A quick way to make a hand print is to cover the hand with dark lipstick and then place the hand onto some fine or flimsy paper, pressing the paper gently up into the center of the hand and then peeling it off. However, if you are going to do the job properly you will need the right tools.
Go to an art shop and buy some water based block printing ink. This looks like a tube of paint or even toothpaste, apart from the fact that you should use black, dark red or any other dark color rather than white. You can try a water based paint, although some types may dry too quickly on the hand to be much use.
In Britain, you should look around for “Block Printing Ink,” which Daler/Rowney manufacture. It comes in many colors. Oil based inks smear and they are hard to wash off the hands or clothes. You can buy tiny tubes of fingerprint ink from art shops. This is much finer-grained than the other kind but it is oil based and difficult to use for whole hands.
You need to buy a rubber coated paste-up roller from an art shop. This is about two inches wide and around one inch in diameter.
A bathroom tile is fine if you have a spare one lying around, but if not, use an old china plate.
This is the roll of kitchen paper that we all use for mopping up spills—and as napkins when we don't have fancy company for tea.
A felt tipped pen for drawing around the hand.
Any normal photocopy or inkjet paper is fine. Expensive papers do a worse job than inexpensive ones because they are often coated with a layer of fine clay.
Supply aprons for yourself and your guinea-pig. Also a basin or sink with plenty of soap and an old towel or cloth for washing the mess off afterward and what else? Oh yes, you need a guinea-pig!
1 Put several sheets of paper towel on top of each other to make a soft base. Take a couple more sheets and fold them in half in order to make a slight ridge or mound and lay the ridge across the middle of your pile.
2 Lay several sheets of paper on top of the stack of paper towels.
3 Squeeze a little of the ink on to your plate or tile—about half an inch will do.
4 Run the roller up and down in the ink until it is well covered but not too thickly or wetly covered.
5 Now cover your friend's hand with ink. Do not lay the ink on too thickly or it will end up in an unreadable smudge.
6 Ask your friend to relax his hand a little and then place it on the paper with the palm located over the slight mound in the middle. Do not press down heavily on his hand or you will smudge the print. Just give the area where the fingers and thumb join the hand a light press.
7 Leave the hand in place for a moment or two and then take the felt-tip pen and draw round it. Don't angle the pen in around the fingers or you will spoil their shape. Just outline them. If you can't get between two fingers, don't push the pen in, just go around the tops.
8 Now hold the paper down at the top and bottom and ask your friend to lift his hand from the wrist end slowly until it is free of the paper.
9 Now mark whether this was the left or right hand, write your friends name and age and date the print. Now do the same thing with your friend's other hand and then leave the prints to dry completely. Once dry, the best thing is to photocopy the print and put the original into one of those plastic pockets that fit into a ring binder file.
If the hand is hollow in the middle, you will end up with a gap in the middle. In this case, take another print and go as far as outlining the hand with the felt-tip pen. Then ask your friend to carefully lift his hand up a little at the wrist end with the paper still stuck to it and slowly and gently insert your hand under the sheet of paper and gently press your fingers into the middle of his hand.
Comment to him that money comes to those who have a slight hollow in their hands—although they usually have to earn it the hard way!
If you still cannot get a reasonable print of the center of the hand, rest the bottom of a piece of paper on a rolling pin or a wine bottle and put the heel of your friend's hand on this. Roll the pin forward and allow the hand to rest on the paper as it rolls along. This will distort the finger shapes but it will give you a print of the middle of the hand.
In this case, pin your two types of print together so that you have all the information that you need for your files or for future reference.
If you make a print of your own hands, take another print every few months and see if there have been any changes, however small.
Some people try to photocopy hands but this doesn't give a readable copy. In the days when I gave consultations for a living, I occasionally received photocopied prints through the post. These were hopeless, and I never understood how the sender could imagine that I would be able to read anything from these images.
