Recently my fifth graders experimented with alcohol inks. This media was new to me and the students so I had to be sure I had a handle on the process before showing the students. Here is a breakdown of the materials and process:
1. Alcohol Inks
These inks can be found all over the internet. I bought a variety of colors on Amazon and Blick, and found the colors to be quite vibrant and beautiful. Tim Holtz has a good selection, but you really only need a few colors to start. For 4 classes of 5th graders we used about 10 different colors.
2. Alcohol Blending Solution
This is where I ran into trouble. I had read a blog that mentioned rubbing alcohol could be used in place of the brand name alcohol blending solution. If you are going to do this project, splurge on the real stuff and leave the rubbing alcohol for later in the process. The blending solution helps the alcohol ink blend and mix well, and a little goes a long way. The kind I used can be found here.
3. Blending sticks
Again, you would think cotton swabs would be fine for this part, but these blending sticks are really wonderful. When the students would accidentally put them in the ink, I would just soak them in rubbing alcohol and they would be good as new!
4. Paper
You cannot use normal paper with alcohol inks because of their absorbency. Yupo paper is an amazing watercolor paper that has a plastic feel to it. This is what we used, and it worked marvelously! Instead of absorbing the color, it sits on top and allows the inks to blend, mix, and then dry. I have heard that photo paper also works, but have yet to try it.
Process:
Each student received a 5"x7" practice paper, and a 4"x4" square that I would keep for the collaborative piece. Students began by putting a few drops of the blending solution on their practice paper and covered the entire paper by using the blending sticks. When they held the paper at an angle, we were able to see the shine throughout the paper and ensure that it was completely covered.
Students then picked their alcohol inks. Analogous colors work best with this process, but as long as the paper is not oversaturated with colors, any combination can work. Once a few colors were on the page, students could add rubbing alcohol to the page with an eye dropper. The rubbing alcohol creates white rings/dots, and also helps the colors to blend more effectively.
In this image you can see that the blue design has minimal alcohol blending solution/rubbing alcohol on it. The red design below has much more liquid, and therefore the inks mix in a more dynamic way.
An important part of this process is to not have the students pick up the paper when they are done. The surface of the paper is often extremely wet, and the colors can easily blend together into one solid color if the paper is tipped. The inks dry very quickly, and usually within five minutes I could pick up the paper and move them to the drying rack.
Once the designs were complete, each class voted on a shape they liked the most for their collaborative pieces. I used a paper cutter to get some exact shapes, and we glued the pieces on wood boards with Mod Podge. These pieces are going to be auctioned off next week for our schools PTO. I might have to try and snag one!
