tandy highlighter colors

[zman7458]

as some of you know I've been having a real bear of a time getting a handle on dying my projects without them streaking up on me. what I've failed to mention is that I've been using tandys highlighter colors as my primary dye. this is because I got a 12 bottle kit for a great price and it seemed to have most of the colors I want to work with, and in my haste to start cranking out projects I thoroughly overlooked one important word in the product I'm using as a stain...HIGHLIGHTER. now in my feeble defence I have to say that tandy really doesn't tell you exactly how to use this product as a highlighter, but insted they simply give the same directions as with regular dye. in essence apply with a damp sponge in circles then remove excess with a dry sponge and buff with wool. what they don't mention is that if you use a slightly damp sponge or rag you can take off more stain in areas that you want to highlight, hence highlighter. so to speak more clearly this product is made to be not as permanant as regular dye and the more water and rubbing you use more of the dye can be removed, even on a peice that has dryed overnight, if you come back and touch it with a damp cloth you will still remove some dye. this is very cool once you know it because you really can get some varying shades, although it does take some work to get it to feather out properly and most of the time I wind up with blotches of light spots, but since I've just figured this out I have some playing to do with different degrees of dampness to my rag I'm removing stain with. anyhow I just thought I would pass this on to those who hadn't figured it out yet. my bottom line though is the reason I was having such trouble with this stuff is because I was trying to use it as a base color and wound up just moving the pigment around while applying my finish. although it does stay in place as long as you don't touch it while applying your finish, so spray finish seems to be the only way to acheive this. Phil