Introduction: Leather Coaster

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This instructable tells you how to make a leather coaster with a picture burned into it with a soldering iron.

Step 1: Materials

- leather
- soldering iron or wood burner (either one works fine a wood burner is usually better though because it usually has removable tips that come in many different shapes and sizes)
- computer and printer to find and print a picture (unless you would like to draw by sight)
- scissors
- marker
- a safe surface to work on so you don't burn your mothers wooden dinner table or any other important surface ( a disposable aluminum pie pan works great)
- tape
- something sharp: a needle, bulletin board pin, safety pin

Step 2: Preparation Before Burning

- Find a picture on the internet that is circular shaped. It helps to get a line drawn picture, so if you do a google advanced image search and choose line drawing it will make it easier for you to find simple pictures to trace.
- Print the picture at the size that you would like your coaster to be.
- Cut out the picture.
- Lay the picture on a piece of your leather and trace it onto the leather with a marker. Make sure you trace it onto the backside of the leather so there are no marks on the front.
- Cut out the circle from the leather.
- Tape the picture to the front side of the leather.
- Trace the picture onto the leather by poking through the paper on the lines of the picture.
- Untape the picture from the leather and you will see a bunch of little dots on the leather.

Step 3: Burning

- Use a scrap piece of leather to tell when the soldering iron is hot enough to get the line value that you want.
- Pretty much you just simply trace the dots on the leather. Use the the paper as a reference if the lines get a little confusing.
- I only traced the larger main lines and drew in the smaller ones later to keep from having to much of a jumble of dots.
- I also added a border to the outside and colored in the stem of the flower.