I was absent for the resin class, thus I tried it on my own. I have done resin casting before in the past so it was not a foreign process, however the resin I used was industrial type, thus its quality was way different from Easycraft – the brand I used for my trial and also final project W.I.P
Firtsly, I used a kitchen weighing scale to measure 2 exact halves (according to the brand’s instruction). I then used the wooden handle of the brush to pour the hardener into the resin part and stir them well. I then use Crimson acrylic ink from Daler Rowney to add in the red pigment to replicate the pigment of cherry blossom in calligraphic painting. The ration was: 20g resin, 20g hardener, 20 droplet of crimson ink.
Fig. 1, 2: Measuring of parts and mixture stirring
I then use a dropper and dropped the resin into droplets on top of wax paper. The mixture hardened really fast, within 1 hour half of the resin was already viscous and very hard to cast, thus I learnt from that and on the second batch, I revamped the ratio to 10g resin, 10g hardener and 10 droplets of crimson ink.
Fig. 3, 4, 5: Droplets of resin and the first batch
The end result was much better than expected. The resin was mostly clear, though some still retain bubbles because of the air inside the dropper and from the mixing (even though I made sure to take out the bubble and tapped on the dropper to release air). The colour is crystal clear unlike hotglue and soft enough to be trimmed using scissors unlike the other type of resin (probably because it is DIY resin for art and craft).
Fig. 6, 7, 8: Final product
Also, it’s funny how some of my droplets trapped a bug inside because they thought that the resin were candies
Fig. 9: “Bug amber” resin