Craft Night: Canvas Photo Transfer

A couple weeks ago I was really excited to have Rubina over for my first craft night!  

READY!

It's just something that seems very "me."  I love spending time with people doing things and I love doing crafts.  Not only that, but it gives me a reason to take out my DSLR camera!  So having friends over for craft nights is something I think I want to continue doing and Rubina was nice enough to try the idea out with me.  When Rubina got here, we had dinner and then we sat down and got to work!  

We made a photo transfer onto canvas, based on the instructions from A Beautiful Mess.
Note:  I put the photos on the canvas with the gel medium the night before so they would be ready to go.

rub-a-dub-dub

Mine definitely did not turn out how I anticipated, but I actually ended up kind-of loving it for a completely different reason.  (I'll get into that in a bit.)  First of all, some things we learned while completing this DIY:

• when they say peeling off the layers of the paper takes patience, they are not kidding!  We literally kept dampening the canvas and rubbing off layers for hours.  (This is not an exaggeration.  Be prepared.)
• we also found it was a bad idea to start rubbing right after dampening an area.  The photo would come right off in that area, leaving a hole.  After we finished we also found someone said something similar in the comments of the original post.  (But we were happy we figured it out ourselves first ;) )
• we reached a point of just being done and tired of the project.  It was clear that when the photo was damp it looked better than when it dried because when it was dry, the bits of paper that were still on the canvas were obvious.  (That's the best way I can describe it.)  So we dampened our canvases, allowed them to dry a bit and then added the final gel medium layer hoping it would dry that way.  We also found someone said something similar in the comments later so we thought we were golden.  I still think the white paper spots are visible after it dried....  
• One tip we read in the comments after making ours:  If you make the photo black and white and up the contrast (pretty much as high as it will go) it makes it look so much better. It may not look quite how you want it to on your computer but it looks great on the transfer.     Next time?

But now to the point where I explain why I kind-of love mine - it's growing on me.  I picked a photo of me with my parents from our Europe trip this summer in Budapest.  The picture has the sun shinning behind us so we look very shadowy, which I like.  I was also balancing as we walked along the road and sidewalk, which if you've walked many places with me, you know is something I do.  Frequently.  That was supposed to be the focus of the photo.  As I kept rubbing of paper, I noticed the Liberty Statue, which we were walking away from, is in the background.  Something I hadn't noticed in the picture before.  The way my transfer turned out the part with my parents and I isn't especially clear, but the liberty statue is (if you're looking for it).  The tour guide explained the statue as standing for peace.  And I kind-of like that.

Yes, it's small in the background, but I like it.

Rubina likes to learn through reading... she's my instruction queen
I like to learn through doing, other people, and pictures.
Dream team?

check out the paper scraps we rubbed off!
Rubina made a nice pile, while mine (in the background) is all spread out.
(I also had little pieces all over my clothes...)