Heidi Swapp Minc Review

image source- http://heidiswapp.com

Hi there everyone!!

So a little while back I purchased a Heidi Swapp Minc Machine from Spotlight. They were on sale for $149 from $199 so I was pretty excited to get it if such a discount. Since then they have dropped in price and I have seen them for as little as $99.
But enough with prices, I want to share with you today how the Heidi Swapp Minc works, and show you a short tutorial on how to use it.

As I have been working with the Minc now for almost 6 months, I have learnt that it is super versatile. Ill be honest, I really thought you could grab any laminator and foil your project, and I did just that! I grabbed my cheapo ALDI laminator and tried to foil......with poor results. The image was splotchy and not all the foil adhered to the image. Considering I was using a Heidi Swapp brand of product I really thought it would work. That was mistake number 1. Thinking I could go all cheapo and use any old thing.
3 Laminators later, I still got a mixed result.Again all spotty and not perfect adhesion.

So I invested in a Heidi Swapp Minc Machine. To start with everything I foiled came out perfect. All the Heidi Swapp accessories and papers worked a treat! I loved it!

Heidi Swapp paper pad and adhesive alphabet light and hot pink foil

Then I tried to print my own images to foil, with mixed results. I decided to purchase a new laser printer. I brought the one that Heidi Swapp recommended, the HP mono P1102w laser printer.
Since I purchased that laser printer, everything I have created has foiled perfectly!
There are a lot of other factors that affect a perfect foil and I will do a post on that soon, but for the money, getting a good printer and the minc machine is totally worth it if you want perfect results!

So how do you use the machine? Today I will how you how to make a basic card with the Heidi Swapp Minc.

Firstly you will need the following-
Heidi Swapp Minc Machine
Heidi Swapp Foil- gold
Carrier folder(comes with the Minc machine)
Cardstock
Laser Printer.

1- On your white card stock, print the image or sentiment you would like to foil. If you have a laser printer use this, if you do not have access to a laser printer, that is OK, you can use a regular inkjet printer and take to your local copy shop. Copy shops use toner in their machines so just get a copy of your design then you can foil that.

2- Once you have printed your image cut the foil to fit over the card.

3- Place in the carrier folder and run through your Minc Machine. It is good to note that there are 5 settings on your machine. Each one is for different material you are foiling. With standard smooth cardstock and a laser printer I have found that setting 3 is perfect.

4- Once it has run through remove the card and foil carefully from the folder and slowly remove the foil.

5- You will see that your image/sentiment is foiled! It is that simple!!!! Fold your card and it is ready to go!

All in all the Heidi Swapp Minc is an amazing machine as long as you do read all instructions and use the correct product. The rrp$199 price tag here in australia is a lot of cash, but if you can find it for $99 on sale its more worth it!

Stay tuned as ill be sharing tips and tricks with the Minc soon.
Until next time.....

Look what arrived!!!!!

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So in the post last week came a awesome little tool! Yup I got the Silhouette mint finally!
I cant wait to share it with you all and a tutorial or two!!!!

So watch this space!!!!!

Until next time......

A New Look for Loki Made it...(Formally A Day in the Life of Osiris and Loki.)

Hi there everyone!!!!

Well I have finally revamped the blog!!! yeah!!!!! Im hoping to get some great tutorials up and running soon on the Silhouette Minc machine, The Silhouette Cameo and the Silhouette Mint Machine...which I might add just arrived to my house today!!!!!

I have a you tube channel up and running now, who atm only has nail art videos and tutorials, as I need to share it with my other blog  Lokis Lacquer but i can pop different playlists in so if you see lokis lacquer about fear not its me too!!!!!

So until next time.......

Paper Smooches SPARKS challenge Jan4-10th

Hi there everyone! wow it has been a while! hasn't it??!!  Well Last year was crazy! I had a bunch of publishing work for different Card magazines which took up a bunch of my time and my beauty blog Loki's Lacquer really took off with many companies asking me to review and use their product. The result is Loki's Lacquer got a bunch of time and Poor old a day in the life of osiris and Loki .....well not so much.

I am going to try and get this blog back to its former glory with any luck this year!!!!

So to kick things off I have decided to do the Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge this week.

 Paper Smooches is one of my go to brands. I use a lot of Kims stamps with my work for magazines and they seem to go down very well. I pretty much have most of the stamp sets these days but am slowly trying to update all the dies. I just can't keep up!!!

With my little card today I wanted to do a one layered card. The theme is anything goes so why not do that?!

I used Paper Smooches Feline Friends and Debonair sets. Im really loving black,white and red ATM so I decided on this colour choice. 

I also used some diamond Stickles for the glasses and a red sharpie to spritz the spray look on the background. I love the Tim holtz spritzer its awesome! and Sharpies are so full of ink they work so well! My go to black ink was Mementos tuxedo. 

He is super cute!!! and reminds me a little of a rapper more than a cat with those glasses!!! its like a cat RedFoo!!!

I hope you like the card. and do not forget to check out the challenges over at Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge and have a go!!!!

Until next time.......