Remove duct tape adhesive residue from fabric I have an article of clothing that had duct tape on it at one point, but after pulling off the duct tape residue remains.

I've debated buying Goo Gone but I am worried about discoloration.
The fabric is all black, no patterns.

What would be the best way to remove the duct tape adhesive residue, without affecting coloration? Has anyone used Goo Gone before? Are there alternative methods that can be used?

EDIT: I've confirmed with the company that manufactured the clothing that it is 94% Polyester and 6% Spandex

Goo Gone and similar products work quite well on hard surfaces for removing adhesive residue. You will find that the recommendations for such products also include testing on a hidden portion or similar piece.

It's likely that Goo Gone will work and you may be able to soak the fabric in the liquid to allow better penetration. Once soaked for a while, a detergent wash is likely to be needed to remove the oiliness of GG.

Alternatives to GG include WD-40, with the same oiliness factor, as well as baby oil, mineral oil and peanut butter.

Work the selected substance in the fabric frequently to ensure good distribution.

A quick search using "goo gone fabrics" shows that many posts have been made to indicate the product works on clothing.

Of all the above, I think peanut butter involves the most effort and perhaps the lowest risk of discoloration, but I've never used peanut butter!


Is it possible to make a charcoal lump stop leaving marks? I thought about using a charcoal lump (you know, the regular stove coal) as a stand.

Is it possible to make it stop leaving black marks on anything it touches? Like, sealing it, or something else?

There are a few ways you can do this.

You didn't say whether you wanted to maintain the natural colours within the coal or not, but if you do, you can use a clear spray lacquer, coat it in clear furniture varnish or any other coating that will seal the coal.

The suggestion by @BellaSwan of using  clear acrylic spray or nail paint will do the trick too but it will take a lot of nail paint bottles to coat a reasonable size chunk of coal.

If you wish to colour the coal lump, then you can use whatever kind of paint you choose; emulsion, eggshell, chalk-based, even gloss.


What are the dimensions of the joint between the tools and body on a Leatherman Surge? I'm modifying a Leatherman Surge, and in the process I'm custom building some new tools to go in it. For this, I need the exact measurements and shape of some of the mechanisms used in the tool:

The swiveled locking mechanism. I have previously found a website which hosted this information, but it went down.
The universal shank that is used to connect jig saw blades to jig saws. This is also used in the Leatherman Surge but I don't think it is proprietary/unique.

A schematic diagram would be most helpful if someone has or can create one.

I was one of a few machinists that made the main pivot pin that links the Leatherman tools in the holder. Because the (stainless steel pin) material was very difficult to work down to the +-.0005 dimensions indicated using standard machine tooling, Leatherman made ongoing changes to the dimensions and material for cost effectiveness. The previous post, buy or use an appropriate caliper to measure would be the best if you are custom making your own tools to mount.


How do I get my jewelry wire to be the right stiffness? I would like to create wire and wire-wrapped jewelry. I know what gauge wire is appropriate for the size of the piece, but I keep buying wire that is too pliable and won't hold its shape like I would want for thin rings, ear wires, etc.

What factors can tell me if a type of wire will be the right stiffness (aside from actually testing it in a store)? Is there anything I can do to make my wire more or less pliable?

There are three grades of hardness in jewellery wire:

Full-hard, which is tempered wire that is very stiff. It's rarely used, because it's just too stiff for most jewellery.
Half-hard, which is hardened during manufacture but is not fully tempered and is not so hard. It's pliable by hand, but you need to use some force to do it and pliers are often easier. This is the stuff you want for most jewellery (excluding things that need to bend such as necklaces (though you should be looking at chain for those anyway)).
Dead-soft, which is just plain wire that hasn't been at all hardened. This needs minimal force from your hands to bend. I suspect you've been buying this kind of stuff.

The hardness also depends to an extent on the material - the cheaper stuff like copper and brass is generally manufactured at softer grades.

Bear in mind that you can also harden existing soft wire by either applying heat to it (i.e. a blow-torch or other high-intensity heat - a match won't do it) and then quenching it (drop it straight into cold water), or applying pressure to it (hammer it - just remember that this also reduces the diameter).

You can ask when you're buying the wire what grade it is, or look on whatever packaging it comes in to see if it's marked.


What are opposing curves? I have been reading a book about figure drawing and it states that opposing curves are an important concept for drawing figures and other forms in nature. Could anyone explain in a simple way what the opposing curves concept is about?

It is a concept used in creating (drawing, painting, sculpting) organic forms.

  Opposing Curves is no more complex an idea than that curves in nature are rarely if ever related to one another as are parentheses ( ), but that rather they are always offset from / or opposed to one another like the curves in the double helix of a strand of DNA. - from CGSociety

The most simple way to explain this is to say that, when drawing, painting or sculpting organic form, we should never use curves that make the form look symmetrical. Beings are not symmetrical. Objects are. So, to achieve organic form, we should not use curves that make being look symmetrical like the objects are. That is why parentheses are used as an example.

() - symmetrical

(( - Opposing Curves - not symmetrical

)) - Opposing Curves - not symmetrical

If you draw a continuous line with opposing curves, you will notice really nice and smooth flow moving down that line.

If we look at the human body (or any organic form), we can see many curves but those curves are made of smaller curves.

  Curves also never curve inward ~ curves are always convex, and never concave. Artists, particularly when they are starting out, draw curves which scoop inward, toward the interior of the form - when in fact, form is created by a series of (sometimes minute) convex curves. - from CGSociety

So, to draw an organic form, lets say a human, we should not use Parentheses () curves to depict the form.

Example:

I hope I explained it well.

If you would like to know more, you can read this nicely written article I found (link is NSFW, due to artistic nudity presented): http://www.cgsociety.org/index.php/CGSFeatures/CGSFeatureSpecial/opposing_curves


Where can I show my work online? I started drawing and would like to post my work on a website, without having to make my own blog. I'm looking for a kind of "social network for images".

I tried the most popular images social network, Instagram, but it is absolutely not what I'm looking for. Maybe it is good for photos of your food, but for drawings I think it is quite awful (upload only from phone, squared images...).

I mainly think about Tumblr, but it is not as famous as Instagram, and not really handy too... Imgur is a different concept.

What are the main/popular websites or community for sharing art?
I want:

easy upload
easy sharing
easy commenting
(possibly uploading directly from the phone)

Thank for your time and advices,
Cheers!

You could try www.deviantart.com . I never used it but it seems like it's a website for artists to easily show their work. I think it is even possible to sell prints of your art.


Paint choices for updating outdoor Christmas figures that are wood My husband brought home some Christmas figures in 2019 after his Dad died. There are 12 of them, and they are choirboys singing and holding candles (the final one is a really little boy running to join the choir, with his candle tipped over). They are made of wood but they are flat, like someone cut them from a flat piece of wood - not plywood but something similar. We think they date from the 1950's, possibly earlier, because we're not sure when his parents got them or made them. They were stored in the basement for decades, a damp and extremely musty environment.
Hubby replaced the metal stands that stick into the ground, and replaced the candles. They were originally wired together but we found LED battery powered lights and retrofitted them. We had them up last year but we think the paint needs to be touched up in a few places. So I'm looking for suggestions of what kind of paint we can use over what we think is oil based paint on wood. They will be outdoors for about 6 weeks and we can get snow but will probably get more rain and ice. Temps will probably be in the 30's and 40's F.

I would say you are limited to using oil based paints to do this. You cannot paint acrylics over oils as the paint will later peel off or flake away. My suggestion is to buy a small inexpensive set of oil paint tubes. You can can buy an art set for as little as $20AUD. After the paint has thoroughly dried, give it 2 or 3 coats of an outdoor varnish to seal and protect it.


How can I make a male object from a female reference object using a mold? I have a female port (slightly larger than a USB port) from an old obsolete device. I would like to use the female port I currently have to make a mold for the male version. I have some ideas for adding the metal contacts to make it functional.

My current strategy is to use a product such as Oomoo 35 to make a silicon mold of the female port. This first mold will contain the shape of the male part I want (but will be too soft to use on its own). I will cut away any part of the mold that I don't need and use what is left to create a second mold, where I can then cast the actual male part in a hard material or resin as many times as needed.

I've never created a silicon mold before so I'm curious if that is a reasonable approach for what I'm trying to achieve. Can I use Oomoo/silicon again for the second mold or do I need to use a different material?

Is there any particular name for what I'm trying to achieve? I've been searching for strategies to this problem but I must not be using the correct query.

Your technique should work, as long as the male is a fairly close negative of the female. If that's the case, then your first mould (of the female part) will be the correct shape for the male part, and can act as what's known as a master.

If they're not exact negatives of each other (in your case, I expect the male connector to be slightly smaller than the female port so it will fit easily, for example) then you'll need to alter this cast until it's the correct shape.

You might find it easier to cast the first mould (the male bit) in a harder material for alteration, before making another mould of the altered casting.

From then, you can follow the normal procedure and make a mould of this master so you can reproduce it.

Silicone can be used to make moulds of silicone objects, but you will need to be very careful when applying mould release agent to prevent the two pieces from bonding.


How best to fill the bottom of a PVC Tee with resin, plaster or some other material? There is a tradition in backyard chicken keeping of constructing chicken feeders using PVC pipe. (See:
https://www.instructables.com/id/PVC-Chicken-Feeder/
https://www.instructables.com/id/PVC-Chicken-Feeder-with-Meter/ )

One of the key components of such feeding systems is a "135 degree tee" (aka "Tee", see image below or in links above)

We've used the system for years. It works well. But you do get some pellet wastage. i.e. pellets sitting in section 1 of the Tee which just sit there and never get eaten. Nothing bad happens to them, but it just seems a waste.

I’ve been wondering if there was some kind of resin, plaster or some other material known to the arts and crafts community that could be used to fill the space at the bottom of the tee. Perhaps overthinking it, I was imagining a two stage pour. First stage (area 1). Simple fill. Then once cured, fix the tee on an angle and do a second pour to fill area 2.

Ideally the material used would be relatively inexpensive and once cured would stay in place, be very occasionally washable and be "food safe" * for chickens.

whilst bearing in mind that they are already being fed from a PVC pipe. However, I do wonder if for that reason, we shouldn’t use plaster or cement, or if doing so, maybe covering it with a resin, sealant or lacquer later? (in which case, what would you recommend?)

I'd value your thoughts. Thanks in advance.

Operating with a two stage fill is a good start. Consider also that the dead space at the bottom need not be anything special, generally speaking. Cut cardboard, stuffed newspaper, just about anything at hand. Create your 1 and 2 shapes all in one step or in pieces, as you like.

Once in place, seal the top surfaces of 1 and 2 with a flat component, perhaps another piece of custom fit cardboard or two.

This now forms the desired surface onto which you can pour food safe resin available at craft stores and hobby shops and online resources.

The last layers are to reduce the amount of leakage into the mass below as well as to reduce the amount required. Even some modeling clay to seal the edges on the inner pipe may be required.

The food safe resin provides for safe pellet access. You can pour in multiple passes and angle changes to get the thickness you require.


How do I identify good quality paper for charcoal drawing? How do I identify paper that's good for charcoal?  By "good", I'm referring to characteristics like how charcoal behaves on it, how fixative applies to the paper, durability, yellowing, etc.
I'm a teenager, so currently I have no money; good "budget" paper is more relevant right now than expensive "best" paper.  I'm using these big sheets of paper, the brand is "Soho Studio".  I've heard reviews of good brands that turned out not to be that good, so it would be valuable to get input based on people's actual experience (along with some context of what were the objectives/expectations, and what made the recommended paper particularly good for that purpose).

I have done a lot of charcoal drawings, and I mostly used paper by Canson (XL, Academy) and Fabriano (large sheets or rolls of the Accademia variety). They create several ranges of papers, and both include very affordable ones.
I have not had problems with yellowing of paper, despite some of these works being almost twenty years old, but admittedly most are stored dry and dark.
A few basic remarks on the characteristics of the paper you're looking for:

Make sure it is acid-free (which also means it is lignin- and sulfur-free1), as the lignin will yellow, and the acids will react to light and heat and deteriorate.
Alternatively, make sure it's made of cotton instead of wood (see this answer).
When it comes to using charcoal, you'll need quite sturdy paper (≥ ± 95 gr/m2), with at least a little bit of tooth/grain to allow for the charcoal to erode (see also this answer).
You can check for cold-pressed paper, which usually has a rougher surface.
Be sure to try different weights, grains, sizes, and colours, to see where your preferences lie.

Additional notes:

Keep the drawings out of sunlight.
Store properly (dry, dark, cool) or display properly (behind UV resistant glass, in dim places, &c.).
You might even want to go as far as to prevent rubbing in residual acids from your hands by washing your hands before drawing, or wearing light gloves. I don't think this will have a huge impact, but it is good to take into consideration.
Don't use hairspray! :)

1: https://web.archive.org/web/20000914045052/http://www.history.pcusa.org/cong/acidpaper.html


Can large pieces of slipware be dried without a kiln? I have a clay (plasticine) positive of a human figure standing 5' tall

Next step is making a rubber mold for the lost wax process and a bronze positive
May I use the rubber mold for slip after the wax positive is made, plaster is to fragile and not at all charming
Is Raku the answer for drying, if I can make a slip positive
Would someone discuss the basics here?  Any pointers are welcomed, if they reference the project!
The actual mold has multiple pieces that will be joined to form a container into which the slip may be poured and later poured out when the piece reaches the desired thickness.
Suggestions on thickness and etc.
Ideas other than plaster or slip

Making a piece out of ceramics, you should use plaster for the mold as it draws out the moisture from the clay slip, and you will not  need to  wait a  long  time to get the thickness of your  clay.  If you use a rubber mold, the moisture has to leave the clay through the  air, which is very slow.
Raku is a way to fire the clay, so unless you want a hardened piece out of the clay, I would not fire it raku style or otherwise.
If you are wanting to make a bronze piece, why use the ceramic as part? You can make the finished piece in several parts of bronze or clay.  The pieces  can  be  combined  afterward; molded clay glued with slip, or welding or soldering the bronze.
Another way would be a breakable mold for the entire piece, where you break the complete work out of the mold in one piece.


Affordable micromotor for jewelry I'm trying to find a cheap micromotor or small dremel suitable for drilling, sanding and polishing jewelry and precious metals.
I'm not sure if it's possible to find something usable for under/around 100$ but it would be great if someone has recommendations.

"usable" is relative.  I bought a perfectly functioning dremel-like tool off of AliExpress for under $30 and it came with bits for the activities you describe above, as well as a 3ft flexible shaft attachment.  It took weeks to get to me but works great, however I am constantly aware that if it should break, I'd be on my own.  Overseas support lines are beyond my patience threshold.

This is not an endorsement.  I'm not even providing a product name or a link.  Just offering a source for what you are looking for and testimony about my own personal experience with that tool.


How can I store my oil pastels? When I was in junior high school (long time ago), I won a drawing contest and the prize was a set of oil pastels. Never used them much over the years, but I ran into them recently.

Someone, either me or my parents at the time, threw out the original packaging and placed all my pastels in a freezer bag. While they were protected from the elements they were not protected from themselves.

Assuming the original packaging is lost, what storage strategy can I consider for my pastels. I am thinking about container as well as long term storage concerns. For instance: How is temperature a factor?

So the main considerations for storing oil pastels are:

The individual pastels are kept separate, so that they do not bleed into one another
They are kept reasonably cool (room temperature, ~20ºC is fine)

If the latter is a problem, just keep them in the fridge (although you'll want to allow them to warm up a bit before using them).

As for the former, if you've lost the original packaging, that is a bit of a pain. Artbin make art supplies storage boxes of many varieties, there will probably be at least one type of box that fits your needs. There are also plenty of places that sell slightly more expensive wooden pastel boxes - these might be overkill though.

In a pinch, the tray from a box of chocolate fingers might do too.


Is there a heat resistant glue that's appropriate for adhering twine to glass? I would like to glue twine to a wine bottle and convert it into a lamp/light. Is there a recommended adhesive that will work for this purpose while being safe from the radiant heat of the bulb?

The amount of heat generated by an incandescent light bulb in an enclosure is not particularly great relative to many adhesive types. One can purchase a silicone product known as high temperature RTV (room temperature vulcanizing) which can tolerate temperatures sufficiently high to ignite paper. It's not particularly suited to your project, however, as it is often bright red and would be unsightly if any oozed from between the runs of twine.

Many epoxies are capable of tolerating high temperatures, especially as they can generate uncomfortable levels during curing. If you scuff up the surface of the bottle with coarse sandpaper prior to applying epoxy, the adhesive will adhere well and provide that much more strength.

A local hobby shop will carry various types of epoxy. The faster curing versions, frequently called "five minute epoxy" will harden quickly but be weaker than the fifteen minute or thirty minute version. The longer cure types will also tolerate the higher temperatures better.

I've used the 30 minute cure version frequently. It has to be applied when temperatures are at 70°F or above. Some hobbyists also use a heat lamp or incandescent bulb to speed up curing. Heat guns are used, but with temperatures above 450°F from such a device, one risks burning.


Name for the turning opening I'm translating a set of sewing instructions from German to English. I don't know a lot of sewing vocabulary, and I'm having trouble finding some of it in dictionaries, Wikipedia and so on. The term I'm asking for here is Wendeöffnung - literally "turn opening" - the hole you leave unstitched when sewing something inside-out so that you can turn it right-side-out. What is that usually called in English?

I agree with the comments.  "Leave a gap or space" would work, instead of a trying to use a single specific word.


Are there specific types of plastic that are more "Clear" than others? I am looking for brands/types of plastic that are more "clear" than others.  I am not sure if there are any differences between types i.e., acrylic, plexiglass, etc, but I would assume that some are more suited for certain situations, and are made in certain ways, with certain materials.

I am essentially looking to replace a couple of computer "side panels" so I would like materials that are very clear, and wont get beat up i.e., scratches and smudges such as one review I had read on Amazon that claimed their "Lexan" was full of non-removable smudges which sounds like a defect to me.

Thank you.

You're probably looking for acrylic.

Computer case manufacturers often use acrylic. For a recent example, the Thermaltake core P5 atx case uses acrylic. Also, according to this datasheet acrylic has higher optical clarity than polycarbonate and can be restored to full clarity by polishing.

Also, acrylic sheets can be sourced easily, can be cut with a scorer, and are light and strong.


How to prevent beading in aluminum palette I have recently purchased an aluminum palette that is enameled on the surface. However upon testing it concentrated watercolors I see it beads severely. I have heard some that use Bar Keeper's Friend (a cleaning product), which acts as a mild abrasive. If baking soda is also a mild abrasive, would it work too? How else would I go about this?

The aluminum aspect of the palette has little bearing on the problem describe, but the enamel surface is the biggest concern. Enamel, unless otherwise modified, is going to be smooth and glossy, the worst circumstance for your undesirable water beading.

You aren't far off to consider to abrade the surface, but baking soda is not particularly abrasive. It's more likely to dissolve and become useless for the purpose.

High grit count sandpaper may be faster and more effective. Consider to look for 400 or 800 or even 1200 grit sandpaper, most often called wet/dry sandpaper. Hardware stores and big box stores will usually stock such products, as will painting stores, but for a higher price.

You'd place the palette in a stream of gently flowing water and scuff the surface of the enamel while keeping the sandpaper wet. The water prevents the sanded material from clogging the grit and may perform other tasks that escape my alleged mind at the moment.

You'd be able to angle the palette to a light source and observe the extent of the abrasion while performing the scuffing. Additionally, you can observe how the water beads on the untouched area while flowing over the portions you've sanded.


How can I make a sketch under a watercolour painting and have it not be seen? I usually use a regular pencil to sketch what I would like to paint very faintly, but I find that no matter how light it is, it can still be seen under the painting. Once the paint is dry, I can't seem to erase the pencil marks. Usually I end up drawing outlines over my watercolour in black pen or markers to seem like it was supposed to be like that to cover the pencil.

Is there a better way to make the preliminary sketch under a water colour so I don't have to cover it later with black marker?
Are water colour pencils the better choice? And if I do use watercolour pencils, how do I make sure the colour evens out with the paint application (if the paint layer is thin and watery)?

Watercolor is, by its very nature, a transparent medium and so it becomes really quite difficult to manage this. However, there are a couple of things you can do to help:

Draw very lightly and then use a kneaded eraser to lift the lines that you have left. The remaining lines will be much more faint than had you just drawn as light as you can.
Draw on normal drawing paper and then use a lightbox to show the drawing through to your watercolor paper. This way you don't even draw on your final painting.
Erase the area you're about to paint. So, do it first, rather than after the fact. If you keep it small enough, you should be able to remember. It's pretty similar to working with kneaded erasers, but you're not making the line fainter, you're removing it.
Go loose! Don't do an initial drawing at all, but use a reference and simply loosely paint it. That's one of the really neat things about this medium, it lends itself to a free style that's hard to do with other paints.

Watercolor pencils won't really work for your purpose in this situation. It's likely that the colors will be slightly different from your paints, so getting an exact match will extremely difficult, especially if you're blending your own colors. Marks from the pencils are hard to blend in a wash situation. However, you just go all watercolor pencil, then you can control your destiny as it were. I'm a fan of the medium.

Finally, line and wash with the right subjects look really great, so don't necessarily feel like you're making a sacrifice to use a liner pen. If you want it to look better, look at being a little less precise with the lines, break them up a bit, and maybe skip some areas. In other words, use the lines to create variance in the image to your advantage in those conditions.


How to remove glitters from glue One of my kids' friends accidentally knocked down a bottle of liquid glue on a container filled with glitter.

So, is it possible to separate the glitter from the glue?

Depending on the glue, there might be solvent available. Dilute the glue a lot (the one containing the glitter), use a sieve to separate the glitter from the diluted glue.
Repeat until the glitter is clean enough. If you are lucky, the solvent of the glue will evaporate and you will be able to salvage the glue also.

Easier method: throw the mess to the garbage and buy new glue and new glitter.

@rebusB posted a very useful comment (thank you):

Unless it is water soluble glue like Elmer's or actual gold in the glitter, the labor, toxicity of solvents, and likelihood of it being a huge messy waste of time makes letting the gluey glitter go a better call.

OR just use the glue glitter as is.


What is a "triple interlocking stitch"? I'm looking at the stitching on my hammock, wondering what kind of stitch it is and how to do it myself.

I see this marketed as a "triple interlocking stitch." But searching on Google only brings up marketing materials for hammocks. I cannot find info on how to actually sew it.

Here are pictures of the frontside and backside of the stitch.

That was made by a triple needle chain stitch machine.  You can tell it was done in one pass with a triple needle machine because the holes align perfectly along the length of the stitch (making it very likely they were all formed at the same time).

You can tell it's a chain stitch (as opposed to a lock stitch, which a typical household sewing machine makes) by the way the stitches are formed on the back.  Another common place to see chain stitches in your house is on jeans.

The main advantage of chain stitching (and the reason it is used in commercial applications like this) is that it doesn't require a bobbin.  A home sewing machine is a lock stitch machine, which means the top thread is twisted around a bottom thread by passing over the bobbin on each stitch.  The bobbin is limited in size because the top thread has to go around it.  A chain stitch machine can sew much longer without interruption.

In particular, I think I see three threads on the back, which is a double chain stitch.  Those extra threads don't actually add any strength.  More the opposite -- chain stitches can easily be unraveled if the thread breaks, just like pulling apart a row of knitting.

If you want to recreate that seam, just sew three times with your home machine on straight stitch.  You won't be able to recreate the stitch length (your home machine just won't make stitches that long), which will cause a bit of extra puckering (shortening along the seam).

By far more important than exactly what stitch you use is to use a good bonded polyester thread or an outdoor item like a hammock will fall apart when the thread rots.

(If you want to see an industrial machine that could do this, Google something like "triple needle six thread chain stitch".  Six threads because it's a double chain stitch.)


How can I smoothly flatten select parts of a wire design? I have seen some simple jewelry designs made out of wire, which I'd like to replicate. These designs are made from a single piece of wire bent into a variety of shapes.

For portions of the design, the wire is still perfectly round. However, some parts are smoothly flatted. By smoothly, I mean that there are no creases or hammer marks.

Here's an example of what I'm describing:

How can I achieve this effect? Can I use steel wire, or does it need to be something softer, such as aluminum wire?

The flat parts of the wire are achieved by using a curved face chasing hammer and a hammering block. The chasing hammer has a slightly convex surface that makes those nice smooth transitions from the flat part of the wire to the regular rounded part of the wire. If the hammer surface is too flat you'll see hammer marks on the wire. Visually check the hammer face before buying to make sure that it is convex (slightly domed) and not fully flat or worse, concave.

Here's what one looks like:

The [my] hammering block is a smooth square of heavy steel about 4" x 4" square and quite heavy. The goal is to have a heavy and very smooth surface that's harder than the wire or metal being hammered so the surface doesn't get marked up opposite the side being hammered.

Steel wire is very hard to hammer and may be as hard or harder than the hammering block. Aluminum wire might be softer but I've heard it's brittle and might not take hammering well. Most of my experience has been with sterling silver, fine silver, brass, and copper.

The example photo is lovely but I was taught that it wasn't a good idea to hammer where wires cross as this makes weak spots in the finished piece. Maybe something has changed.


The Last Supper - Vanishing Points The vanishing point seems to be at the center of the frame, where the parallel lines seem to meet.
I am wondering why the parallel lines of the semi arch are pointing down.
Any pointer would be helpful.
Please excuse my ignorance. Thank you!

The arch is not a painted part of the painting, but a physical part of the room in the Santa Maria delle Grazie above which the mural can be found:

source


How to maintain dry ink in a fountain pen and Pilot V7 pens? I have got a dry ink and I have a fountain pen and Pilot V7 pens.
I wish to use the dry ink in the above-mentioned pens. I will refill the cartridge of the Pilot pen with this ink.
What precautions am I supposed to take in order to make things easier w.r.t this ink and these pens considering that they are dry?

Fountain pens and metal-tipped technical pens rely on capillary action and flow limiters to deliver a controlled amount of ink.  They're manufactured to precise tolerances, and there isn't really any form of adjustment.  If the pen is clean and the ink is fresh, and the ink is in the general range of viscosity the pen is designed to handle, it should work.
The combination of the pen and a third party ink should deliver an ink line, although the characteristics of the line may not match what you want or what the pen manufacturer's ink produces.  For example, a lower viscosity ink may result in more ink being delivered, so the line will be wider and contain more liquid; it may take longer to dry, resulting in more spread and a less-well-defined edge unless the ink is much faster drying.  A higher viscosity ink may result in a thinner line.  In extreme cases, the pen may have trouble keeping up if you move the pen too quickly.
The pen will have prescribed maintenance, which is basically cleaning.  There isn't any different maintenance for third party inks, it may just require doing it more often.  If the third party ink is faster drying or higher viscosity, it will more quickly thicken inside the pen and dry in the nib or tip.
So if you want to use a "dry" ink in a pen designed for a "wet" ink, you will have the least problems if you use the pen regularly.  That will keep ink moving through the nib or tip to keep it free of dried ink.  It will also result in using up the ink inside the pen before it thickens.  If you want to use that pen-ink combination only occasionally, you would be better off emptying the pen and cleaning it before putting it away (unused ink can be returned to the original bottle).


Creating food-safe silicone beads I'm looking to create molds for food-safe silicone beads (like the ones babies use for teething). From another question here, I guess I can't use silicone to make silicone beads. Is there another food-safe product to create a mold?
I've seen clay and acrylic water kits suggested, but I am concerned with the food safety.
(Regarding the linked question: I'm concerned that if I use the suggested materials for casting (clay or water acrylic resin) the silicone beads would no longer be properly safe. Now I'm wondering if I should just clean the beads well once cast. I'm nervous because these are meant to go in the mouths of babes, so I was hoping someone had done this before successfully.)

You can use food grade silicon for casting as well as for making molds. What you need to look for is chocolate casting silicon. They are pretty expensive and there are plenty of manufacturers, but you need to follow the directions very carefully.

In Europe I have had good experience with a product called schokomold

If you do cast silicon in a silicon mold, you can use a cooking spray as a release.

A word of caution though, the silicon is robust but it will break down over time through stretching and (chewing). You can make it more robust by adding more of the binding component, however your working time will also be reduced. Experimentation is called for.


How do I turn old post-it notes into a quilt I use multi-colored post-it notes to remind myself things.
After the task is complete I don't want to tear the notes.
How do I covert these post-it notes into a quilt?
Here are examples of quilts

The "post-it" notes, if on standard sticky notes paper, cannot be made into a quilt directly. If you want to do this in future, you should look into coloured and starched squares of high thread-count cotton or linen to write on, use fabric markers to write the notes with, then just use them as normal quilting squares afterward.
Real Quilt
If you want a quilt using your old paper sticky notes as a design, you will have to copy/print them onto fabric. The printers that can do this directly don't use very permanent ink, so great for T-shirts that only need to last a couple of years, not so good for quilts. You can also do it yourself by making the notes into collages, copying the collage squares using a colour laser printer and transferring the image to fabric using gel medium. Again, not extremely long lasting/colour fast. You can also use photos and other elements. One explanation of how to do this is given at Cloth, Paper, Scissors, see also the image below:
.
You can sew the cloth like ordinary patchwork/quilting until you have the desired size for your quilt, then use plain cloth for the "back" of the quilt or make enough to have your post-it design on front and back and then complete using batting, etc. Just remember the quilt will lose its colour with frequent washing, so will not last that long if you use it often.
Wall Hanging / Art
If what you really want is a wall hanging or poster that just looks like a sticky note quilt/collage, you can use the method above or just stick the notes onto whatever backing you want to use (paper/canvas/board) with a suitable glue stick in the collage design you want, then apply a good matte acrylic varnish once you are satisfied with your design. If you use a canvas or fabric as the backing and use a really good quality varnish that dries "flexibly" you can even use decorative stitching on it and hem the edges to make it look more like a quilt.
Remember to stretch the canvas/fabric on/over a suitable frame or board before starting to glue the paper squares on. Also apply varnish to both sides when finished if you want the paper to look textured like the canvas/cloth. This works better with coarser thread (more textured surface) such as rough linen or canvas, or even old burlap/sisal bags.


What is the name of this black lines only oriental drawing style? If I recall correctly from my art history lessons many years ago this drawing style should have a distinct name, but I can't remember.

source

The technique seems to be woodblock printing.
You can tell by the linearity of the drawing, the lack of large dark areas, and the wavy structure of the lines. Especially the second picture shows the underlying wood nerves, as adjacent lines have the same slight deviation.

Not very oriental sounding, I know.

The Japanese term for woodblock printing is mokuhanga, and stylistically, the images can be considered a form of ukiyo-e, which until the early 18th century were done in black and white, and of which the linework is iconic:

  The earliest prints were monochromatic, and these lines were the only
  printed element; even with the advent of colour this characteristic
  line continued to dominate.
  source

Hokusai and Hiroshige are its most famous exponents.


Is there such thing as squeezing your values? I was reading the answers to What does it mean to “push your values”?. The accepted answer shows that when working with a narrow range of values "the image looks hazy as though looking through a fog".
Can you "push your values" too far; and in what scenarios would you want to intentionally "squeeze your values"?

As a non-native English speaker I'm not too familiar with the expression 'pushing values', but I think the intent goes both ways, that is to say, it doesn't mean pushing them in one direction, but in both (or all) directions.
Pushing one's values too far either results in a high-contrast image, where all values have been replaced by binary values (resulting in a kind of poster decal art style), or is simply not really possible (within the use of this expression as a technical criticism), since values can only be stretched to a certain limit and can therefor not go too far.
It seems to me this is a matter of semantics, more than it is of art theory.
'Squeezing one's values', or rather 'limiting one's values', has a somewhat opposite meaning, and is illustrated well by the left part of the painting in the picture of the accepted answer in the question you linked (here).
Limiting the tonal range makes the image look hazy indeed, as the contrast has been limited, and this is exactly what happens when looking at objects through fog, or mist, or smoke, or from a larger distance (see also atmospheric/aerial perspective), or in the twilight, where the additional effect of diminishing colours can be appreciated even more clearly.
This expression ('squeezing values') deviates slightly from being an exact opposite of the former expression ('pushing values'), in the sense that these values can be 'squeezed' or limited within several value ranges (it is not a binary adaptation), e.g. the edited images on the left and right of the centered original below:

Euan Uglow | Two Apples (source). Here the Curves tool in Photoshop was used to limit the colour range
As you can see, the difference in atmosphere in both edited images is dramatic: the first seems to want to convey a certain gloominess; the second gives the impression the artist wanted to show the intense and warm lighting of a summer's day. (Whereas the original exemplifies Uglow's generally quite neutral palette - although any image naturally would have its most neutral-looking version in between these renditions.)
Limiting your values like that will usually let lighting play a more important role, but everything will depend on the (intensity of the) colours one chooses: colours can become desaturated when changing their value, but you can also opt to only work with colours within a certain value range to best maintain their saturation.
To get an idea of what can be achieved with limited value ranges, I suggest looking at the works of Giorgio Morandi specifically, and several symbolist painters (like Pierre Puvis de Chavannes), some (renaissance) frescoes (esp. Pierro della Fransesca), and maybe Vilhelm Hammershoi for his twilit atmosphere.
Unfortunately, I can't yet think of a good example of an artist working with predominantly dark value ranges.


Interlocking plastic, rubber, or foam product that can be cut to size? Would you know if there's some sort of interlocking plastic (or other material) mats that can be cut to any size and which is less than 1 inch (2.5cm) thick? Ideally probably 1 - 1.5cm thickness.

I'm trying to use this to hold together hobby electronics/robotics parts. Something like this:

I took an online class from a Russian instructor on robotics, and in Russia they sell this in their version of one of the electronics/robotics stores called Amperka (our version is called Arduino). However, it hasn't caught on in Western stores yet. I can't easily order it from Russia because of differences in the types of payment/banks they use, not to mention the shipping cost and time.

I've been trying to search for this online but I can't find what I'm looking for.

I believe that Matt's suggestion of what is called plastic mesh is likely to be the best find.

The image above shows a typical product known as 7 mesh plastic canvas, for 7 holes per inch and lists as being 13.5 by 10.5 inches without a thickness reference. I've seen this material in the past and found it to be about 2 mm, perhaps slightly thicker.

Another site has similar material, a wide selection, including some 5 mesh plastic canvas. That particular product must have rather large openings, allowing for an approximate 5 mm between holes! As such, it's likely to be stiffer as well.


Exhibition preparation - What is an artist biography for someone in the early stage? I have done few exhibitions few years ago, then I stopped and stayed away from the art scene for a while.

I have new work that I would like to submit to galleries but they are asking for an artist biography.

What should it include?

It's difficult to answer this without knowing the specifics. But what I can say is that a gallery will look for some kind of narrative that ties your experience as an artist together. Generally you should include your most recent/most prestigious shows from the past, and then draw a connection between your former work and your current work using the time you spent not exhibiting.

Is there something you studied during the time you weren't showing work that has influenced your current work? Don't dwell on it, but do mention it. I find that art lovers have a positive view of artists with interests outside of the arts, so I'm sure you'll be able to massage some nice sounding narrative out of whatever you were doing.


Is there a way to make a complex model easier to fold during the learning phase? I'm trying to learn how to fold Won Park's dollar-bill koi, but even with his Youtube video correcting his diagramming mistakes and the series of videos demonstrating how to fold it, I'm not getting anywhere.

Is there a way to make a complex model easier to fold during the learning phase?

A couple of things that come to mind:

Don't try to run if you cannot walk yet. In other words: do some simple projects first. You obviously like the finished results of the more complex ones better. But by trying easier ones first, you gain experience on how to read the diagrams, and you're practising the techniques for precise folds. Plus: better a nicely finished 'easy' project and the feeling that you succeeded, than a complex ball of paper and you giving up completely, don't you think?
Larger paper makes things easier to see and to fold. I know dollar bills come in only one size, so you'll need to cut your own piece of paper. Make sure the proportions match.
If you insist on folding the complex item, try to figure out till which point you still understand the steps; you must absolutely be sure whether folds go up or down, or maybe between two parts of the paper. Your result may look similar, but if it's not completely the same, you'll find out sooner or later. So, check and double check and maybe ask someone else if they notice any differences.

Good luck, wishing you a lot of fish.


DIY galvanize copper on stainless steel? For a little project, I would like to oxidize or galvanize stainless steel. So far I figured out, that it is not really possible to oxidize stainless steel yourself at home.
There for I had the idea of maybe galvanize it as this should be possible to DIY. If I could galvanize the stainless steel pieces with copper, I could let the copper oxidize afterwards.

Material question: Can I galvanize copper on stainless steel?

Common sense question: Is the expenditure reasonable to try this at home?

It's apparently easy enough to plate a layer of copper on stainless steel.  The problem is getting a layer thick enough to be visible, and getting it to adhere well.  @fred_dot_u's answer beat me to the discussion in the linked article.  For results suitable for typical industrial use, it generally requires chemicals you might not want to mess with at home.  Even manufacturers farm it out to companies that specialize in it.

That said, what you can reasonably do at home might be adequate for what you need.  Here's an Instructable that describes the typical way to electroplate metals with copper at home.  Stainless steel will be more of a challenge, and the plating may not be durable, but it would be a relatively easy thing to test.

There's also been some work with a gel that you apply to stainless steel and then abrade the surface under the gel to expose metal that is instantly plated.  It immediately forms a layer of copper that's just thick enough to color the surface, and then the process stops.  This video shows the process.

It links to this video that describes the gel and shows it being used in an additional way.  They use some copper wire connected to the stainless steel and embedded in the gel.  The gel acts like an electrolyte, and the wire and stainless steel create a battery that deposits a thicker layer of copper.  Unfortunately, I didn't notice a specific description of how to make the gel, but you may be able to find it by exploring their links.  Just knowing that the stuff exists means it's possible to do it (although they do it in a lab, not at home).


How is my Art and how can I improve? I am a complete amateur with no formal training in Art. I am interested in the Art of Sketching. Since I have no teacher, trainer, or adviser, I do not know how my sketches. I am providing here a sample of my artwork in two versions.

I haven’t delved in this business for long and hence it is quite reasonable that I will be making errors.

All suggestions, constructive criticisms, appreciations are welcome, and in case you are answering (yes I am speaking to YOU) Thank-You!!

Samples in original and darkened formats as below -

This is actually both a really easy, and a really difficult question to answer.

One of the wonderful things about art is that it is different to everyone. So you need to think about where you want to get to. Is it photorealism? Is it accuracy in still life? Is it shading? Some artists want their portraits to remain abstract, some want pinpoint accuracy. From your two pictures you'd need to let us know how much you like each one. I can see arguments for either being the better one - so trying to do that here would be a bit opinion-based.

So identifying where you want to go is key - and a really useful way to do this is to look at art. In galleries, in books, online, everywhere.

Then practice. Either with tuition, or help from sites such as this, or from the plethora of YouTube videos teaching this subject to guide you. And show people if you do need their opinion. Ask them what they like - but remember you don't need to follow their preferences.

If you really want to progress as effectively as possible, there isn't really a substitute for art classes, teaching technique, styles, history etc.


How were these tiles made? I bought a box of various 2"x2" Mexican tiles to create a backsplash behind my oven:

What I want to do, is to make some of my own tiles to mix in - tiles that don't "stick out" as being obviously different, but which contain images personal to me.  I want my tiles to use the same colors and the same design styles as the ones I bought.
So I'm working with a local ceramicist, she's got some red clay to match these tiles (here's a side view of one of the purchased tiles, showing the clay):

and she's working with the clay to figure out shrinkage amount and what thickness to start with.
But now we're looking at the designs on these tiles and trying to figure out what they did, so that we can match it.  (BTW I've contacted the company and they don't want to give up trade secrets, I guess that's understandable)
Some of these tiles look like they could have been hand-painted:

and possibly even

but others are just way too intricate and precise to be hand painted:

Any idea what process they used to put the images onto the tiles?

They probably covered the tile in white glaze and then used a paint brush or sponge stamps to apply the blue glaze on top of the dried (but not fired) white glaze.
Unfortunately the only source I could find is a German documentary without any subtitles, but starting at 28:10 it clearly shows a potter applying different patterns by sponging pigmented engobe onto unfired clay items.
She explains that she made all of her sponge stamps herself by drawing a motif onto a fine sponge and either cutting the excess away with nail scissors or burning fine lines into the sponge with a soldering iron.
To apply the pattern, the sponge has to be damp. The clay item is covered with a first coat of engobe. After the first coat dried, the sponge stamp is dipped into a very shallow pool of engobe and then stippled onto the clay item.
You won't get perfectly crisp lines with this method, but especially the bottommost picture you posted looks like it was sponged. You can even see a very slight sponge pattern in there. All of the other tiles have very smooth lines and are most likely hand painted, but I can imagine that you can stamp a guiding pattern onto the tile and then follow that pattern with a paint brush.


Where can I find 1/2" thick colored acrylic? For years I've been looking for a low cost, reliable source for 1/2" thick acrylic (plastic/plexiglass/Plexiglas(R)) sheets in various colors and sizes. The only things I can find are clear/non-reflective, black/smoke, and sometimes white. I'm looking for a whole rainbow of colors (at least 6-10 distinct colors) for my Etsy store.

I've looked at TAP Plastics, eStreetPlastics.com, ePlastics.com, InterstatePlastics.com, and lots of other places, but the thickest I can find is 1/4" in the sizes I can use. Some places only sell colored 1/2" acrylic in 48" x 96" sheets, which costs several hundreds of dollars. I need pieces as small as 6" x 12", up to maybe 24" square, shipped to me.

I'm not looking for polycarbonate, vinyl, PVC, etc., since I'll be laser cutting these into checkers and backgammon pieces, with an etch on one side.

I've tried stacking multiple pieces of thinner materials on top of each other with varying success.  Unfortunately, the quality I've gotten with stacking hasn't been reliable or good enough for some of my more discerning customers.

I've had better success stacking dis-similar colors than I have with the same colors, specifically because you can still (faintly) see a seam in the like colors.  I can make an Othello/reversi chip that looks amazing, just not a solid color.

I have access to a 90 watt CO2 laser cutter, which should do a decent job on the edge without having to do more edge surfacing.  I used a 100 watt laser to get excellent edges on this thick of material.

I've also tried dying the acrylic, with no success and no consistency.  What little I've been able to do was time consuming, messy, and not at all what my customer or I wanted.

These sheets also need to be paper backed or have some sort of protecting film still attached, to prevent scratches.  I will be shipping the end result to my customers.  I have found that peeling the protection away before laser cutting works best on this thick of material, but I need it for scratch prevention before my use.

Does anyone know where I can find what I'm looking for?  I'm willing to buy/take cut-offs/scraps from another company that uses this thick of acrylic in their manufacturing process, as long as the scraps are in decent condition.

Thank you in advance for any help you can provide!  Also, let me know if this is off topic and where I can move this question to, if there's a better SO site.

Unless your customers require personalization of the game pieces, you might want to consider going to a mixed medium approach to your production.  Prototype your products with the laser cutter using an opaque laser safe high-density foam or any other laser safe media which comes in your desired thickness.  Then once your prototypes possess the desired shape/size, make a silicon mold of them and then cast them in clear resin.  That will free you from your height limitations and seriously cut down on your material costs, while still producing a transparent product of acrylic hardness.

By adding a vacuum chamber to your resin casting process, you can eliminate the embedded air bubbles which often diminish the appeal of cast products.  When fully degassed, clear resins can produce crystal clear transparency, totally free of embedded imperfections.

The best part is that you can mix powdered dies into your liquid resin, allowing for a full rainbow colors and shades.


Achieving Smooth Concrete Texture with Tiny Bubbles I have noticed that some concrete items (actually often interiors of buildings) have a certain texture characterized by being very smooth with tiny bubbles as shown in the image below.  Is there a term for this type of concrete texture or a technique for achieving it or a special type of concrete that produces it?  I don't think it's often done deliberately so I have been having trouble with google.

Surface texture
The fineness of the sand determines the surface texture (ignoring texture created by the surface of the mold or through a treatment like brushing the surface).
On something like a sidewalk, where high traction is important, relatively coarse sand may be used or combined with finer sand, resulting in a gritty surface.  Finer sand is used for purposes such as building construction.  Non-decorative concrete walls are pretty smooth but "flat" (as in not glossy).  For concrete countertops and some art casting, extremely fine sand is used.  If the mold has a smooth, polished surface, the resulting concrete can look like shiny stone.
The triangular castings in the top picture look like ordinary, general purpose concrete (although the units toward the back look like they were made without using good technique that an experienced concrete worker would use for structural purposes). The planter in your bottom picture looks like it was cast using a general purpose mix, either a concrete topper or one containing very small aggregate.  The irregular rim and non-uniform color suggests this could have been mixed with some other material, or it was a recipe mixed from scratch.  But the surface texture looks like the sand particle size used in a standard, general purpose mix.
Bubbles
Concrete has bubbles.  Air fills the space between the particles when it's dry and air gets blended in when it's mixed with water.  Concrete starts with bubbles.  If you don't do anything to it, it will harden with bubbles.  For concrete structures, like buildings, bubbles affect the strength and longevity.  So after fresh concrete is poured, it is vibrated to help the bubbles work their way to the surface.
On something like building construction, the forms are often very tall, so even pouring and working in layers, it's hard to eliminate all the bubbles.  With art casting, the craftsman may not have been trained in concrete techniques.  But on a thin-walled casting like the planter in your bottom picture, it's harder to get all the bubbles out.
It also could have been intentional to give it the appearance of crude, poured concrete, which is a different look from the smooth surface of clay (they could have achieved a clay-like surface texture in concrete with a different mix and technique if that's what they were going for).
However, referring to the cast triangular item in the upper right of the first picture, that has an unusual amount of bubbles -- more than concrete normally has.  That one looks like the craftsman may have been experimenting with partially foaming concrete.  They may have used additives, and probably whipped the concrete more than blending it.
Terminology
If you see hardened concrete with visible bubbles, the term for that would be "concrete".  A more precise term for concrete with the smooth, flat surface texture like the items in your pictures would be "general purpose concrete".  The technique for achieving that surface texture would be pouring it into a form or mold with smooth sides and then leaving it alone until it's hard.
Basically, what's pictured is not special in any way and doesn't have terms for a special mix, technique, or finish.  It's concrete with no special treatment.  It would take a special mix or technique to make it look different from that.


How to get neat edges on embroidery patches? I'm thinking of making my own sew-on or iron-on embroidery patches. I hope someone here could help with something I can't resolve:
In every tutorial I've seen people say you should do the embroidery and then cut it around the edges. But that would leave canvas sticking out of it, wouldn't it. What is the proper way of getting nice neat edges on the patch?

There are several ways, no way is best for every kind of canvas.
In most canvases you can fold over the edge and hand embroider around the edge. When you do an images search for -edge embroidery stitches- (order of words may change the results) you will get many stitches that will work.
In some cases the canvas is so strong or stiff that it will not fold over as wanted or sticks out between the edge stitches. In that case you may want to apply a narrow strip of tape to the edge (cut or folded) and embroider over that.
In some cases people embroider a strong strip just inside the actual edge, all around, and tease out the canvas outside that strip, ending the patch in a fringe.
There is also an option of using glue on the edge, with or without embroidery, I am not familiar with that method, but I know it is on the WWW.
Some of these methods can also be done with machine embroidery, but you have to be careful to stitch on a raw edge, as it is harder to get an even set of stitches. If you want to try, set the zigzag stitches to the widest it can, the distance between stitches very short, and carefully stitch on the edge of what you want to keep. It will be easier to first stitch and next cut, but it has the risk some of the canvas will still be visible.


How do you make the winged sonobe module? This is what a winged sonobe polyhedral looks like:

Image from DeviantArt by Piplup-fangirl66

This should not be that hard but I cannot, for the life of me, find a resource online that tells me how to make this without making a purchase. Another question on this topic mentions about a book called: Zap! Origami Creations which I do not own, nor can find a reference to what I am looking for. There is even a video which "explains" how to make one but it ends up just being a fake out involving useless folds and a magic reveal. (I only include it to show what I have looked for. I would not waste your time watching it.)

I have a hard copy of a great book: Modular Origami Polyhedra but it does not cover this unit.

Is it possible that this could be found with a different name?

I am trying to avoid having to buy a book to get the fold instructions. Surely this is something that is shareable with proper attribution?

Take two ordinary modules and join them together with one of their tabs in one of the other's pockets, forming the analogue of a triangular pyramid but with two sides only.

You obtain a subassembly that looks and works like a single Sonobe module, with the same tabs and pockets in the same position (the unused half of each module) and an additional triangular fin (formed by the joined halves of the modules) protruding from the outer side.

Make a plain old pyramidated octahedron with these assemblies replacing the regular modules and you'll get the 8 pyramids and 12 fins in the photo.


Tips for pressing flowers using a microwave There are a few references to speeding up the process of drying flowers using ceramic tiles (apparently ones for this purpose) and a microwave, but not many of the videos and guides are very specific about the length of time and power of the microwave that works best.

Obviously this also depends on the type of flowers, but I am wondering if there are some tips that are useful while someone is trying to experiment and work out the best settings and parameters to set for doing something like this.

The following might be suboptimal, but it worked several times for me (and is purely empirical):

Set the microwave at minimum power.
Put the flower in a folded paper towel which you place in a tupperware.
Put the tupperware a few seconds in the microwave.
Open the tupperware, change the paper towel and dry the vapor in the tupperware.
Restart at step 3 until you are satisfied.

Of course, the number of seconds depends a lot on the type of flower. Typically, I start with 5-10 seconds and then decrease the amount of time. I never did it for flowers with petals, but I guess that you'll have to reduce the time in this case. Note that keeping small times allows a better control on your experiment.
I should admit that I never could get it as dry as after a long natural process, but you can definitely boost it with this technique.


What are practical advantages and disadvantages of learning to use both hands to draw? This question is not only about using both hands simultaneously, it's about being able to use either of your hands in general. By practical, I mean advantages and disadvantages in terms of drawing. In other words I'm not talking about cut of aggression level etc.

I've started learning to draw recently using Draw a Box lessons and wondering whether I should do the offered exercises with both hands or just focus on my dominant hand. I read somewhere that some professional painters use their non-dominant hand for less skill demanding tasks, so their dominant hand gets less worn out or tired. Others say that they learn to use their non-dominant hand so they can use it for work in case they injure their dominant one.

I meet with a small group once a month to "do art". Each month one of us is in charge of the lesson. We just did pencil sketches using our dominant and then non dominant hand. We were all amazed- everyone liked the non dominant drawings better. You are more detail oriented and try to draw to perfection w your dominant hand. The non dominant  drawings were looser and more free. It is considered a good practice to do to increase your awareness to detail, your drawing skills and good for your brain.


How can I sharpen a round leather punch? I'm using leather punches to cut polypropylene film, but the round one isn't sharp enough to do a nice job.  The film cuts nicely with a scalpel or scissors but I need 5mm discs (with a 3x2mm hole in them, cut using the rectangular punch, or a more complex cutout using a scalpel).

The rectangular one also needed sharpening, but this was easy -- a small diamond file and an approach like sharpening a chisel.

But I just can't get a good edge on the round one.  I don't know if I'm having trouble holding it at a consistent angle, or what the problem is. I I've got sharpening stones, a diamond file, and various abrasive sheets.

Is there a trick to sharpening small, hollow, round, steel things like this?

The approach is the same. You remove metal from the outside of the periphery of the punch end, at an angle roughly the same as it was originally.

The contour of the round punch adjacent to the cutting edge looks rounded in your picture. This makes the edge stronger, but makes it trickier to get the sharpening angle right when using a flat stone. The punch won't get sharper unless you remove material right up to the opening, producing a keen edge.

You'll have to pick your sharpening angle (I'd start with 45-degrees) and stick with it until your grinding marks meet the opening. With something like this it's sensible to mount the punch in a drill or drill press and use the stone against the edge while it's rotating. Best results come from holding a consistent angle, which is easier when the drill or other rotating device is fixed to a bench or whatever, not hand-held. I suppose you could try holding the stone fixed and run a hand drill guided by hand, but avoid holding both in hand.

If you're brave and have a steady hand, you could try using the hand-held drill approach against a a bench grinder or belt sander instead of a stone. Only problem there is when things go wrong the go wrong quickly. Might be something to work up to once you've gotten a feel of how it works against a stone.


What can I do to protect my hands while felting? I just bought my first set of needles and I plan to start some felting. Going to put a face on a Pachimari.

Needle felting is done by repeatably stabbing felt or roving to tangle fibers. There is risk with those repetitive motions. Now, I have seen tutorials, like this one that created a felted purse,  that used a foam pad or brush as a work surface. That seems fine and dandy but what about smaller things?

It is very tempting to pick up the work and use my hands for more control but I am not likely the idea of stabbing myself. Is using the foam pads and/or brushes the only way to accomplish this? If I wanted to make something small like a mushroom...

Image from Pintrest

Even if I am wrong about how to do felting on that scale my question still stands. What safety precautions should I observe while needle felting?

You might consider a small piece of leather.  I've seen leather pot holders that would likely work, but any suitable size piece of suede of sufficient thickness would work.

You could also wear a heavy leather glove on the hand that you're holding the piece you're felting.

(note -- I don't do felting, but I've done plenty of other needlework projects ... including hand-sewing leather, so I know needles don't go easily into it unless it's that thin stuff they use for driving gloves and such)


Rapidly Paint Fabric Flags? I would like to set up a flag painting station at a festival. I have a bunch of white pillowcases. What kind of paint/painting devices should I use? Ideally, the paint would allow rapid application (pens are pretty slow if you're covering a whole pillowcase with a simple design) and dry quickly (traditional fabric paint doesn't), although I suspect those may be mutually-exclusive requirements? It doesn't need to look good up close and it doesn't need to be durable.

Rollers in various widths with a fast drying acrylic.

I would insert a piece of card inside each pillow to stop the design running through to the other side and to keep the fabric straight. Your challenge is to keep the fabric flat.

To speed the drying process, or to store or display finished or unclaimed works, rather than using a table, find some sort of rack arrangement, or use the sides of the marquee with bulldog clips.

A hair dryer will speed up the drying process.


Casting Elastomers as Acoustic Insulators This is my first foray into casting. Forgive the question if its basic.

I would like to cast an object to act as a vibration damper. The initial positive would be 3d printed using something like Polymaker Polycast. It looks like the silicon rubber that is normally used to make molds would be a good option as the casting material.

Is there a particular material that is a better acoustic/vibration insulator?

Thanks!

Dampening is actually more complicated than what you're asking.  It isn't simply a matter of using a material that dampens vibration. It's a function of the frequency you want to dampen. You will dampen some frequencies, but amplify others, and can get resonance that's more problematic than having no damper at all. If the dampers will be supporting weight, you also need to consider things like how the compression will affect it.

There's actually some physics involved in designing dampening to do what you want.  If you don't have access to a physicist or engineer who deals with this stuff, your best approach would be to play with different materials, sizes, etc., to see what works best for your application.  Another option would be to use commercially available dampers that have been designed for your application and that users have said works well.


How would I identify the type of paper being used in a folded origami? If I was looking at a piece of origami on display or somewhere where I cannot feel it, how could I identify the type of paper being used? I do not need specifics.

You pretty much can't, unless it's specifically listed in the description of the piece.  The sheer variety of papers used worldwide, and the fact that some creators, like Michael LaFosse, make their own paper specifically for the model they're folding, means that your chances of accurately identifying the paper used is going to be very very tough, especially if you can't judge the thickness, sizing, or the fiber content by touch.

That said, the appearance of some papers is very characteristic, and if you have experience with kami, elephant hide, Canson watercolor paper, various craft papers, tissue foil, etc., some of those may be self-evident. Every origami folder tends to be intimately familiar with kami (so-called "origami paper") and can usually identify it on sight both from appearance and usage.

Characteristics of the paper that might lead to identification would be the surface texture being shiny or matte (surface sizing), fiber appearance/color, thickness/weight, and, of course, the size.


Party Blowers to Noisemakers? I went to the store to get a couple packs of party horns for a Bible story in Sunday school.

However, I did not realize that they were actually party blowers that did not make any noise until I got home, which is not as entertaining for the kids and is irrelevant to the story.

Is there any way to modify these to make noise? I know they are really cheap, but I'm the kind of guy that will sand cast and weld jewelry before going to James Avery.

My computer won't let me see the picture, so this answer might not be helpful. Assuming we're talking about the regular party blowers, the only issue with trying to add a reed to make noise are space and ability. There's not that much space for it to go, only about an inch in the plastic tip, but the tube is very small. Second is actually getting it in there. Putting it in the hole then trying to attach it would be hard since most of them are glued together, and you can't pull of the tip. Unless you can figure out a way to build a reed that's small enough, and get it in there, you might have to get back and buy some other ones.


How can I clean a paintbrush used in acrylic paint? When I try to look up videos or tips for painting with acrylic, I always see them dipping the paintbrush into water to clean.  But every time I paint with acrylic paint, it seems there is a never ending supply of paint in my brush. Am I worrying too much about over-cleaning it? I don't try to add too much paint and I dip my brush in water to make it a little thinner so it isn't so gloopy. At least that is what I have been told to do when working with acrylic. I've been told paint thinner isn't necessary. Is there a technique I can use to clean my paintbrushes fast and effectively?

One thing I should add, I don't mean after I'm done using them. What I really am aiming at is needing to use the same size brush but with a different color. For example, my whole background is red. Well, then I have to clean out all the red because I need to use that same paintbrush for another color like yellow. I want my red brush to clean quickly so that I can get into the yellow and paint a different area. But cleaning the red out seems to take FOREVER! I dip in water, try to clean, squeeze out into a paper towel, and then use some construction paper to see how clean it is.  Basically, it looks like I'm painting with just a slightly thinner coat of paint. I'd like to clean my brush without having to clean it several different times. This leads also into the fact that I would like to paint more than clean my brushes.

Dipping your brush into water isn't going to do anything other than get your brush wet. To actually clean a brush, you need physical agitation, and I don't mean "swish it around in the water jar a few times" agitation, but "mash it back and forth against your other hand while holding it under running water" agitation. Use some paint brush soap (or plain old hand soap) and really work up a lather. Rinse and repeat until the lather bears no trace of the pigment you were using, then rinse thoroughly.

If this sounds like too much work when all you want to do is switch pigments, there are two things that will help. One, don't put so much paint on your brush: put the paint on just the tip, not the whole thing. Of course, that's not a terribly effective way to paint a large area such as a background, which brings me to: Two, get more brushes. Basically, use one brush per color, or at least per color family. If you're switching between, say, vermilion and cadmium red, you can get away with just swishing the brush around in the water jar and wiping on a paper towel. You still need to do the thorough washing as soon as possible after you're done, though, since acrylic paint can dry on a brush even if it's sitting in water (plus, sitting in water is itself a bad thing for a brush).


What are alternatives to creating a marble floor? The tomb-full marble floor of St John's Co-Cathedral in Malta is breathtaking.

How can I create something similar to a marble floor or floor fresco, and protect it in a large room that will be continually walked through?

I intend for the floor to have a giant figurative painting, something akin to the Procession of the Magi in the Medici Chapel.

To do the whole floor in marble would cost a phenomenal amount. Instead, what options are there? Are there any examples of other people having done this?

The floor will be walked upon daily by many people, so raw paint would not only fade, it would smudge and ruin (especially when people are coming in from the rain). Would paint and a glass layer on top to protect it work and be an option? Because glass breaks I'm hoping there's another way.

I want to know all options that I have. If imitating marble is an option, that's great, but I want to know all feasible options. I can't see examples of where other floor murals exist that will be walked upon, so I don't know what options I have, and - to make this project a reality - I must present a range of options to the patron, in terms of feasibility and cost (including maintenance).

NOTE: I'm looking for a condensed overview of different methods, each of which I can look into hereafter individually.

As I understand it, you want to have a beautiful floor which can be walked on, without degrading its beauty.

You have 2 issues:

Creating the beautiful floor.

You can paint it, use marbles, or anything else you desire. 2D or 3D. Let your imagination go wild.
Protecting the newly made floor.

Apply a thick layer of an epoxy resin. I am not experienced with this, but I saw many videos on the Internet of people doing this. If the epoxy gets degraded, you again have options:

Polish the epoxy, if it is still thick enough.
Apply a new layer of epoxy. Ideally, you polish the old surface first for the best results, so do not wait too long before doing it.

You might be successful using a large, high quality poster for the floor, and cover it with the epoxy.

Preparing the base floor for coverage is the subject of another question, as well as details on how to use the different materials.


How to stretch a canvas without extra fabric? I have a large canvas that I want to stretch, however, the image goes all the way to the edge of the canvas. I don't know how I can stretch it without losing a significant part of the painting (several inches on each side). Should I sew more canvas on with a sewing machine?

You can staple it right at the outer edge of the frame instead of wrapping it over and stapling it at the back. You will still lose some of the canvas, though (if the canvas you are using has clean edges, not prone to tearing, it could take as little as 1 cm on each side). You may want to put some glue (PVA) at the edges of the canvas and where the staples are to strengthen it and prevent tearing of the cloth, just in case. For that option you will need an outer frame, understandably.

If you have no intention to use an outer frame you can actually stretch it as an ordinary canvas but  wrap it at the back just enough to be able to staple it (basically the same as the above, just wrapped at the back). Thus you will have your edges as part of the painting, instead of having the whole image at the front.

Gluing the canvas to a panel (which you can frame as desired) may be another option. I’ve never done that, though and I don’t know what the best glue would be for that purpose (it will also depend on the medium you used to paint with).


creating something like an expanding ring mandrel for my homemade lathe I am crafting my own drill powered lathe so I can improve my ring making. The problem is, even though I can make a working lathe, I do not have a way to securely place the ring in the lathe to make it fit snug like I could with an expanding ring mandrel. The expanding ring mandrel does not fit inside of my current drill so I have to use alternative methods. I like crafting things with my own hands, and this ring mandrel is just another step in the fun process of starting a new hobby. Anyone have any ideas on how I can make this work? My drill can open it's jaws up to 1/3" I believe.

Video for reference on how I will create my lathe.
https://youtu.be/KmpdEtvVRfI

How an expanding mandrel works. 7:08
https://youtu.be/iiFIfKikJRM?t=428

Making one properly without a (metalworking) lathe would be very difficult.  With one it's quite easy.

This youtube video shows one made from simple hardware, and you could choose an appropriate screw for the shaft to fit your chuck.  But I'm not sure I'd trust its centration (might not matter if you're just using it like the second video link).

It may be possible to replace the chuck on your drill with a 1/2" version.  Then you could buy and off-the-shelf ring mandrel.  1/3" is uncommon, though 3/8" or 10 mm is quite common on battery drills, and I have a hand drill with a 1/4" chuck.


Are these fabric scissors? I am new to sewing. I have a box of old sewing stuff (+ other stuff) from an older relative, which includes the two pairs of scissors below. Sewing tutorials say you need to use fabric scissors to cut fabric or it will fray. I am curious if these scissors are fabric scissors or regular scissors? Is it a good idea to get different scissors to cut fabric?

Basically what makes good sewing scissors is that they are nice and sharp, and will make a clean cut. So the simplest way to find out if your scissors are good for cutting fabric is to test them on some fabric. Take a scrap of fabric (not a large piece that you want to use for a project) and try to cut it. If you can cut a nice clean line in a single snip, then your scissors are good for cutting fabric. If you get frayed edges, or you have to open and close and kind of saw at the fabric, then your scissors are not good for cutting fabric.
Here's my take on the three pairs of scissors you have, but definitely the best test will be to try them out.

The first pair, with the brand name Farr on the side, is probably a pair of fabric scissors. Farr made a variety of good sharp scissors, including barber scissors and fabric scissors. So even if they're now dull, it might be worth having that pair professionally sharpened.

The second pair, the ones with no brand name and black handles, reminds me of scissors I used in school art classes. Instinctively I assume they won't be sharp, but it's possible that type of scissor can be good quality when new and well-maintained, and the ones we had in school were just really abused.

The last pair, also with no brand name, look like sewing scissors to me. They look a bit like a pair of Sears brand scissors I own, that are quite good quality. But mine have the brand name and country of origin embossed. The lack of brand name doesn't seem like a good sign in terms of quality. But the handle is well-worn, which might be an indicator that they were the original owner's favorite scissors, which is usually a good sign in a tool.

Once you have some nice, sharp scissors that do a good job at cutting fabric, don't use them to cut anything other than fabric, even (especially) paper. If you decide to have your scissors sharpened, make sure you take them to a reputable sharpener who knows how to do scissors; don't just ask your friend who likes to sharpen their own knives. If you do it wrong you can ruin a pair of scissors.

Pinking shears are a type of fabric scissor. Pinking shears have scalloped edges, so they leave a scalloped edge on the cut fabric, which reduces fraying. That's useful when you're cutting large pieces of fabric, or in particular types of fabric that are extremely prone to fraying. But you do have to make your seam allowances a bit larger to compensate. I've definitely seen sewing tutorials where they do everything with pinking shears, though. Your scissors are not pinking shears.


Will gold leaf adhesive work on flexible TPU plastic? After gold leafing part a piece of IKEA furniture, I'm going a little gold leaf crazy. I'd like to leaf part of my phone case, which is a flexible matte plastic. Will the adhesive stick to it? I would test if I could, but I unfortunately only have the one case.

This is the listing for the case. According to the manufacturer's website the case is made from Thermoplastic polyurethane or TPU. According to the wiki it has the following common properties:

  high abrasion resistance
  low-temperature performance
  high shear strength
  high elasticity
  transparency
  oil and grease resistance

I am using ArtMinds gold leaf.

I've never tried to gild a phone case before, so take this with a grain of salt...

I would suggest using the same methods you'd use for exterior gilding: prime the surface with several layers of primer, sanding in between; apply an exterior-grade gold size (also called "oil size" or "solvent-based size"); wait for the size to dry to the appropriate level of tackiness; apply the metal leaf; after a bit more drying, brush off any loose gold; after allowing the size to fully cure (could take a week or more), apply a sealer to prevent tarnishing.

If you don't want to go to such extremes (trying to buy oil size in quantities small enough for your purposes would probably be difficult), it might be sufficient to use primer + your existing gold adhesive (probably PVA-type) + leaf + varnish/sealer. For the primer, try to find a paint that's specifically meant for plastic: you want something that's guaranteed to stick to the plastic, and then your gold adhesive will stick to the paint (or at least it should), and then the metal leaf will stick to the gold adhesive, and then (after everything has cured as fully as it ever will, but before oxidation has set in) seal the metal leaf both to protect it from abrasion and to prevent tarnishing.

Regardless of what specific steps you follow, you may end up with a phone case that's noticeably thicker than it was before. Make sure to mask off any areas that shouldn't get thicker, i.e. any prongs/thingamabobs that make the case stay on the phone, the inside of the case, the holes for the camera/power cord/headphones/switches and buttons, etc.

The other caveat is that, unlike IKEA furniture, your phone case is probably not flat. This means that you will be gilding around a curve, which is more difficult than just covering a rectangular flat area. You will end up with gaps, and even after doing your best to fill them in, you'll see the seams, and some gaps will just be too small to fill but not small enough to be invisible. (This is where genuine gold leaf would make things easier: it will stick to itself, allowing you to fill in gaps totally invisibly.) Depending on the effect you want to achieve, choose your primer and/or adhesive color to either contrast with the gold (a red Armenian bole color is traditional for this) or blend in as much as possible (i.e. yellow).


A kind of paper where you can pull away the top layer? I’m trying to make a Mother’s Day art project with my toddler. My idea is to trace their hand on some special paper, use a craft knife to cut the hand outline out, and then  pull off the hand. My toddler would then paint the paper, and once done, I would pull off the entire top layer of paper so only the hand print persisted.

Does paper like this exist? What’s it called? Any recommendations on where I can obtain it?

Bonus if a kind of paper exists that reacts to heat and causes it to dissolve, letting me use a laser printer to cut out the hand print instead of a knife for better accuracy.

Thanks!

While Elmy has the right idea with masking tape, I have found that, in practice, even the gentlest painter's tape tends to tear up paper.

What you want here is temporary repositionable adhesive (glue). It's available under a variety of brand names (Aleene's Repositionable Tacky Spray, Aleene's Tack-It Over and Over, Elmer's Craftbond Repositionable Glue, 3M Spray Mount Repositionable Adhesive, etc). These glues come in a variety of forms (spray, stick, and liquid) and function much like the line of glue on the back of a Post-It note--they hold in place, and peel away easily. Because of how gentle the glue is, it's very unlikely to damage paper when pulled away.

In a project like yours, you may wish to use a stick or stick and spray combination, to ensure you get enough adhesive around the edges of the cut-out to prevent glue from bleeding underneath. Cut the paper, run the glue around the cut edge, and follow the instructions on how long to let it dry before adhering it to your heavier ground, pressing along the cut edge to ensure it's as sealed as possible before giving it to the child to paint.


How do I attach the back of sheets of paper when layflat binding a book? I want to attempt to bind some booklets myself. An issue is that the paper I will be using (darkroom paper, to be exact), has only one printable side. Therefore, were I to bind the booklets the regular way, I would end up with spreads of which only a single page would have anything printed on it.

To tackle this issue, I decided to do layflat binding. This way an entire spread can be printed. However, this also mean other spreads will have two unprintable pages. For this reason I intend to somehow attach the pages of these empty spreads to each other; whether with some kind of adhesive or perhaps by sewing them.

I am worried that using an adhesive will create an uneven surface, as I think of some experiences with Pritt sticks and regular 80 gsm paper (I must add, this paper is thicker at 190 gsm). Sewing, on the other hand, may not look very clean as I have very little experience with this method- and none with paper.

Therefore, are there any 'clean' methods you can recommend me?

I don't know if there's a "standard" glue for this, but I would try rubber cement (regular solvent-based type, not water-based).  It doesn't warp the paper like water-based glues, and doesn't leave chunks like glue sticks can do.  The layer dries to a small fraction of the thickness applied, so variations in application thickness aren't visible.  With two sheets of heavy paper glued together, it won't be brittle when pages bend in handling.

Brushing it on the normal way holds paper well, but the paper can be easily separated.  There's a stronger way to apply it.  Brush a thin coat on both sheets and let it dry without joining the sheets.  Then brush another, thicker coat onto one of the sheets and while it is still wet, carefully align and join the sheets starting at one edge.  If you join them while the glue is still wet, you may have a brief ability to adjust the alignment a little if it's off.  If you wait for the second layer to dry before joining the sheets, it will be like contact cement -- the alignment will remain the way you joined them.

It wouldn't hurt to immediately press the sandwich between two flat surfaces without shifting them (it doesn't need much pressure, and just a couple of minutes; putting the page in a cardstock folder like used for hot lamination will help avoid accidentally shifting one sheet when you press them).  Give the page maybe an hour for all of the rubber cement to thoroughly dry before working with it.  If any excess is pushed out, it will easily rub off when dry.

This "two coat" method gives a pretty secure, permanent bond.  The sheets won't peel apart in normal handling, especially if they're well-aligned so one sheet doesn't have an exposed edge to catch.  Current formulations of rubber cement are acid-free and have archival life.


How can I know what chemicals are there in a 'hue', for example viridian hue? Often, some harmful pigments are replaced by a safer 'hue' version. But what exactly is there in this hue colour? Is one supposed to blindly trust the manufacturer on this? There is no specification on the colour tube itself.

I am using a paint brand named camlin kokiyo, but my question is a general one.

Other than a material safety data sheet (MSDS) or a completely outfitted laboratory and mad science skills, there is generally no way to know for sure what chemicals are actively producing color effects or passively integrated as fillers / extenders / driers. Technically, stores are required to give out manufacturers MSDS upon request. If they don’t, you can report them to the local business bureau. You can also contact the manufacturer; they are required by law to send you MSDS information free of charge.

A good reference work about the general composition of paints is a recent edition of The Artist’s Handbook. There you will find pretty much bleeding edge information about the state of the art in chemical hues etc.

One thing that is rarely talked about however, is the fact that modern pigments - even technically inert ones like titanium dioxide - undergo a crushing process that creates nano-particle sized pigment components. As is well known, nanoparticles can easily traverse cell walls, and can lead to DNA mutations or simply cell death. This is why I highly recommend never getting any paint on your skin - especially those made from heavy metals like cadmium and lead.


Building Outdoor Concrete Sculpture For building an outdoor public park sculpture (1.25 times life-sized, containing several figures) would it be better to build a metal frame, wrapped in mesh, covered in concrete;

Or, would it be better to make a model and create a mould and pour concrete into that?

The first option (hollow) or the second option (solid)? For a public park. Is there an obvious choice, or would each option have equal advantages and disadvantages?

Exposed to the public it will take a lot of abuse . So it needs to be as strong as possible. Use the hollow mold but put a steel rebar armature /core into it before you pour in the concrete. Use lots of rebar and lots of cement in the concrete. I have seen solid concrete benches destroyed in Cook Co IL and other places.


Printed document lifespan How long will a document (black text) printed on standard paper using an inkjet printer last?
I will keep it in an envelope in a normal house hold environment, not overly hot or cold.
Looking for tips on how to increase preservation.

I will interpret the question as you wanting to know how long it takes until a black ink inkjet print noticeably fades.
As with many artworks involving colourants, keeping prints flat in a dark, cool, (atmospherically) stable and pure, and dry place will preserve them for the longest period of time.
Make sure the envelope you're using is made of acid-free paper, as acid can break down the chemical compounds of both the paper.
Similarly, use gloves when handling the print to avoid transferring acids and other contaminants to the print.
Relative humidity should be kept stable somewhere between 30 - 40%, the temperature around around 0° Celsius (32° Fahrenheit) ideally, or between 18 en 21° Celsius (65 to 70° Fahrenheit) when stored in your house, and the air free of pollution ("sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, ozone, peroxides, and formaldehyde"). source
Kept like this, based on this article and the values in the adjacent table, your print could remain visually unchanged for over a century:

click image for larger version | source

Of course, as for the larger question here, apart from the environmental conditions, the longevity of prints is determined by a range of options that need to be selected carefully for the intended purpose.
I assume you know this already, as you mention the type of paper, but both the ink and the paper used are important for print permanence.

The inkjet ink will be either pigment- or dye-based.
Pigment-based inks last longer, since they consist of much larger particles: they are more stable, retain their colours better, and are less sensitive to environmental factors.
For a more detailed comparison see this related answer.

The paper used is important for the bond that the inkjet ink will form.
The paper should be acid-free, too. Coated paper specially intended for inkjet printer prints lets the ink bond better, resulting in improved ink stability.
Inkjet paper, fine arts paper, permanent paper, archival paper (wood pulp/cotton rag), swellable polymer coated papers (for dye-based inks, a coating that encapsulates the ink), and microporous coated papers (for pigment-based inks) have an increasingly longer 'ink-life'.
You can read a more detailed study of the preservation of prints, diving deeper into these particular factors, on this page of the NEDCC.

Even though, depending on your printer and settings, the black ink might be composed of a variety of colours, "'black and white' prints are vastly more stable" source.
Also, note that different brands, manufacturers, and models of printers have different technologies, inks, and qualities. And your printer settings will have an influence, too, if only for the amount of ink used for the print - even the font you use has consequences for the permanence of the print, as this study (pdf file) shows.
The conclusion to be drawn is that it's hard to tell how long the print will last, as there are too many factors involved.
A great general resource on print permanence is the Wilhelm Imaging Research website, full of studies and tests performed to find out the longevity of printed materials.


How to sew in a single page into a book I am binding a book using the traditional technique of sewing the signatures. In addition to these signatures I have a few single pages which should go between some of the signatures.

Is there a standard technique for doing so? I do not want to simply glue them in since I am afraid that then they tend to fall out later.

If you are looking to add signatures to a completed sewn binding, you would have to unpick the binding, add the signatures, then re-sew the binding.

Individual pages (leaves) cannot be sewn into the signature unless they have an excess at the binding edge which you can fold into the signature crease.  Without the excess, you will need to glue the leaf to their neighbouring leaves with a thin bead of glue as close to the binding as possible.  This will be the most secure possible.