September 23, 2011

Bottle Cap Mural : In Progress



This 1st panel is complete for the most part.  We are leaving the gray capless.  It is an exterior house paint(about three coats to protect the board)...and I like the look of it with the bright colorful caps. 

The 2nd board is well underway, but I've got an issue.  There are not a lot of purple caps out there!!!  I had a large bag full of purple from all the caps my students had been bringing in since the start of the school year & my dumpster diving at the recycling drop off near my school.  However, what I wasn't realizing was I was only getting a few purples here and there.  So now I am left with a large purple section that is uncovered.  I went dumpster diving last night...and only found 4.  So now I am thinking I'll use fun foam & cut circles from that to finish off the purple section.  Cheating...maybe...but I really want to have this complete by the time the mayor comes next week!!

19 comments:

  1. I absolutely love this!!! Are you doing it, or the kids? The colors are great!

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  2. Could you spray paint caps purple? They make spray paint that is meant to adhere to plastic. Just an alternative approach to using foam.

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  3. Spray paint white or clear caps with the plastic spray paint. Works great!

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  4. Ted....This is so cool! I love that you are doing this!!! I so want to do one, just not sure where.

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  5. Put an email out to all the teachers at your school and I bet you can get more purple caps, but I like the spray paint suggestion. Looks great!

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  6. Mr. E.

    It is looking great so for... Can't wait to see it when it is done...

    Also we are going to start the collection of cap at my school.. I was wondering if I could use one of your pics to show what we plan on doing with the cap?

    Let me know
    Thanks
    Mr. R

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  7. I would say Purple Fusion Spray Paint by Krylon - their fusion line is supposed to adhere to plastic - it works reasonably well.

    BTW these look absolutely fabulous...

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  8. @ Carol. The kids did the design..I drew it onto the board. The kids, faculty, and my church are collecting bottle caps for me. I'm pulling kids to put the caps onto the boards(not during class time, but if they finish lunch early..before class..after school..etc.)

    @ Mr. R...please feel free!!!

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  9. So awesome! I have been saving caps FOREVER thinking "one day I will figure out something cool to do with them." You're inspiring me!

    Amy Jackson
    www.houseofjacksons.blogspot.com
    (previously artisthebestpartoftheday)

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  10. I did two bottlecap drives at my school, giving treats to the classes that collected the most caps per student. After the first drive, I realized some colors were very rare! Knowing my design, and the availability of certain colors, I assigned point values to different colors for the second drive. I actually had students who tried to paint the caps to get more points!

    http://artabroad.blogspot.com/2011/06/bottlecap-mania.html

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  11. Middle and high schools usually have soda/juice machines right in the schools. (Yuck!) Could you contact the art teachers at the schools near you and request they put a donation box in their room for you? If they talk it up with the kid's you could probably get a lot of caps fast.

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  12. what kind of adhesive are you using? I am thinking of doing this at my school for a christmas themed mural...so cool!

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  13. @Brittany - I used an indoor/outdoor caulking. In theory, it is going to work :) ha ha I am also going over the whole thing with Krylon FUSION clear spray paint. It sticks to plastics and wood...so I thought if I gave it a generous coat...it would help stick it a bit more!

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  14. Thanks!! One more question..do you think it makes a significant difference if you paint the image on first, or do you think it would be ok to just outline it and fill in from there?

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  15. @ Brittany - I painted it in so that I could have students work independantly...and they could know what color went where. Also...allowed me to place the lids I had the most color of in the bigger areas.

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  16. I wanted to find out - what did you use to attach them?

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    1. if you look at all my bottle cap posts(click on bottle cap mural in the word cloud to the right)..you can get the brand. It was a window & door caulking that works in different temps.

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  17. Hi I am currently researching better options than glue guns for our plastic bottle lid murals. I work at a special school in Australia - thank you for the glue suggestion- have tried many glues! I am writing you to thank you and suggest a purple lid source for your purple shortage, if you have any contacts with special needs school staff, the students who rely on tube feeds have purple lids on their liquid meal bottles.sure they would save them for you.

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