Image Transfer Painting

 The other day my friend sent me a photo of a friend of hers and asked me what sort of painting she could get for a small budget. I decided I could do an image transfer with painted details.

I started wit ha small canvas board and a printed copy of the photo in reverse. I forgot about the reverse part the first time I printed it, but that then became my reference photo.

Then I coated the canvas in an acrylic gel medium, which works the same as image maker.

This is the same technique I used with this picture.

Once the medium had dried I wetted the paper to rub it off, leaving the image behind. Unfortunately this didn't work as well as it has done in the past as some of the image started to come off as well. This just meant that I'd be doing more painting than I'd originally planned.

I think I ended up painting over everything except the ears and teeth.

I had to use acrylic paint for this as I didn't know how oil paint would react with the remaining paper.It was a bit of a challenge as I'm not used to using it for painting in a realistic style but I think it turned out all right. 

Photo Transfer On Canvas

You may have seen tutorials for transferring photos onto canvas. The first one I can think of is from A Beautiful Mess. I'd bought some small canvas boards from The Works on sale and decided to use one to display one of my favourite photos from the end of uni.

The tutorials say to use a gel medium, and I happen to have some from a pack I got given in my first year of uni. It's meant to be mixed with acrylic paint to create texture I think, but I've never used it.

I printed off my photo using a laser printer. That bit's important. You also have to remember that the image has to be in reverse. I say this because I forgot and had to print it out again.

Then I generously covered the canvas board with the gel medium and put the photo on top.

Once it had dried over night I dampened the paper and started rubbing it off.

Elsie says to expect an imperfect image but I was surprised by how well the image had transferred.

I decided to add paint to the image. It is on a canvas after all.

Using acrylic paint I filled in the white edge of the canvas board and then went over some of the photo.

You can see the difference between Natalie's face, which is mostly still the photo, and my face which I've painted over.

I added paint to large areas, like my dress and skin, instead of trying to recreate some of the details like my eyes. I think combining paint with a photograph creates an interesting look.