Saturday, August 16, 2014

Why Cans?

Over the last 2 years, my photography efforts have centered around printing on "Upcycled" Aluminum Cans. Originally, I printed on the inside of cans because I thought it would be a cost effective way to "test" an image printed on metal before sending it to an expensive lab. But something else happened. People became interested in the cans. So for the last 2 years, I have pursued ways to make the process more efficient, not ruin my printer, and to display the cans.

I have spent countless hours refining my process so the final product is faster to produce and more reliable. It now takes about 30 minutes of work and 2 days of time to convert a can to a printable surface and my failure rate has dropped from over 50% to about 20%.

Displaying cans is a challenge. They want to go back to a can state.  I have found that their desire to curl is stronger than tape. The best way to keep them flat is to tack them down. At first, I spray painted plywood background but was told that looked cheap. Then I started covering the plywood with other materials such as screen or aluminum flashing. Then I hand painted these surfaces with acrylics and tacked the cans down.


Copy of G.K.'s Pool

The photograph is a shadow in a pool.  I hand painted the background on a screen.  Then framed the piece with a hand-colored frame.



1 comment:

  1. I love the repurpose of cans. Very clever! I can see the small can triangles as birds and would work well as a "flight" series.

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