I have question, when you're ironing do you lift the bottom of your iron so the top half is touching the beads or do you place the entire iron flat? I've always find myself having trouble properly melting the beads because the bottom side tend to be over-ironed even though I'm working on the top half of the project. Any tips on this? Thank you for the tutorial by the way!
You may have your iron setting too high. I put my iron flat on the beads. One key thing is to always keep the iron moving and the heat distributed evenly, you don’t want to let any parts overheat or you’ll get the over melting effect on the back.
I know I'll sound dumb since it's been quite a few months since your last response,but I hope you'll see this coment. I wanna ask you if you know how to properly iron a big bead art,and if yes may you please give me some advice,I have a 5/5 bead work and I'm anxious of messing it up....
I keep my iron set on silk/wool. Not all irons are the same, but on my iron, silk/wool is the setting exactly in the middle of the lowest temperature you can set the iron on and and the highest.
Hi! You said that you would run out of pegboards when you make larger pieces, can you show us how to "stick" them togheter after you put them on masking tape and you are ready to iron? sorry my English es very bad. Best wishes from Switzerland
Potato Tato I personally find the masking tape method easier, even if it is more work in the long run. I struggled with ironing directly on my pegboards, because if my parchment paper moved at all, the warm beads would stick to it and it would move and mess my work up. With the tape method, the beads stick to the tape while you iron, so you don't need to worry about that. Also, most of my pieces are so big I run out of pegboards, so I have to do them in segments. Since I use the tape method, I can finish one portion, take it off the boards, then do the rest and then iron them all together. When using the tape method, I find it easier to get the beads into that fully melted square shape as well. One negative though is that you have to poke holes in the back of every single bead through the tape so they release heat properly when melting. That normally takes quite a while if you do it using a needle tool like I do. But really that's the only downside I can think of. I've only ironed traditionally maybe three or four times out of all the stuff I've done, so I might be a little biased, but I think the masking tape method just works better for when you're making big pieces.
Use edge of pegboard to punch holes, press down firm with ur palm. be cAreful when lifting it off tho. Do a rolling motion or use a knife to help it lift off
Oh dang, I didn’t even notice. I filmed this with my old laptop’s webcam and hoped for the best, I’m happy the video is coherent enough to help people!
I find myself at an enpass i would love to use the tape method how did you transfer such a big project like that, ive honestly consisderes building a table that rotates
Yes, it's masking tape. I actually can't get all the tape off the back since the tape melts to the beads during ironing. I can get it all off the edges where it shows though. Since it's the back of the piece I don't really mind if the tape sticks to it. You might be able to get it off with some rubbing alcohol, but I don't know how that would affect the beads, so if you try that you should test it first. Hope this helps!
Bejeweled Walrus yeah it melts bad, I just take it off once I iron a bit but it is dangerous and it is still hot, the beads move and wiggle but it allows for a clean side with full bead unfused texture. It is indeed almost impossible to remove the masking if it melts, for me it ruins the piece completely for one side
Personally I prefer the fully melted texture rather than a bead texture. I melt my beads to the point where they look square so the piece looks more like pixel art. That's why the tape on the back doesn't bother me, it doesn't show at all. If you want the back to be clean I'd definitely try the rubbing alcohol, it's way less risky than pulling the tape off as you iron. It would probably be fine since the beads are wax, but I'd definitely test it on something small first. They make rubbing alcohol with different percentages of alcohol concentration, I'd start out with a low concentration to be safe. If you try it, let me know how it works!
J- Scribble I use the masking tape method. There are a few other videos on RU-vid about it. Basically you stick the beads to masking tape, and that keeps them in place.
