Introduction to Acrylic Technology Advancements
Due to the increasing interest in using acrylics by glass and paint conservation and restoration professionals, a conference of seventeen people from six countries interested in the scientific and technical aspects of this material was held in April 1978 at The University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology. This conference provided an opportunity to discuss the use of acrylics and to review relevant techniques. It was clear from the discussions that workers using these materials faced similar problems, many of which involved applying the current state of technology developed for other materials to the conservation of modern materials.
This often resulted in damage caused by inappropriate and sometimes aggressive techniques and materials. Many of the papers delivered at the conference, and some additional ones, have been updated and assembled in a volume which it is hoped will make a useful contribution to the advancement of knowledge in the field of using and conserving modern materials. The volume is divided into four sections, covering the nature and use, examination, deterioration, and conservation/restoration of modern materials with papers within each section dealing with specific materials or groups of materials.
New Textures in Acrylic Design
Glazing with acrylic is a little harder to control texture as usually it is a smooth finish that will be obtained. A slight change in direction and a new approach to glazing is to try staining the surface. In a 50/50 ratio with water, the use of paint is watered down and applied to raw canvas or paper. By using a wet-on-wet technique, paint or dyes can be mixed on the surface and manipulated in various ways to create interesting textures, often with a more spontaneous result. This is easily worked on in stages and mixed with other techniques.
Pattern In the search for new textures in acrylic design, there are several roads one can go down. One is the combination with another medium, which will be touched on later. The second is the effective use of glazing or stains, and the third would be the mixed media approach. The combination method can take new textures to the extreme, especially in the abstract, where the use of textural pastes and gels can be combined with other media, which always produces interesting results. This mixed media approach creates unlimited texture potential with good planning.
Exploring the Latest Colors in Acrylic Design
One notable improvement has been in the area of iridescent and metallic colors. Interference Acrylics, made by Golden, are highly unique colors that shift between complementary colors as the viewing angle changes. Other iridescent colors have a silver or gold sparkle. These colors are best used on a dark ground or over darker colors to see the full reflective effect. Gold and silver metallic colors are also available from several brands. Acrylic is particularly well suited to metallic colors because of their high opacity. High Flow Acrylics, again made by Golden, are very fluid colors that contain no pigments, only dyes. There are eight iridescent and four matte colors that are equally fluid. This makes them ideal for calligraphy or airbrushing.
A wide array of exotic pigments have enriched the artist’s palette, and the case is no different with acrylic. Manufacturers of acrylic color have worked to meet the demands of an increasingly sophisticated market; consumers who are knowledgeable about color, its application, and its light-fastness. They have also been mindful of the needs and concerns of artists working in other media and have sought to entice them into working in acrylic. As a result, there are a number of acrylic colors available today which offer new possibilities to the artist.
Pushing the Boundaries: Acrylic’s Enhanced Capabilities
The enhanced capabilities of acrylic resins as an ideal coating material have engaged research chemists over the years. It has not been an easy task as the complex nature of the polymerization process and the sheer number of variables involved have made attempts to develop new resins an uphill task. Work with conventional free radical resins has shown a moderate level of success with attempts to produce harder, more chemical resistant resins involving copolymerization with “reactive” monomers such as hydroxyethyl acrylate/isobornyl methacrylate showing some promise. Whilst this has been a step in the right direction, it was realized that the development of resins with significantly enhanced performance characteristics would require a more radical approach. Anionic polymerization resins based on alkyl cyanoacrylates were first developed by the medical industry as a fast-setting adhesive; however, the product did not find widespread use due to its brittleness.
This form of polymerization was reinvestigated in the late 90s. The use of “living” radical polymerization techniques provided a high level of control over molecular weight and dispersity, something that had not been previously possible with anionic polymerization. This work has resulted in the production of resins with excellent performance characteristics and high toughness when polymerized at temperatures between -30°C and 0°C. Despite the positive results with anionic polymerization techniques, it has shown that radical polymerization is the most viable means of producing resins with enhanced performance characteristics. The development of resins aside, it has been shown that the engineering of the resin’s molecular weight and dispersity can result in improved coating performance. This involves the production of resins with higher molecular weights and lower dispersity that can be produced through the use of controlled radical polymerization techniques such as ATRP and NMP. With regards to the development of new resins, the prospects for the future are extremely promising.
Conclusion and Future Prospects
Applying the scientific method in designing is very important because by applying the scientific method, the designer can observe and analyze the design problem thoroughly before deciding to make the design. This can make the designer think positively that the design that has been decided is the best decision. Pei Ee and Nasir’s research presented the application of different scientific methods in design and analysis to innovate.
They had been through 2 cycles of the scientific method to obtain the best result for the new product. The first cycle is creating the coral frag rack to hold coral frags in an aquarium. The first thing the designer does is defining the problems, goals, and constraints before moving on to the concept generation phase. When creating the first design, the coral frag rack can only hold a small quantity of coral frags. The designer then goes through the analysis phase by comparing the existing design with others and taking the best features to improve the design. After finishing analyzing, the designer does a conceptual design and an embodiment design.
After that, the designer reviews their design. It’s known that from the first design, the designer satisfies the constraints, but the result is not as good as they want, so the designer takes over the new design and keeps the old one. Before moving on to the detailed design, the designer conducts a design review of the embodiment design and gets feedback so that the best design can be chosen and the designer can respond to the feedback. This will move to the second cycle, which is design and analysis. With the same steps as the first cycle, the designer’s design can fulfill the needs of the customer and be unsatisfied with the existing design, the constraints, and the result are more efficient. This will result in the best coral frag rack that has been made. Then the rack can be used to hang a large quantity of coral frags and is durable with the best design.
The importance of the different scientific methods each designer uses to innovate and the new design model of the design narration by Ulrich. A study in innovations in acrylic products manufacturing presents the effort through research by studying three different case studies of acrylic product design along with the design narration model in the case studies.
