OUGD504 - Primary Research: Foiling & Flocking

After completing primary research into screen printing, Charlie and I decided to further this into Foiling and flocking.
To do this we had to get a textiles screen (white mesh). We then went through the same cleaning and exposing process to create the screen. We decided to only do one design each for this process as.

Exposed screen

To start with we decided to do one print for each process, though bought enough of the material to do two. We decided on a gold foil on black paper and burgundy flocking on white paper. To do this process we needed glue which is specifically for this process, which is what you put through the screen.

Equipment

We taped up the area around the screen. For this printing it isn't done on the screen printing frames, rather on a board which is placed on a table and has screw clamps to hold the screen in place.

Taped up screen

For the glue to go through the screen well, a small amount of water must be added until the consistency is smooth and still thick.

Printing the glue

We then printed the glue onto the two pieces of paper. As the print goes into the heat press, the glue doesn't need to be wet when this process is completed. It means there is no rush to get it from the screen straight into the heat press. This is good because the glue clogs the screen up very quickly so it needs to be washed immediately otherwise the print may become useless.

Glue on the paper.

For the heat press there are multiple different temperatures and time limits depending on the materials used. For foiling, the colour side must be facing up, and for flocking the textured side must be facing down. For foiling 160ºc for 12 seconds, & for flocking it is 160ºc for 20 seconds.

Once these were done, we peeled the foil off to reveal the first design. We then put the flocking through and did the same.

Finished designs:

Once these were finished I cut them down to size and we each took our designs.

My designs

Overall I was very pleased with the outcome and quality of this process. Before doing the process I thought it wouldn't turn our brilliantly as I hadn't done it before, however this process shows that you don't have to be an expert to do it well.

Problems faced/everything that went wrong

Flocking: On the second attempt at flocking, a small bit of my print came out a bit patchy. I'm not sure if this is to do with the amount of the glue in this area or if the flock paper was pulled off too soon.

Foiling: On the second attempt at foiling, the foil came out quite creased in certain areas. This was to do with the face the foil was spread across the print too many times instead of just left to sit on the top.