My First Project - Crayon Art

Ok, crayon art seemed like a simple enough starting point. I'm sure you have all seen pictures with the melted crayon all over lately. I decided to try the "rain" effect using only shades of blues with some purples, greens, grays, and even a black (I suggest NOT using black as I feel it made this piece seem really heavy) with the painted silhouette of the man and woman.

I ventured out to my local Michael's to get the supplies which I think was the most overwhelming part of this, but luckily I had a good friend come along for the ride. I bought a canvas, paint brushes, black paint, and crayola crayons. I'm not kidding when I say I was starting from scratch here so most crafters would probably have most of this on hand. I need to work on building a stockpile. I also ordered a glue gun and exacto knife earlier that week from Amazon.com. (side note: if you sign up for Michael's email list online you get a ton of great coupons!)

Simple enough, I glued the crayons in random order to the top of the canvas and then (I'll admit) traced a stock silhouette and than painted it in. If I was doing this again, I would have melted the crayons first and then painted the silhouette because I had some issues with the painters tape not working super well, but we live and we learn. So once the black paint for the silhouette was dry, I took Garette's hairdryer out (which could possibly be the first hairdryer ever manufactured, it practically breathes fire) to melt the crayons. I think the hairdryer was a little too hot and I wasn't patient enough to use the lower setting so they melted very quickly and into a big blob. Round 2, I would go with the lighter setting which may take longer, but would get a better result.

This was my outcome:

Not too bad. We have created a rating system based on rooms in the house. This was meant for the dining room wall, but ended up in the upstairs hallway. I'll take it for my first project!

I've also seen online people have used a glue gun to melt the crayons. I feel like this would create the "rain" effect well, but I don't think it would have a positive outcome on your glue gun. What do you think? Has anyone tried it this way?