Autumn Glory Triptych - Finished!

[StratoArt]

Okay, I'm starting to brush on the embellishing gel. But, I'm doing it on a sample giclee that I personally printed out. The white gel will turn clear after drying. It is very important that the brush strokes correspond to the texture in the painting. The tree's bark is a horizontal texture and I use a dappled approach to the bushes and leafy areas. I use smoother strokes for the trees in the background. I have a video that I made too, it is just a silent hand-held video. I had to hold the camera in one hand and embellish the print with the other, which was hard. I did apply some music to it, but there's no talking. I'll upload that soon. Again, as usual with photographs of this nature, the photo doesn't do it justice, it looks MUCH better in person, trust me.




Most of the left side is embellished but I intentionally left the right side untouched to show the difference.


When viewed from the front you see right through to the painting. When moving around the painting, it shimmers here and there where the embellishing is applied. There is added depth in this technique.

[StratoArt]

I'm just waiting on my video to upload to YouTube - but here is my blog post on the subject of embellishing this digital giclee print.
I'm extremely pleased with ArtRage while working on this rather large triptych.

Embellishing Giclee Prints

[copespeak]

You've done a beautiful job on your painting/s. That gel is quite interesting, I've never seen it used before!

[StratoArt]

You've done a beautiful job on your painting/s. That gel is quite interesting, I've never seen it used before!

Thank you!

I just posted this video demo of how I "paint" the embellishing gel on there.

[D Akey]

Glorious. What a great finish. I'm very impressed.

So a couple questions:

1) That is gloss polymer gel is it? It's been a while, and I don't think I ever used it for other than mixing in with acrylics, rather than applying it for the surface patina. It kind of threw me because I look at the giclee not as a bunch of ink, but I see it as a painting, and so seeing you applying a plastic onto oil was jarring and I kept having to remind myself that it's ink.

2) Why were you painting on something that was as yet not mounted onto stretcher bars. I thought that was what giclees came mounted on -- similar to blank canvases for painting.

Anyway, the triptych is sensational. Bravo!!!!!!!! Super inspiring.

[StratoArt]

Glorious. What a great finish. I'm very impressed.

So a couple questions:

1) That is gloss polymer gel is it? It's been a while, and I don't think I ever used it for other than mixing in with acrylics, rather than applying it for the surface patina. It kind of threw me because I look at the giclee not as a bunch of ink, but I see it as a painting, and so seeing you applying a plastic onto oil was jarring and I kept having to remind myself that it's ink.

2) Why were you painting on something that was as yet not mounted onto stretcher bars. I thought that was what giclees came mounted on -- similar to blank canvases for painting.

Anyway, the triptych is sensational. Bravo!!!!!!!! Super inspiring.

Thank you so much! I've actually begun embellishing the large gallery-wrapped prints, and I'll post some updates on those.

For 1), This isn't really for mixing with acrylics with oil. At least not this specific product. I did see acrylic gel from the "Golden" line and you can mix it with acrylics. But I didn't see that with this product. I'm not sure what you mean by "applying a plastic polymer onto oil" The printers that made these giclees did spray an acrylic gloss coat archival sealant on it before shipping. So what this is, is an acrylic gel that dries clear, meant to be brushed on in an impasto fashion over a giclee print.

For 2), What you are seeing there, is me practicing on my own giclee print out. I have an Epson Stylus Pro 4900 and I wanted to practice the technique on a sample canvas (Epson exhibition satin canvas) before applying the embellishing to the real thing.

[D Akey]

Cool.

What I meant about the polymer gel over oil was that it's often seen to be risky to put oil base over water base and visa versa in the long run. Were you to try to take an oil painting and brush acrylic (plastic based medium) over it, it would either resist or run the risk of cracking or coming off -- that's what I remember from regular painting and mixing mediums a couple decades ago.

No, with giclee ink, it's likely not an issue when you're putting the impasto goop over it because it looks like it's been developed for that kind of surface (or it was a preexisting material that also works on this surface). If there is a coating over the ink that is water base (?) then adding something water base over it would suggest it would work. But my thinking is merely trying to associate what you're doing to what I remember of painting materials and how they work together or not.

So seeing how well you had it working made me wonder if you're using a product that was a polymer gel medium originally designed to work with acrylic paint. The stuff I'm talking about also goes on milky then dries clear and it came in matte and gloss (gloss was truer to the colors underneath, matte retained a little bit of a milky haze, depending on how thick it was applied). So your video got me to wondering if they just realized gel medium could be sold to this giclee market because it automatically filled that niche -- same product, different label.

I don't know much about giclees other than in theory of what they are basically, and of course by now they would have come up with materials where you could do what you were doing. I just recall people who added onto paintings that resembled an oil painting actually painted oil over the giclee. Did it last? I don't know since I had only bumped into it in galleries seeing other people's work -- and that was over a decade ago. A lot has happened since with the technology.

[StratoArt]

Cool.

What I meant about the polymer gel over oil was that it's often seen to be risky to put oil base over water base and visa versa in the long run. Were you to try to take an oil painting and brush acrylic (plastic based medium) over it, it would either resist or run the risk of cracking or coming off -- that's what I remember from regular painting and mixing mediums a couple decades ago.

No, with giclee ink, it's likely not an issue when you're putting the impasto goop over it because it looks like it's been developed for that kind of surface (or it was a preexisting material that also works on this surface). If there is a coating over the ink that is water base (?) then adding something water base over it would suggest it would work. But my thinking is merely trying to associate what you're doing to what I remember of painting materials and how they work together or not.

So seeing how well you had it working made me wonder if you're using a product that was a polymer gel medium originally designed to work with acrylic paint. The stuff I'm talking about also goes on milky then dries clear and it came in matte and gloss (gloss was truer to the colors underneath, matte retained a little bit of a milky haze, depending on how thick it was applied). So your video got me to wondering if they just realized gel medium could be sold to this giclee market because it automatically filled that niche -- same product, different label.

I don't know much about giclees other than in theory of what they are basically, and of course by now they would have come up with materials where you could do what you were doing. I just recall people who added onto paintings that resembled an oil painting actually painted oil over the giclee. Did it last? I don't know since I had only bumped into it in galleries seeing other people's work -- and that was over a decade ago. A lot has happened since with the technology.

Oh, I see what you are saying. Yes, I definitely agree that it's not good to put an acrylic over oil or visa versa. Yeah, with giclee printing nowadays, since they are dealing with inks, albeit in a very sophisticated way, and when they spray a coat of archival gloss coat over it (and that is water based), it's no problem at all do do this water-based impasto embellishing.

The particular company I got my embellishing mediums from is called Premier Art - but I got it through one of their dealers, ITSupplies - as I also buy my printer ink from them too for my Epson 4900 - EXPENSIVE ink btw. here's a link to the embellishing gel: https://www.itsupplies.com/Premier-I...lear-3001-5116 and they have a nice video of how it's applied to giclees too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxHU0SSiGyU

I did get some print shield coating from them too for future works. I found out that I didn't need it for these giclees because the printer already applied that gloss coat. The Eco Print shield stuff is here: https://www.itsupplies.com/Premier-I...rt-BR-3101-MQT and they show you how to apply it: http://youtu.be/N2Kkvrhr20E

It's really my first time doing this kind of embellishing on a giclee print, so I don't call myself an expert on it, but honestly, it's so easy to apply and it's kind of fun. It's like brushing the texture back into my painting, like I was meaning to do within ArtRage. So in a sense, it is like bringing a digital print closer to something that is painted traditionally, like an oil or acrylic painting.

I believe Thomas Kinkade used this method (I'm not a fan of his work though), but he and his sub-artists applied actual paint to prints, and when he would touch it, that print would be very very expensive. I believe many artists do actually do this to their prints, depending on the genre of art. For instance, I probably wouldn't do this to a typical aviation art piece, I dunno, it depends I guess. It works very well and looks excellent with landscapes. I guess it depends on the artist and how they "paint" the texture back onto their giclee prints.

I find it really fun actually, and the fact that I was able to paint initially with ArtRage, which I seriously have fallen in love with, makes it all the better.

[pai]

Oh, I love this post a lot. Thanks for sharing your awesome painting as well as the process and photos about how you printed out and the final process. As I really want to print out few to see my work in real...haha...I have to favorite this post. So easily for me to go back to read more details on how you process this. Beautiful painting.

[StratoArt]

Oh, I love this post a lot. Thanks for sharing your awesome painting as well as the process and photos about how you printed out and the final process. As I really want to print out few to see my work in real...haha...I have to favorite this post. So easily for me to go back to read more details on how you process this. Beautiful painting.

You are very welcome! I'm starting another commissioned piece, again done entirely in ArtRage, I'll keep everyone updated in the work-in-progress on that one.