Paper Kit

I stumbled across this by accident, and although it seemed a bit pricey for only being able to make 10 images, I thought this would be a fun project for my grand-daughter (age 9) to work on over the summer. I guess these kits have been around for a long time, but somehow I never knew about them...I think they are a great idea, and I had fun, too! Easy directions are on the back of the package. The kit is simple: inside of the package is the paper in a protective dark pack--don't let light hit the paper when taking out one sheet! and a thick piece of acrylic to hold the objects to be printed flat--there is an adhesive sheet protecting it that needs to be discarded first. We simply laid a large, flat piece of cardboard on the lawn in a spot where there was full sun. For the first picture, she made a simple design from pieces of torn paper to make a floral pattern...she put the print paper on the cardboard, arranged her design on top, and covered it with the acrylic. It took about two minutes for the light blue paper to turn white and then she just popped it into a dishpan full of clean water--I know now that it is best to change the water after every one or two pictures--and it slowly turned a dark blue, and ta-daa! There was the image! Pretty! From there, she tried 3-D objects (without the acrylic sheet, of course) and the one that turned out the best was a branch with fruit--the detail and depth came out great! I didn't see any refills available for the same size paper (about 8 x 10) but I was able to order a couple of 5 x 7 packs, so lots of opportunity to make more Sun Prints! I think this is a great kit for elementary school age kids (and I'm sure older kids could come up with some pretty creative uses, too) but for more than one child, with only 10 sheets, I think it would be best to have a refill on hand. In fact, if kids want to make Sun Prints with 3-D objects, the kit isn't needed at all, just save some money & purchase the paper by itself!

Fun & easy to use. Finished product works great in my Art Journal.

The paper worked well. It was not fogged, so the image was clear. We used a drop of hydrogen peroxide to deepen the blue, so that worked well. The exposure ranged from 2 minutes in the sun to over 15 minutes on a dark, cloudy day, It was a fun project. The paper is very thin, like old blueprints of building plans. This is fine, but I have used other cyanotype paper that was thick like watercolor paper, and it provided a more substantial print. I have no problem with this being thin, but those who are looking for paper the weight of drawing paper could be disappointed.

I was obsessed from the first print! It's a great beginners kit or for those with limited space. Very easy to use. I cut them to my desired sizes and made bookmarks with the scraps.

One of the Bear Scout electives is to make a solar print. I wasn't too sure how interested 9 year old boys would be with this activity, however we started with a scavenger hunt (nature crafts elective, leave no trace, and buddy system), and ended with the solar prints. The boys actually really were interested in it: choosing their items, the pattern of laying them out, and watching them develop. This age of children have no experience with "film" or "developing", they only know digital images, which led to an unexpected conversation about film, exposure, etc. The paper was easy to use and made very stunning and vivid silhouettes. We laid our items out in the waning evening sunshine, and developed them in a shallow pan of water. The paper and image remained light and the contrast increased as the paper dried. We did not use a back piece under the solar paper, nor the clear Plexiglas as recommended, as we did these with 16 boys at once and did not have the resources to do more than one at a time.

Fun thing to do with my granddaughter. She still has some of the paper left and we did one of these when I visited her last time. The prints turn out nicely.

This paper works really well. It's simple and easy to expose and develop. I was even able to cut it and put a piece in a homemade camera with a magnifying glass lens. After an extended exposure, there was a basic photo! Very basic; a blurry tree and railing. But... not blobs, so very cool! Pinholes haven't been as successful although I was able to get a sun trail along with some blobs. Normally, items are placed on the paper and squished with the included plastic type plate then put in the sun for exposure. But, I've been having fun attempting in-camera experiments.

If I wanted to do a craft project with younger children to demonstrate the Cyanotype or sun printing technique, and didn’t want to spend too much money, but was not greatly concerned with quality, this paper would suffice. However, I was hoping that the thickness of the paper would be more substantial than very lightweight copy paper. The paper dried very wrinkly and curled because it is so thin. The prints themselves were very light, even with longer exposure times, so a bath in a capful of peroxide and water did intensified the color to the richer cobalt hue I had hoped to achieve. In addition, the two packages I purchased BOTH had gaping holes in the top corner of the cardboard; luckily, the inner envelope was not damaged, so the packaging was light tight. Personally, I will not purchase this material again.