this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2025
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I Made This

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One Month of Making Pigments (europe.pub)
submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by Wren@lemmy.today to c/imadethis@lemmy.zip
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Ever scrubbed a beet or tumeric stain out of your favorite booty shorts and think "I bet I could make this messier and worse?" Ever stared at a red cabbage and wonder if you could make your whole apartment smell like salty farts? then DIY pigments might be for you.

Most of these were done using the lake method, using metalic salts to snag onto pigments in solution, and a base to precipitate them out. Most were from food scraps: an old cabbage, a freezer-burned bag of blueberries, expired cranberry sauce, slimy bag of spinach, floppy carrots, and a couple recovered pigments from dye baths using commercial products.

The three jars on the side are part of my verdigris farm, a small section of my forray into decomposing metals for more colourfast pigments. They all look different because the top two have different percentages of sulfur added to the acetic acid. So far more sulfur = more better.

Yes, I have a fan, dedicated utensils (since a chemist told me to,) and a mask with acid vapor filters. I just don't use them.

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[–] Wren@lemmy.today 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Sure, look up the lake pigment method for your walnuts, black walnut is great for making ink and dyeing as well. You'll find a lot of instructions, mostly the same. However — none of these removed know about molar mass, ignore all measurements unless you have the equipment and the inclination to get very precise. I've needed more aluminum salt and less soda ash than most instructions say.

Do not dump the precipitated pigment directly into the filter as soon as it's done bubbling. I always get a richer colour by stirring a few times and letting it settle overnight.

For mica — If it's still a rock you'll have to look up how to separate it from the matrix. My only tip here is: mix with transparent media or else the sparkle gets covered up.

If you want to make good paints I recommend a good mortar and pestle, classifying strainer, and a muller/glass panel to prepare the paint.

Pro-tip 1: Alum, gum arabic, gum tragacanth and linseed oil can all be bought at 1/10 the cost of art stores at Indian spice markets.

Pro tip 2: Mullers are stupid expensive, glass butt plugs are basically the same thing as long as they have a flat base. Mine was eight bucks on sale.