Photo Etching onto silver

Hi,

I was asked last weekend about transfering a photo onto a piece of silver jewellery. I would appreciate some help and advice on the process involved.

Many thanks
Les

I have etched a photocopy of a drawing onto silver in the past but I'm afraid it was a long time ago! Hopefully someone will fill you in with any missing details.

The way I did it was to photocopy the image onto acetate. Most good photocopiers will allow you to put in acetate - but it does have to be the correct photocopier friendly kind! Please check else the wrong kind might melt and damage the photocopier.

The silver was then placed on an upturned iron to get it really hot and the acetate with the image on was placed toner side down onto the silver. The heat will transfer the toner to the silver which will then work as a etching stop out.

Please do remember it will turn out the opposite way round - i.e the dark areas will remain and the light areas will be etched away. So if you were to then oxidise it, the image will be reversed. You might want to make the image negative first. Also it will mirror the image too!

Hope this helps!

You can also get photoresist sprays through electronics supply places that carry PCB development; prep & spray the metal (in full darkness); print your image onto acetate (laser printer always used to be best - inkjet blacks were never opaque enough, but I haven't tried using them in recent years); expose the image with a PCB lightbox, develop it, then etch.

Press'n'Peel blue is another toner transfer method that works fairly well.

One thing that is important with all these methods - grey does not work. You can get away with using half-tones, but fundamentally the image has to be black & white.

My recommendation would be to get the image lasered onto the silver. Our very own Alan may do it for you. You can contact him via his website GETi Wedding rings, black zirconium mens rings and titanium rings. - Home

I can do this but i have a specialised photoengraving machine, i generally do this on stainless steel but it works on sterling which i am about to start doing more of.

Regards

Stuart

I went to a brilliant workshop last year run by Victoria Kershaw on photoetching onto silver. She used UV sensitive film and a UV exposure box, with images copied onto acetate. It works really well.