week 4

Bio Dye

Assignment | 17 oktober 2017

Explore (at least):

ref.: http://fabricademy.fabcloud.io/handbook/classes/03_biofabrics.html


Research

Color dye - What is a mordant

Natural dye video short

Article


Gathering materials

I wanted to try something with a local product and since I live 1 street down from the coast, gathering seaweed was not a too hard task. :)

seaweed-1.jpgseaweed-2.jpg


Cleaning and cooking

Back at home I rinsed the seaweed with cold tap water. Vacated the last snails and mini shrimps that were trying to hide between the plants. Boiled some water, chopped the seaweed in smaller bits and kept it on the stove for a hour.

seaweed-sink.jpgseaweed-cook.jpg


Adding fabric

While the seaweed was cooking, I turned my house upside down to find white fabric, which sat in clean water for about 10 minutes (I know this is a bit on the short side). Then I filtered the seaweed from the now red-isch water. Added the fabric and kept it on the stove for another hour. After that was done I poured the colored water into a jar, where it sat with a second path overnight.

seaweed-cook-color.jpgseaweed-cook-color2.jpg


The result

A bit hard to photograph since the white balance of my camera can be deceiving. The result are 2 soft pink colors. The darker fabric is from sitting in the dye overnight.

bio-dye.jpg


Laser cutter

Setting engraving : 600 DPI / Speed 100 / Power 50. and setting vector cut : Speed 30 / Power 80 / Feq. 500.

bio-dye-laser.jpg


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