Photo Candles

A little preview: I love crafts--however, when I craft I am messy, inconsistent, and random. For this reason, I can never make two of the same project. I am also horrible at things most people find easy (such as wrapping presents). I am the exact opposite of a perfectionist. I go through stages of crafting: card making, candle making, scrapbooking, etc, etc.

I am going to talk a bit about a photo candle project that I made for our unity candle. This is the YouTube video that inspired my technique:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1257_Td2Ag

I used this exact technique and tweaked it a bit to include my personal photos.

You will need to adhere an 8.5x11 piece of white tissue paper to cardstock. I used a scrapbook tape runner and went along the entire outside edge of the cardstock to make sure no part would get jammed in the printer.

I used Photoshop to create a collage of photos to cover the whole candle. You do NOT have to do this; you can print each photo individually and adhere all separately. I didn't want to do this, because I wanted a nice smooth finish and the more pieces you adhere the more likely to get bumps you are. I also wanted to add in our names and wedding date. I made all of my photos in black and white to avoid color issues when printing on tissue paper. Make sure you do not print too close to the edge, as that part will tear when you remove it from the card stock.

Before you print make sure your paper is facing the correct direction to print on the tissue paper; this is something I OFTEN forget!! :)

After your image is printed, carefully remove it from the card stock. I used an exacto knife to make sure I didn't tear part of the image.

Wrap your image around your candle the way you want it to appear. Use a small bit of adhesive to help hold your design in place.

Once you have your image in place and all the creases smoothed out, take a piece of wax paper and wrap around the top. I like to have a large piece that I can really grab onto; you want to be able to pull it TIGHT. This is what is going to keep your candle smooth.

Once you have it pulled super tight and smooth, begin heat setting it using a heat tool. Take your time with this. Also, watch those fingers, the heat gun gets HOT. You will have to shift the wax paper several times, but once some has melted this becomes easier. It will be easy to tell when it is finished because it will look glossy over the wax paper. You will want to make sure everything is melted. If you miss a piece, it is easy to go back in later and melt it.

When you are finished you should have an image that is set in the wax just under the surface. It should appear as though your image is printed directly on the candle. Cool! These make great and inexpensive gifts. (The top photo was taken by Rae of Light Photography)