Below is a photo of the filtered pigment left to air dry in my studio - behind a closed door where cats and sudden breeze can't disrupt it. It's been sitting here un-disturbed ever since I filtered out the water. The filter on the right was from a couple of days earlier, when I filtered a bit of sediment that had been siphoned off. If you look back a few posts, you'll see what it looked like when it was sitting in the funnel just after filtering - now it looks like a few dark crumbs with a little powdery pigment caught on the rest of the filter. I've been utterly amazed at how much the volume shrinks as it dries out. If you want an immediate comparison - compare this photo with the next.
Day 16
The pigment has just been sitting and drying over the past couple of days - and will continue to do so until it has all dried. I expect at least a couple more days of waiting. To compare with the photo above, the two filter papers at the very top of this photo are the same ones from above. The top left filter is the same filter paper shown on the left in the photo above. Notice just how much the volume of pigment has shrunk over the past few days while it's been sitting and drying! The larger bits have also turned quite dark as they've dried - nearly black.
I recently added a new mini-fridge to my studio (courtesy of Craigslist, and in perfect working condition), for the purpose of storing dye when its not in use. As you can see below, I've found a nice new way to recycle my plastic water bottles. The three pink bottles on the left are a weakened version of cochineal. I've used the dye bath twice, and gotten pretty intense colors both times. I've read that you can use the same cochineal dye bath quite a few times before exhausting it. I'm looking forward to using these to get some nice medium and light pinks. The two on the right are madder that I let boil for an hour. I haven't used these yet at all, and am curious to see how the boiling will affect my result. (if you recall, the madder I used for the pigment project above wasn't heated to anywhere near the boiling point). I have read you can obtain a brilliant orange with a tin mordant and boiled madder. Time will tell - I've got tin on order, and am looking forward to giving it a try.
This one is the madder which has not been boiled, but only heated to about 40-45*C during the pigment making process. I also recharged this bath with the madder & re-heating it to 40-45*C. This is the bath that I used with an alum mordant to achieve the golden blonde color on the skein of wool (pictured below).
Here's the final photo of the wool dyed in the madder bath described above. I put it into the dye bath twice, hoping to get a darker color, but this light color was the best I could get. I do have a feeling that I would have gotten a darker color if I had used the first dye that came from the roots - which of course were used for a lake pigment this time around. I may try it again with the exclusive purpose of creating a dye for wool, just to see what happens. This time around, dying the wool was just a nice side project and a good way to re-use the discarded dye from the pigment project.
I also find myself wondering if the wool-alpaca blend that I used for my last cochineal dye bath would have taken the color better. That particular skein seemed to absorb a surprising amount of the color from the cochineal bath. I'm very curious to try it again with a different dye to see whether those results had more to do with the dye or with the wool-alpaca blend.
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