Moving

Wordpress is easier to use, and I wanted a new name.

http://noxiousmuffin.wordpress.com/

Close-ups

I'm pretty sure this is what my insides look like.  They've got that carved fleshy feel to them.  Rolled acrylic on acetate.

Supply list... so far.

• White refined beeswax
• Damar crystals
• Pancake griddle for heating up my pigments and also to be used as a palette.
• Cupcake sheet, for making my pigment cakes.
• Little 2.5 oz steel/aluminum containers, for mixing pigment on my burner.
• Heat gun, for fusing together wax layers and to enable me to rework areas on my surface.
• Thermometer, encaustic paint needs to maintain and not exceed a certain temperature (this will be a separate post eventually).
• 20 different dry pigments.

Things I need:

• Hog bristles, lots of them.  I read that you should have different brushes for different hues...reds, greens, blues and such...so as not to contaminate the different pigments.  No synthetic brushes, they will melt!
• Pots with the pouring lip.
• Wooden mixers, someone suggested stealing the coffee stirrers from *bucks...a life of thievery it is!
• Oh yes and painting surfaces of course.

Safety first!

Check out these excellent links for safe encaustic painting...just say no to cancer and yes to renaissance parades and maypole dancing.

http://www.rfpaints.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=235&Itemid=128
http://www.rfpaints.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=52&Itemid=99

The Encaustic research (initial)

Encaustic factoids (typed spastically as new info was discovered)

· Make your own pigment, much cheaper in the long run and buy in bulk after the initial trial.

· You can make your own pigments with oil based paints, no acrylic though. One blog says to squeeze the oil paint on to a paper towel to soak up the extra oil before adding it to the molten wax for safety reasons.

· You need to fuse each layer with a heat gun otherwise you’ll have an affect like phyllo dough, lots of layers that don’t stick together.

· You need a rigid support, like birch wood or luan. You can also you rag paper, but you want to first adhere it to a more rigid support. Encaustic does not work well on canvas.

· Encaustic is beeswax, resin and pigment.

· Get a pancake griddle and put tin cups on top instead of buying the expensive tools! I bought a 22 in griddle on amazon for about 30$, but you can probably find them cheaper.

· Damar crystals are resin so they are toxic, ventilation is a must. So far from what I have read, the best way to ventilate (on a budget) is to work across from an open window and have a fan close to your working area that sucks the chemicals away from you. Also work with a mask and rubber gloves.

· Go to a thrift store to buy pots, ones with a pouring lip are best, less mess.

· I went to www.earthpigments.com for my dry pigments. They have a big selection and have little to no toxicity depending on the color.

· I went to http://www.rfpaints.comfor my beeswax and damar crystals because it was highly recommended on most of the blogs I researched. I chose the white beeswax, because they do not bleach it, which would break down the wax. I choose white because the yellow varieties, well would affect my pigment choices.

· Still looking for a good place to buy the little aluminum/steel pots that everyone uses. They are about .75 cents at www.encausticsupplies.com but im sure I can find them cheaper. This site also has pretty good materials and premade encaustic paints and its Portland, OR based so yippe!

· I also bought two books on amazon the first one being “Encaustic Art: The complete Guide to creating Fine Art with Wax” by Lissa Rankin, this one was recommended by the encaustic artist Cat Crotchett. The second one is “Embracing Encaustic: Learning to Paint with Beeswax” which has been immensely helpful so far.

·   Well I found a cheaper place to find the tins/pots….I’m ashamed so it starts with a W and ends in a mart.  Four for .97 cents and they are called condiment containers, they come in 2.5 oz, which is perfect.  I also picked up a cupcake pan for about 8$, these are handy for molding your pigments.