Raptor Para-Red

I know this isn't exactly the pinnacle of artistic quality, but it had an interesting creation process!

This was created using a dye called Para-Red that I synthesized myself in lab as part of a project in an organic chemistry class. After creating the dye, we were given small squares of cloth to put a blob of it onto - in order to turn it in to our professor along with the lab report as proof that we did the experiment correctly.

Well, I wasn't satisfied with just blobbing dye onto the cloth. So I tried actually drawing stuff with the stirring rod. Once my professor saw I was drawing with it, she got unreasonably excited (science majors with artistic talent?! Blasphemy!) and cut out a big square for me to use, and got me a paintbrush. xD The black parts are just sharpie.

Para-red is pretty interesting. It's an azo dye that has two separate components, both of which I synthesized individually in lab. It has a para-nitroaniline part which must be diazotised at ice-cold temperatures with HCl and sodium nitrite, as well as a coupling component created from beta-naphthol. The two compounds are almost colorless when separate, but when added to one another instantly form a very bright, intense red color as a result of the two compounds coupling with a double bond between the nitrogens on the aromatic rings.

This was made by soaking the entire cloth in the coupling component, and then drawing on it with the diazo.

SCIENCE!