A new art technique I have been experimenting with lately has been photo transfers using colorless blender pens. Blender pens are my new favorite tool as they make the process of photo transfers quick and easy. The process only takes about 5 minutes and the prints come out with a cool vintage look. I’ve tried this process a couple of times using prints I’ve taken of places I’ve been to like the photo above taken in Kyoto, Japan and they have all turned out looking really pretty.

To create your own print all you need are the following materials:

1. A laser jet print of a photo (it MUST be a laser photo print or it won’t transfer)
2. Scissors
3. Blender pens (I use Chartpak colorless blender pens)
4. A wood panel or matte paper
5. Tape

Directions:

1. Take your laser jet photo print and cut your print with scissors so that you have at least a one inch border around your print.
2. Tape your photo down face down onto a wood panel or a matte paper making sure to only put tape on the one inch border around the photo. Try to center it as much as possible so that you will have even borders.
3. Using your blender pen, color the back of the photo print until it’s fully saturated
4. Peel off the tape and BOOM! You have your new print!

It’s literally that easy and fast. You could literally eat a sandwich during the time it takes to make a print! It’s that quick! I swear! On the real don’t eat a sandwich while actually making the print though because the blender pens have a strong chemical scent that might make you feel a little light-headed. When completing a print make sure you are working in a highly ventilated area and maybe wear like a a SARS mask so you don’t die or something like that.You won’t really die but just be safe and take the proper precautions.

Here are some amazing examples of ones some of my students have made on wood panels:

When the students were working on this transfers, all of them loved the results of their completed works. They said the best part of the whole process was taking the saturated photo prints off the wood panels for the big reveal because they were anxious to see how their transfer turned out. Many of them were also very surprised at how much of their original photo the transfer picked up. Lastly, they loved how fast the process took and some even mentioned that they wanted to use the same process at home to make Valentine’s Day cards for their friends and family. Overall, they all had fun making their prints and I think you will too!

Note: Do not try this process on canvas because it simply will not work. I tried and it looked like poop. Not literal poop but yeah…the photos didn’t transfer well so stick with the matte paper (Bristol board or mixed media paper) or wood panels. You don’t want to waste costly canvases…I did and it made me really sad so just don’t do it!