Number of people: 2 - 3 people best but I would recommend no more than 5, as it gets obvious when you have 5 people pasting things up.
Time of day: night time activity
Duration: 1 - 2hrs+
Budget: $5 -$20 starting
Equipment: (all rough estimates)
- ~3/4 cup of wheat flower - though rice flower works too
- ~6 - 7 cups of water
- ~1 teaspoon of Sugar
- A house pain brush or paint roller - a half size paint roller works best from my experience
- Printed pictures you want to put up - they should be printed by a laser printer
- A Small bucket - make sure your roller can fit inside if your using a paint roller
- An Open hand bag - the cotton ones that shops gives out are best or the cotton reusable grocery bags
- A Bag for your designs - we use a paper bag
Steps
1. Make your design, draw it on computer or by hand. (a black and white/grey scale picture will be cheapest)
2. Print your design out with a laser printer (a photo copiers is a laser printer) if you print it on a inkjet printer(most home printers) the ink will run, if you drew it by hand you can photo copy/scan it, if you don't have a laser printer (most people don't) you can take your design/poster/picture to a printing shop or photo copying machine, usually about 20c per A4 page and colour copies will cost more. Note, half a A4 page is about best size for your design for ease of finding places to put them, but making big ones are also fun, and you only need about 10 - 40 copies a night before your legs get tired.
3. Cut around your design so there's a small white boarder around it, it just looks better after you put it up.
4. Put the flower into a medium-large size bowl, add about 1 and a 1/2 cup of cold water and start string till there's no more lumpy bits (or close enough). If you use boiling water to open it it'll cook the wheat and makes it go lumpy as.
5. Pour the mixture into a pot with a little bit of boiling water, add the sugar and slowly add boiling water while cooking and string the mixture. Don't add too much water it shouldn't be runny (better to be too thick than too runny). Just experiment with water to Wheat ratio as I've never noted it down. The first time you do this you should test it on something at home before you go out. (this video might help)
6. Once your mixture is ready pour it into your bucket and your ready to go.
7. Find a flat wooden, brick, metal, plastic etc surface that you want to put your wheat paste on, paint/roll the paste onto the surface, slap the design on then paint/roll the paste over it again this water proofs it. The paste needs to cover the whole design to water proof the whole thing. This should be done when no one or not many people are watching/around.
Please be curtest and not wheat paste on people properties as that's just sad. Stick to street signs, lamp post, transformers etc usually where other wheat paste have already been done, another word government property. If you see places where there have been wheat paste pealed off or painted over then they clean that area regularly and its a bit of a waste of your time pasting it there as it'll get taken down or painted over straight away. An untouched wheat paste can last a few years. Try making different designs, different sizes to change things up a bit, write a message if you feel the need to educate the world. The CBD's the best place to wheat paste.
Remember this is illegal in most countries, look out for cops, security guards, street cleaners and CCTV cameras!
Have fun :D
