Homemade Permanent Gelatin Plate

First of all, I want to say I absolutely love my Gelli Arts Gel Printing Plate and I use it a lot. However, last year when I saw this video by The Frugal Crafter on how to make a permanent gelatin plate, I just had to try it. I wanted a round plate to play with.

I made a regular gelatin plate in 2011, but it broke down pretty fast. Check out my blog post here.

Here is the recipe for the homemade permanent gelatin plate:

6 tablespoons of gelatin (7 packages)

1 1/2 cups water

1 1/2 cups of liquid glycerin

Dissolve the gelatin in glycerin and then add boiling water. Pour into a shallow pan to set.

So last December I poured mine into a cake pan. I put plastic wrap on the bottom of the pan so I could pull it out easily.

And here it is sitting on the plastic wrap.

I played with it a couple times and then put it away. I stored it with the plastic wrap. It shrank a little and the plastic wrap I covered it with made deep lines in the plate. I like texture, but not on this plate.

I pulled it out the other day when I played with preserved ferns on my Gelli Arts plate and also made some fern prints. You can see in the picture how deep much texture was on the plate. It was hard to keep from putting on way too much paint due to the ruts.

Here is one of the prints.

Not bad, but I really want a smooth surface so this past week I melted the plate and repoured it. I broke up the plate into several pieces and microwaved it on high for several minutes.

After it was liquid I poured it into a smaller pan and let it set up for about 8 hours. I then used a blunt knife to cut around the whole plate. I used the knife to help me pry up the plate and it popped out.  My “new” printing plate is colored from paint left on it from previous printing sessions.

I left this plate alone for another 12 hours. Then I decided I wanted it to be smaller. I found a container the size I liked, set it on top of the plate and cut around it.

This is how it turned out.

It wasn’t perfect or even close to it, so I took some paper scissors and clipped.

But wait! Look at all of the leftover pieces. I just can’t throw them away.

I remelted them and poured them in a small container to have a small rectangle.

I decided that the plastic wrap was not needed and it could put unwanted texture on the plate. I only used it because I thought I needed it to get the plate out of the pan. No, it pops right out.

I ended up putting the new round plate on a piece of Dura-Lar, the same stuff I use to make stencils. To store it I also put a piece over it. If you have a Gelli Arts plate it is stored with similar material on the bottom and top.

Tomorrow I’ll show your some prints from this “new” homemade permanent gelatin plate.