Distressed Picture Canvas Project

Ok, so I said a week ago to stay tuned for me turning my picture of CJ into a distressed picture canvas. The idea to do this project came from the blog Delia Creates. You can visit it at http://www.deliacreates.blogspot.com/. Right now she's featuring this baked apple recipe and it looks simple and awesome. To get right to the insturctions for this project click here. This is a really cool blog. If I had to describe the type of blog I hope to have it would definitely be something like Delia's. She has everything from fun simple mommy crafts, to photography, to cooking.

So on with the results....

To get started on this project was a bit of a challenge for me. I went to michael's and got all the supplies about two weeks. They were easy to find: Gel Medium, canvases, and sponges. (Use a coupon for the Gel Medium the canvases happened to be no sale that day so everything was cheap.) I had a vision for the picture and put it together. Simple right... Well then I went to Office Depot to get the picture printed. This was supposed to be the easy part right...well it was a nightmare. After 3 days and 2 hours later I was able to walk out of there with something I could use. Just remember if you have words on your image you need a mirror image and it will save you both the time and a headache to just flip and save your image yourself.

Here's the end result. Picture taken with my iphone. I had some step by step pics of me doing the project but have them saved somewhere in the many picture folders on my computer. Please review Delia's site for step by steps pics.

If you decide to do this project...which I hope you do; this is what you should know:

1. Its easy!!
2. When you spread the medium on be sure to spread it evenly.
3. When you lay your picture down make sure to work out all the air bubbles. I had 2 small ones but didn't realize it until I was removing the paper.
4. This is not a one hour project. I allowed the medium to dry over night and worked on it here and there throughout the day to remove the paper.
5. A good tip that helped me get the paper off is to spray the canvas with water all and rub it with your fingers. After that work in small areas. Near the end instead of spraying water on the canvas I sprayed my fingers and then rubbed the area I was working. That seemed to work really good.
6. This is a distressed canvas image so its supposed to look aged and worn.

So try it and let me know how it works for you. I think with the right pic this will make a wonderful gift for grandparents, friends, and spouses. My husband even liked it and he's not really into this kind of stuff.

Check out Delia's blog to see other images she's transferred.

Enjoy.