest denomination that a bitcoin can be broken down to, which is One Hundred Millionith. This is very, very small, but eventually this measure may be as important as the penny was to allowing a dollar to be broken down to purchase candy back in the day. A Satoshi is named after the creator of Bitcoin, Satoshi Nakamoto, and although he has tried to remain anonymous in his personal life, he did no such thing by naming the smallest measurement of Bitcoin after himself. Thus I have used this recently uncovered exposure of Satoshi himself to mint a coin with his face to be non other than a Satoshi itself.

This coin is made with epoxy and steel atomized powder with cold-casting methods in my experimental molds. The first batch of Satoshis were too small of a font, so I only made 8 of those. These will never get into circulation officially. My next batch had a larger font and is currently setting up. There are another 8 in that batch and if I use only my experimental molds then I can always produce them with the highest resolution possible with my techniques. By using steel powder I can keep the cost of production down to match the fact that a Satoshi isn't worth very much, if anything in any other measurable equivalent currency. Still I like the idea that making Satoshis may have been overlooked by the more opportunistic Bitcoin entrepreneurs.

I will sell Satoshis for the equivalent US dollar value of what a Satoshi is worth in the Bitcoin world, but the cost of shipping and handling will cover my cost of production in the long run since they won't even be worth a penny currently. One day a Satoshi may be worth a dollar or more, but the value of a Bitcoin will have to more far beyond where it is now to make that a reality; which may require the value of a single Bitcoin to be $100,000,000 US. Not likely. In the meantime you can own one of these for fun and be the proud owner of one of the smallest denominations of a digital currency that has ever existed.

3d printing at yque

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