3D Printed Snowflake Ornaments with Metallic Alcohol Ink


These snowflakes were one of the first flat ornaments I printed on our 3D printer. They printed quickly and turned out so nicely that I just kept on printing them.


This snowflake ornament pattern was printed using standard settings (.2 resolution, 20% infil) with white pla filament. 


They printed so nicely that I made a second, and then I made a third, and then I printed a fourth. So I had to figure out what I was going to do with all of these snowflake ornaments.


So I got out my craft mat and decided to ink them with a little bit of metallic ink.


I started by inking them with some pearl ink. It's a white ink with some metallic shimmer. I used a felt applicator to stamp the ink all over the ornaments.


It was subtle. It did turn out shimmery, but it was hard to see, and Christmas is no time to be subtle.


So I decided to add some silver ink in with the pearl ink and see if I could get more of a silvery shimmer that was a bit more visible.


Ah, that's more like it. It had a visible shimmer! After one side of the ornament dried, I flipped them over and inked the other side.


After letting them completely dry (overnight would be good, but an hour or two will do in a pinch), I sprayed them with some Kamar Varnish to set the ink. Then I hung a couple of them up on my Christmas tree!


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