Mixing water stain and gel antique

[Katlyn4jc]

Hi there,

Has anyone ever tried to mix Eco Flo water stain with Eco Flo gel antique? If so was the result nice. Is it possible anyway.

The other thing coming up with my staining  process is that even with the same dye, leather cut from same huge piece , I get different results. Can someone help me explain this.  Thanks all for your kindness 

[Mattsbagger]

New but here are my experiences.Granted I use Fiebings spirit dyes. Tandy leather sometimes has a coating on it to make it look better cover some flaws. You need to clean before dying with oxcilic acid expecially if any tooling was done. HO leather dyes a lot nicer. All leather will dye different due to different density in different places. An airbrush seems to be the easiest way to get an even finish. Dyeing is an art not a science. Best advice is experiment on scraps from same hide and cut the  closest to where you cut your work piece from. Mixing water stain and antique gel probably possible but don't know why want to. They are both water based but are to achieve different things. You can apply multiple coats of the gel to get a richer solid color BUT you will lose the highlight effects in your tooling.Mixing the water stains to get different colors is pretty common and in a Tandy video on using eco flo water stain he does mix them.  Good luck. Ta. Matt.

Edited February 18, 2017 by Mattsbagger
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[Katlyn4jc]

Thanks Matt. I work with laser engraved leather so l need a rich background but at the same time need my lettering to pop out. What advise would you give inorder for me to achieve the above ? What are HO paints ?

 

thanks 

[Mattsbagger]

Sorry taking about Herman Oak Leather as opposed to Tandy dying better. Idk about lazer engraving. Painting with acrylics or using antique is only way ik how to make any marking in the leather "pop". There are a few tutorials on here and YouTube showing both. The gel is very thick because you put a resist on probably more than 1 coat. Let dry well. Then using a damp sponge and WAY more than think of the gel work in good over entire piece. It will get down in all impressions in the leather. Wipe excess off with a DRY paper towel. 90 percent will come off raised leather. I will slightly darken the un tooled portions. You can the VERY CAREFULLY use a damp not wet sponge and remove a little more. Don't press hard or you will pull color out of the engraved portions. Hope that makes sense. Check out a bunch of videos is my advice and what I rambled on about here will make more sense. Lol Look up Hidepounder on here and check his stuff. He teaches classes at Prescott and Sheridan at the expo's. Good luck.

[NVLeatherWorx]

19 hours ago, Katlyn4jc said:

Hi there,

Has anyone ever tried to mix Eco Flo water stain with Eco Flo gel antique? If so was the result nice. Is it possible anyway.

The other thing coming up with my staining  process is that even with the same dye, leather cut from same huge piece , I get different results. Can someone help me explain this.  Thanks all for your kindness 

Never mix the water stains with anything else and, if you can, stay away from the Eco-Flo line altogether; you want rich finishes and you won't get them from that product line (water does not equate to rich).  Antiques will give you that rich look that you are looking for if employed properly and if you find yourself using the Fiebing's line of Antique pastes or stains you can also blend colors as well as blend any one of the spirit dyes with the paste products to create custom hues, which I believe will fit your needs.

Whether working with laser engraved designs or regular stamped/carved & tooled designs the process of coloring is the same so it might not be a bad investment to obtain some of the writings of Al Stohlman as well as the book on coloring directly from Fiebing's; these are like the Bible on coloring and covers all of the unique ways to blend colors as well as a multitude of coloring techniques.

Regarding the question on why you get differing results of coloring from the same piece of leather the answer is simple (and published repeatedly throughout professional reading sources as well as within these forums), it is due to the various non-visible imperfections that each hide contains and, being that vegetable-tanned leather is about as natural as it gets, there have been no steps taken to alter the hide in order to try and give it the illusion of "perfect appearance"; it already has that perfect appearance because it hasn't been modified to cover up the natural beauty of the grain.  If you want that so-called perfect looking leather then you need to be using what is called "top grain" leather (vegetable-tanned leather is full grain because it is just the way it would be if you shaved the live animal down to its skin and hasn't been sanded and pasted to look perfect) but I can guarantee you that you won't get the results you are looking for when laser engraving it and you won't be able to dye/stain it because it is already done for you.

There is a wealth of information on the various ways leather is tanned and what the results of these processes are and most of the questions about the issues that new leather workers run into can be answered by just going out and researching the materials that are to be used in your new found hobby; the bulk of this information doesn't cost you a dime and it will provide you with so much information that I guarantee that each new Crafter would be better informed when it comes to everything else that goes into creating a finished project.

[Katlyn4jc]

Thank you, thank you all your so kind