I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it again: screen printing is all about the preparation. You prepare steps 1 through to Almost Ready and the finally you get to pull the paint over the screen (so exciting) and lift the frame to reveal your...masterpiece? Too often I have lifted only to be disappointed that the paint didn't go through everywhere or I entirely missed the corner of the pattern. Great. As I usually print on t-shirts, it's not an entirely cheap loss. Anyways, so there I am, staring at my not-so-great outcome and it occurs to me that it's my design, I can do whatever I want with it. I'm the creator, if I don't like it, I can change it to something I do!
I have fabric markers, fabric spray paint and 3D fabric paint that I can add to the original print. Sometimes it just makes things worse, which leads me to add more colors, more paint, more cover-up. Gah! In the end it looks like some hodge podge mix, like a Versace shirt gone bad. Real bad. At some point I have to give in and accept that long gone are any chances of saving the design but at least I tried.
This print was one of the very early ones. Two kayaks on the water, as seen from perhaps Jericho Beach. The sky is a result of spray paint, so it bled onto the mountains. Then, I added waves or ripples on the water using a fabric marker. The kayakers are also done with marker. I should probably have stopped right before I started outlining the mountains, but the owner of the t-shirt loves it, and still wears it after 5 years! I guess it's a good sign that the image is outlasting the actual cotton t-shirt! Perhaps it's time for a revised version?
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