Fred mentioned sealing and color filling stone. I haven’t tried sealing it yet so I’m wondering…do you etch it, seal it, then color fill it? Or, seal it, etch it then color fill?
I’ve noticed some of my pieces (marble & granite) catch some of the color in the flecks of the material. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t so I was hoping sealing it would fix that problem but I didn’t know what the procedures were.
What I do is etch the stone first. Every so often there are white blotches in the etched area. I spot those with a black sharpie till it matches the surrounding stone. DO NOT TOUCH THE ETCHED AREA WITH YOUR FINGERS! Dab with a paper towel if you need to spread the sharpie, if you screw up you can clean the sharpie with a solvent and try again. Stone is a natural material and you should expect some random things, but sometimes the nature of the graphic makes it a problem.
I consider color fill to be a temporary solution and since in theory the stone image could easily last 1,000 years, at some point the color fill would need to be replaced. That’s why I seal first then color fill. It’s quite possible that some color fills could replace the sealing. Right after etching the pours are sitting wide open. If you touch them with a greasy finger, the oils from the finger will be absorbed into the stone. It’s a real bitch to get these out.
To seal a freshly etched tile I pour 1/2 cap full of the home depot stone sealer. There were a couple choices I picked the more expensive. Then I spread the sealer around on the stone using a paper towel (home depot box of rags) trying to wet the stone as much as possible with the table spoon of sealer. I’ll rub it around for 15 seconds or so, then use the dry side of the paper towel to pick up the excess. If it takes an extra towel to pick up the sealer, your using too much and wasting it. The I have a 10″(?) random orbit car buffer with a terry cloth cover. A quick buff leaves the stone nice and shinny with no swirls from the sealer.
One of the best but most temporary color fill I’ve found is talc powder. It dusts across the tile real easy and the talc is very white, yet it has a natural look to it. It needs to be re-applied on every cleaning.
I’ve never liked the look of rub and buff. To my eye it either looks blotchy or too thick.
One theory I had about coloring but have not had a chance to follow through on. Light is what granite really needs, not color fill. If a proper stand could be found to illuminate the tile, it would look a whole lot nicer than a color filled tile.
Thanks for your detailed reply. I’ll have to find some of that sealer and test it out.
When I first got my machine and materials I did a wedding invitation in black marble that consisted of just the text and some lines framing it. I color filled it with Lasersketch’s silver highlighting ink and I was overjoyed.
Now that I’ve had a little more practice and a more keen eye for detail, I notice silver flecks all over the stone. I did a couple granite plaques and colorfilled and tried gold rub and buff and LS white highlighting ink to see the differences. First of all, my highlighting ink dries very quickly in the sealed container. Each time I use it I have to pull the skin off the top. Otherwise it doesn’t take much. I’ve wasted more than I used! Rub and buff can be a little better if that’s the color I’m going for.
But for some reason one granite stone picked up the flecks and the other didn’t. The paint literally looked smeared all over. The other stone was very nicely colored. (Guess that’s the beauty and headache of natural stones!?) I had to scrap an otherwise perfect piece just because I tried to colorfill it. So I’m hoping if I seal the stones I won’t go through so many scraps. And I’m considering not going out of my way to suggest color fill.
Granite has flakes in it, if you don’t like the look, I’d suggest using black marble instead of black granite.
www.lasersketch.com has both granite and marble in various sized.
Marble is darker black and brighter white. The one thing granite has over marble is its very scratch proof, but whose going to be washing a marble wedding invitation with a steel wool? Another advantage of granite is would be weather resistant, but a wedding invitation is virtually guaranteed to be used indoor.
So for a wedding invitation, I’d use black marble unless someone specifically wanted granite.
Color filling engraved stone (and indeed a lot of other materials) is easily achieved if you use a paper based vinyl application tape over the surface and laser thru it before filling, it acts as a mask. You can spray or paint or use wax based metallics. Even better is to use a polyester based self adhesive vinyl, laser thru that and then sandblast the material (if you use a fine grit, you can easily do 1/2 tone work). This also acts as a mask for colour filling and it sticks real tough (the shiny silver vinyl is polyester - safe for lasers). Mutlicoloured and complex Clipart is best engraved via Photograv into wood, stone, acrylics etc.