Gi Art: Green Lantern Gi

[Steve]

Bad Boy Pro Series Light Gi dyed Dark Green (PR31). (Link is to a review I posted on my blog of the gi) I used 4 oz of dye for 15 gallons of water and dyed it for a total of one hour (30 with dye only and 30 with the soda ash to fix the color).

Pictures don't tell the entire story. It's greener than the pictures look, and the design on the back is more faded than I was going for. Getting the wax hot enough to soak into the thick gi fabric is a challenge. I'm getting more confident, though, in applying the wax. My lines are cleaner, much less sloppy. It's just getting the wax deep enough into the fabric that it holds up throughout the dying process that I continue to struggle with.

Still, I'm happy with it, and will rock it at class regularly.

 

[Carol]

Like, like, like.

Great job!! I love seeing how you are coming up with these designs.

 

[Omar B]

Dude, you just slayed me with that. Huge DC nerd I am I would love to have something like that. Though a red gi with The Flash's logo would be a little cooler for me. But then any thign with my top 4 geeks me out (Superman, Batman [Bruce], Flash [Barry], Green Lantern [Hal])

 

[CrimsonPhoenix]

Sweet! It looks great!

*grumbles about having to wear a boring, plain white gi to class*

 

[Omar B]

Nothing wrong with a plan white gi. The other day I passed this dojo in a mall, the kids inside had all these crazy patches everywhere, some of them even had stars all up and down the arm! Colored belts with a bunch of stripes, all kindsa crazy crap. They looked like they worked at some chain restaurant and had to have "pieces of flair" on their uniforms.

As awesome as many of those colored uniforms are, I would only wear black or white and with only 2 patches, style name on the left breast and flag on the arm. Non of that crazy stuff with the dragons or eagles or banners on the back (I'm lookin' at you Kenpo!).

 

[Msby]

I gotta say, that looks pretty cool! The design has an interesting "distressed" look to it! I'm going to search your blog for more stuff about dye, I've been trying to figure out how to do this. :asian:

 

[Andy Moynihan]

"In brightest day...in darkest night...No evil shall escape my guard!"

 

[seasoned]

Looks very cool.

 

[CrimsonPhoenix]

Nothing wrong with a plan white gi.

...except that solid white makes me look like a marshmallow. :uhyeah: I'm looking forward to the day when I can wear either black or white, or a combo of both.

The other day I passed this dojo in a mall, the kids inside had all these crazy patches everywhere, some of them even had stars all up and down the arm! Colored belts with a bunch of stripes, all kindsa crazy crap. They looked like they worked at some chain restaurant and had to have "pieces of flair" on their uniforms.

Yikes!

 

[Big Don]

That's awesome

 

[David43515]

That looks amazing.

You mentioned having trouble getting the wax hot enough to soak all the way ito the fabric. Just off the top of my head, have you tried also heating the fabric, say with an iron or maybe a painter`s heat gun/ (You`d have to wath that you didn`t burn the fabric with a gun.) It seems that might keep the wax from cooling immediately on contact. Or maybe make the fabric more absorbant so it sucks up the wax a bit more....On the other hand it might be a horrid idea, but you never know.

 

[Steve]

Dude, you just slayed me with that. Huge DC nerd I am I would love to have something like that. Though a red gi with The Flash's logo would be a little cooler for me. But then any thign with my top 4 geeks me out (Superman, Batman [Bruce], Flash [Barry], Green Lantern [Hal])

Flash is next... gonna be tricky, because I'll have to dye the gi yellow, then red, applying more wax as a resist in between...

Regarding the wax, I realized what my mistake was. Not my batik technique at all. I'm mixing parafen and bee's wax, and it melts at a pretty low temperature. The problem I was having is that I typically dye the fabric in hot water. The colors end up deeper and more vibrant. But as a side effect, the dye bath being hot was slowly melting the wax right out of the fabric... eliminating my "resist".

Live and learn. My technique is getting cleaner and more precise with every design, so I'm looking forward to doing another one and seeing how dying in cold water affects the final product.

Thanks for the feedback everyone.