DIY Art Fail?

I found a project in the newest edition of Do it Yourself Magazine that I thought my 8-year-old daughter and I could absolutely tackle.  The project was a DIY wall art project using gel medium, a photo printed on a transparency sheet and a blank canvas.

The basic idea was to spread a thin amount of gel medium onto a canvas, then place a printed transparency sheet ink down onto the canvas.  We were supposed to rub the back of the sheet with a spoon and voila, the photo would transfer onto the canvas with an "artsy, gritty quality", which looked oh-so-cool in the magazine.

I decided to buy my daughter the supplies as an Easter gift.  I picked up some canvases ($8) and gel medium ($15) at Michael's.  I didn't have time to get the transparencies for Easter, so she and I went to Staples today.  Lo and behold, those suckers were EX-PEN-SIVE!  $60 for 50 sheets!  If I hadn't already promised her that we'd do this, I would have stopped right there.

We browsed the 'net searching for some cool owl images (note: we just did the old 'right-click and save' to make some sample canvases. AquaSeventy6 always recommends that you get permission before using online images!)

After ruining our first canvas by using way too much gel medium, we ended up with these three sample canvases.  We still haven't decided if we like them or not, especially since the materials were not cheap.  Maybe they would turn out better if we used photos instead of clip art.  We'd like to hear what you think.  Was this a DIY fail or is it DIY fab?