Sunday, June 23, 2013

Permanent Gelatine plate made with Gelatin leaves

By special request a quick blogpost with the recipe to make a permanent gelatin plate with gelatin leaves, in stead of powdered gelatin.

I got the original recipe from Lindsay, The Frugal Crafter, but since the powdered gelatine isn't easy to come by here in the netherlands, I adjusted her recipe to use the materials I could find here easy. I also found another great blogpost by Shaz in Oz, she doesn't use alcohol, but substitutes it with sugar. When I made my plate I couldn't find her post anymore, so I used Lindsay's recipe as a starting point. I'm glad I have since found it again.

Here is Linsay's recipe:

  • 6 Tablespoons geletin (7 packets)
  • 1 1/2 Cups water 
  • 1 Cup Alcohol (70% isoprophal)
  • 1/2 cup glycerin 

As I posted last wednesday in my WOYWW post, I did get it to work with the leaf gelatine and I promised to post the recipe.


I first started to do some research on the internet, but couldn't find anything that told me exactly how to convert it. Then I figured I would just wing it, as it isn't an exact science. 

I calculated the volume Lindsay had and converted it al to the metric system and wound up with the amount in ml. I converted the comparative amounts of alcohol and glycerine and compared the lot with the gelatine recipe on the back of my package.

To make a long story short. It took several tries, because it first wouldn't come out of my "mold" and then turned out to be too thin. In the end I got it right and I had a plate that was both firm and came out of the mold with a little cheating.

Here's my recipe for leaf gelatin:
  • 400 ml water
  • 120 ml 96% alcohol (because I couldn't find 70%)*
  • 110 ml glycerine
  • 3 packets of Dr. Oetker Gelatine leaves (30 g)
* if you're using 70% alcohol, you have to add more alcohol and less water.

I put it all in a bowl and brought it to a boil for about a minute. Which isn't necessary, but I did it anyway. Let it cool a little, because I lined my mold with plastic wrap and I wasn't sure how warm I could make the plastic wrap. 

That's my little cheat, with this plastic I can lift it out of the mold really easy. 

The first two times I couldn't get it out, so I had to remelt the gelatine mix. The remelting is really easy and should you damage your plate in any way, you can just remelt it and repour in your mold.


Now with this recipe your plate will not be as firm as the actual gelli plates are, but you can easily add more gelatin to the mix if you want it to be thicker. For me this works just fine and the surface of the plate is really firm. As I intend to keep it on a hard portable surface, I'm not concerned about it breaking, but you might want to change that.

My plate is still going strong even after the abuse it took last week, with me trying out all sorts of things and refusing to put it in the fridge. Even though the temperature was really high for several days. As you can see, I keep it on a kitchen board on top of the plastic wrap. The "cracks" you see are the plastic wrap underneath the gelatin plate.

I'm now playing with my prints and a really cool technique of treating the print, to make them just to my liking. 



I'm distressing them with distress inks and I love how this looks. I haven't seen this before, so the result sort of took me by surprise...a nice surprise I might add.

I hope you find my recipe useful and should you have any questions about it, please let me know and I will try and answer them.

Thank you for watching and I wish you all a lovely weekend.

14 comments:

  1. Ziet er erg ingewikkeld uit ;) Het is mij nog steeds niet zo duidelijk wat je er precies mee kan, zal eens gaan googelen. Jij ook een fijn weekend!

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  2. Thanks for sharing! Must give it a try! Valerie

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  3. Wow! I had no idea you could do this! When you say permanment does it mean it doesn't dry out? I have a small Gelli plate and am often frustrated by its size, this could mean could make a much larger one! Thanks so much for sharing. :)

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  4. It would appear people have been doing this with gelatine for all sorts of uses.

    I don't know about the drying out, but it's supposed to be plastified this way. I thought I'd give it a go, because the ingredients are cheap and there's no harm done when it doesn't work in th end.

    I do cover it with a plastic when I'm done, but I don't know if it is necessary. Wel I can always remelt it and add water =).

    I'm interested to hear your results and how you feel it compares to a gelli plate. Since I don't have one, I can't compare them.

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  5. Heb inmiddels wat meer filmpjes bekeken, wat een leuk idee zeg! Misschien ga ik er ook een maken. Waar heb je de glycerine en de 96% alcohol gekocht?

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  6. Hoi Joyce, de alcohol komt bij het kruidvat vandaan en glycerine hebben ze bij de ETOS. Daar hebben ze vast ook alcohol, maarja, die had ik al =)

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  7. Geweldig Monique zoals je zelf een gelli plate hebt gemaakt...super dat hij ook nog eens zo goed "werkt".
    Je hebt er vast al veel plezier mee gehad en er mee krijgen!

    groetjes, Alie :-)

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  8. Thanks so much for posting this recipe, Monique! I think a lot of people want to give it a try!

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  9. Lovely prints - kudos to you for making your own plate!
    Alison x

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  10. Wow.. this is fab to have such a great recipe..THANK YOU VERY MUCH! here in Austria we have also just the Gelatin leaves from Dr.Oetker.. so it is fantasstic for me... will give this a try !
    And the trick with the distress ink over the prints is so clever- that looks great!

    Thank you for sharing this all Monique!

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  11. very interesting post . i have the small gelli plate and i love it but the larger ones are so expensive, i might have a go at this and make a bigger one. thanks for sharing
    toni x

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  12. Thank you all for your lovely comments.

    I hope you do give it a try and please let me know how you fared or any tips or improvements.

    Happy printing =)
    xx

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  13. Thanks for linking over Monique and yes have converted them in similar way for my post as the original was too large for me and and in old British measures not metric like we use now.. and it works a treat that is for sure... glad you sorted it out...oh and I joined your blog too :D Shaz in Oz.x

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  14. Thank you for your metric conversion.
    I was very confused too, will attempt to make my own plate today. Thank you, Agnes

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