Inking/Painting Neoprene?

[Aquatarian]

So I am a little fuzzy on how to customize a neoprene tail. I purchased some neoprene from JoAnn's and it comes with one sided fabric. The color i chose was this turquoise blue which is similar to the color I would like my finished product to be.

Now I've heard that you can use different paints to detail a tail but I haven't heard of anything solid that works on neoprene that already has the fabric attached to it. I know Hannah Fraser has previously screen printed some of her first neoprene tails and it makes me wonder if I could do something similar. I want to detail some scales, in a few different colors, and detail the fluke on the tail I'm making. I found a website that sells screen printing ink (www.dharmatrading.com (http://www.dharmatrading.com)) and I want to know if I buy the ink and then paint it on by hand, would I get a "printed effect" or "paint effect".

Would the ink "dye" the fabric on top of the neoprene like Hannah's blue tail? or would it act the same as paints like Lumiere and Createx and just sit on top (leaving chance for peeling)? The shipping charges and pricing even for a single bottle are a bit pricy so I don't want to buy the ink online just to get it and find out it doesn't work for what I'm trying to accomplish.

Any sort of tips or info would help. I'm making one of my dream tails and I don't want it to turn out wonky. Haha. :confused:

[Mermaid Kalliope]

I'm looking for the same thing... I found the same site as you and I'm wondering about buying them... I'm also not sure how MUCH I'll need. They're 8oz jars of paint and I have a lot of surface to paint.

[malinghi]

I just went looking for information on painting scales on neoprene, and it seems that a lot of the information is a bit spread out across the site. Does anyone know of a good central thread for discussing painting neoprene? If not, I propose we collect information about it here and make this the central resource on painting neoprene. Eventually a guide can be made using the information.

So here are some places where painting neoprene is discussed:
http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?2548-First-time-tailmaking-Jade-s-attempt/page2
http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?577-Archive-quot-Scale-Painting-Video-and-Quick-Tail-Preview-quot
http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?2487-Another-quot-How-I-made-my-neoprene-tail-quot-thread
http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?3182-JACQUARD-Paints-Creators-of-quot-Lumiere-quot
http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?757-NEW-Painted-scales!!!!-I-m-LOVING-it!!!!-D
http://mernetwork.com/index/content.php?139-Materials-and-Supplies
http://www.spearboard.com/showthread.php?t=71568

Also, continuing with what Aquatarian asked above, can anyone compare and contrast all the different paints that can be used on neoprene? These are the ones I've found mentions of:
Createx airbrush paint
Jacquard's Lumiere fabric paint
Dharma Trading Co fabric paint
Delta Creative acrylic paint with Mediums additive for fabric painting
various spray paints
various screen printing paints
various dyes
various neoprene cements

[Mermaid Ripple]

Hi guys, I'm brand new so I'm researching how to paint a neoprene tail (I want to be prepared so I can start as soon as I get the opportunity) I couldn't seem to find any definitive answers about whether or not the Lumiere paint stuck efficiently to nylon covered neoprene. Would you happen to know?

[Ilyena]

There are some more recent neoprene threads which explain what paint/processes people used, the search bar should help. I have a thread and used Lumiere paint on neoprene and that has held up really well. Swam in chlorine for a couple of hours yesterday in my neoprene top and it held up fine.

[deepblue]

I was just reading about this, myself. I came across some info in one of the threads that Malinghi posted above.

http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?3182-JACQUARD-Paints-Creators-of-quot-Lumiere-quot&p=40578&viewfull=1#post40578

I'm not sure if that quite answers your question or not. I was researching how to make a silicone tail, then decided to start with a neoprene one.