Suggestions For Metal Powders

[TassoBarbasso]

Hi Guys,

 

I'd like to start playing around with some "home-made maki-e", i.e., experimenting with shellac lacquer and some metal dust to see if I can get some basic maki-e style patterns. Problem is, I have no idea where to get metal powder. A google search gives only providers of metal powders for industries. It's especially hard to find reliable sites that sell gold dust. But I'd like to experiment with silver, copper and bronze dust as well.

 

Any ideas?

 

thanks,

Fabio

[Inspector]

You could look for the mica powders used for making makeup and colouring casting resins people make pen blanks out of.

 

http://www.tkbtrading.com/category.php?category_id=12&page=g

 

http://www.kamapigment.com/store/index.asp

 

Pete

[TassoBarbasso]

thanks!

 

I'll check that out.

[TassoBarbasso]

I cannot believe it: This website (kamapigment) also sells the typical green earth of the place close to the village where I grew up! I had no idea that it could be found outside of there. This is so nice! It was like a trip back to childhood when we would go around with my grandfather picking up those strange green rocks with their weird shapes. If I do decide to go ahead with this, I'll definitely use this earth. Thanks for making me discover this.

[Rich L]

I'm not kidding - make your own. I've done that with silver and you can do that with, say, 10K gold. Sand it or use a #6 file and collect the dust. If you use sandpaper (or emery) keep it wet with water so the dust doesn't get stuck in the paper. Using a file is easier but clean the file thoroughly first and then comb out residual filings with a piece of wood or acrylic.

 

Cheers,

Rich

[TassoBarbasso]

thanks for the suggestion. It turned out, getting shellac in Lithuania is a bit hard, and I really want to use that because it's more "natural"; I'll have to order it from Canada alongside some of those pigments above.

Edited July 14, 2015 by TassoBarbasso