Softpencil Candle Tutorial

Have you tried Softpencil Digital Images? They are so versatile! They can be resized for any project! Today I am going to show you how to place a Softpencil Digital Image on a candle. I chose one of Elizabeth's "Three Hearts" images. She has such adorable images in her shop!

 

After you have downloaded the image of your choice, pull it into a photo paint program. There are many out there in Computer Land. Mine is an old program, Photo Express, but I like it.

 

 Choose your colors and fill in the spaces. I used the "Paint Bucket" feature on mine. When complete, save it to a file. My program colors in a bmp format, but I saved it to a jpg with no problems.

 

It looked like the above picture when I saved it to my computer. Now it is time to assemble your materials.

You will need: 1 piece of regular copy paper, tissue paper, waxed paper, scissors, a glue tape runner, (I used Ad Tech) a white candle, and a heat gun.

Cut a piece of tissue paper that is slightly smaller than the copy paper.

GENTLY roll small dabs of glue dots about an inch apart around the two sides and the bottom of the tissue paper. You do not have to place any glue dots at the top.

Turn the tissue paper over (glue side down) and carefully place on top of the copy paper. Keep the tissue as wrinkle free as possible and smooth it on to the paper. The glue will hold the tissue paper in place so you can print on it without it getting stuck inside of your printer. Choose the size for your image. I chose a wallet size and "shrink to fit" feature for the heart. Place your paper in the printer, tissue side up. Be sure that the bottom of the paper that was glued, feeds through first. Then print.

 

I printed two. I have two daughters. Guess what they're getting for Valentine's Day?

After your image has printed, cut it out leaving a small border around the image. Cut through both layers. You do not need to remove the tissue from the copy paper before cutting.

Now you can remove the tissue from the copy paper. Remove it slowly, as some of the ink may have soaked through, and you don't want it to tear. You can see that some of the ink soaked through on mine.

Place the tissue image on your candle. Press it on gently and it should stay. Cut a strip of wax paper that is a little taller than your image, and long enough to wrap around the candle.

In the above picture, I am holding both ends of the wax paper, and the candle is in the middle.

Now for the fun part! Using a circular motion, blow hot air from the heat gun over the wax paper and the image. I started on the right side, If you look closely you will see that the upper right hand side facing you, is darker than the rest of the image. That is because the wax from the wax paper has melted on to the tissue paper, and the image is now adhered to the candle. Continue using a circular motion until the entire image is "melted" into the candle. The tissue paper just seems to disappear!

Remove the wax paper and you have a lovely candle! I dressed mine up a little by squeezing small drops of silver Stickles around the edges of the heart.

And now I have perfect gifts for my daughters for Valentine's Day! I know they will love them, because they are truly  handmade gifts from my heart! Stop by the Softpencil Shop, "Michu and His Lovely Friends" and choose some images for your Valentine candles and cards!