New Trimcraft First Edition Foil Applicator

Trimcraft have recently launched a super new Foil Applicator which opens up a whole new shiny world! At the touch of a button you can have beautiful foiled greetings or images on your creations. It couldn't be simpler. It really is a just a matter of turning the machine on, feeding your printed item into the front and collecting it from the back of the machine a few seconds later.

There are some gorgeous colours of Trimcraft foil to use with the machine 

- these come in 310mm x 2m rolls.

This A4 Ultra Smooth card is the best to use with the foil. I can personally recommend it as I've tried several others and got the best results with this one.

Getting started..

1. Simply plug the appliance in and switch on. Set the little button at the back to "Hot". When the green light comes on the machine is ready to use.

2. Print out the images or greetings you want to foil onto the white card with a LASER printer. The Foil Applicator will not work if you use an inkjet printer as the process uses heat to fuse the toner from the laser printer to the foil.

NB. I do not have a laser printer (....yet!) so I printed the images which I wanted to use from my inkjet printer to get the correct sizing and spacing etc and took the pages to the local printers who photocopied them onto my Ultra Smooth card very inexpensively.

The black sheet in the background was one which I asked to be printed in solid black to experiment with.

 3. Fold a piece of copy paper in half and place your chosen image inside. I'm using one of my own outline drawings of a Magnolia and I have added some extra areas of solid black to catch more foil.

 4. Cut a piece of foil to fit over the image and place on top - with the coloured side facing upwards.

5. Fold the piece of paper over to cover the image and foil then place into the mouth of the Foil Applicator.

6. A few seconds later the paper and foil etc will be ready at the back of the machine.

7. Peel away the foil to reveal the magic!!

I'm sure the thrifty/ creative among you will also find a use for the beautiful piece of foil "waste".

You can see from the images above (the Robin and the Magnolia) that the outlines are quite heavy. I found that this gives a better result. However, I do also like the subtle effect which you can achieve by using lighter weight lines - make sure you experiment and have fun!!

Other ideas..

In this photo I've used my drawing of a Cairn Terrier and printed it onto the back of linen textured card. The outlines are quite light and the overall effect is beautiful but more subtle.

This time I've used my drawing of a Robin with red foil for a festive look. The Greeting at the bottom of the card is also foiled.

I used the Holly leaves from the Dovecraft Christmas Basics Poinsettia die set to cut out two leaves from the plain black printed card and then foiled them in the same way to create beautifully shiny gold leaves.

 I had some sheets of linen type textured card printed in solid black ink so that I could experiment a little. This time I used some gorgeous leaves from the "soon to be released" Foliage die set by Trimcraft to cut out the shapes....

...then I put the shapes through the Foil Applicator with bronze foil on top. Because of the texture, the card only picks up some of the foil so you get this amazing aged metal effect! I used an embossing tool and mat to shape the leaves and give a little dimension.

The only limit is your imagination :)