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Acid Etching-Another Art Form

Built by Jack E. Phillips on Monday, August 14th, 2006

Acid Etching is an Artform that everyone seems to enjoy seeing, but doesn’t get much exposure when it comes to Arts and Crafts.

Acid Etching is reatively simple to do and very inexpensive compared to every other Artform with the possible exception of pencil drawings.

You have to be able to visualize in absolute black & white to be successful in creating and acid etched project.

All the materials, incuding stencils are available at most Arts and Crafts Stores.

Let me show you how elegant and easy this artform is with examples.

Here is an example of an etching…

This etching was done on a piece of 12×16 mirror panel and cost a whopping $20 all together.

Here’s the list of items you will need:

A 12×16 piece of mirror or glass

A 2 inch wide roll of masking tape

A bottle of glass cleaner

Paper towels

A #2 pencil

A razor or exacto knife

Acid Etch Solution

An Acid brush

The majority of these items, other than the mirror/glass and the acid etching solution, you already have laying around somewhere at home. The other items are available in most Hobby or Crafts stores. The acid etching solution comes in various sizes, a little goes a long ways. If I remember correctly, the last time I bought it the price was $12 for a decent sized bottle and I used it for almost a year! You can also purchase etching patterns at these same places. If you look at the borders of these etchings, they are from a pattern book that I purchased.

The process is very easy and never changes:

Clean the surface to be etched thoroughly with glass cleaner

Dry the surface with paper towels.

Cover surface completely with 2 inch masking tape(overlap the tape a little to ensure no acid leaks into tape gap)

Draw your image on to the masking tape using the #2 pencil

When you are satisfied that your image is what you want, you cut and remove the tape that has the pencil marks you made.

Now is the time for the acid solution, you just brush it over the areas without the tape. Let it sit for about 5 minutes- instructions are on the bottle. Then rinse it under the faucet to remove the acid and remove the tape.

A Tiger Family Mirror Etching…

One of the topics that comes up about Acid Etching is that you can get better texture, diversity, and control with sandblasting. This is all very true, but, we are talking about the biggest bang for the buck here.

With sandblasting- You are talking about a compressor, hose, gun, silca, special material to mask with, and an area (booth) to do the sandblasting.

You can get around the compressor with those pressurized cans, but what’s the expense?

You don’t need to go to the expense if you just want to give etching a go. It will add to any decor and it’s it great art form that doesn’t get much exposure.