And the same in copper

I don't find copper easy, I'm not really good with delicate lines, and etching something upside down and in a dark fluid so that you can't see what is going on adds to my di comfort. I didn't like the original plate I made, so I decided to etch something else on the back for practice, and when I did the 'back ( ie the front of this plate) also got etched. IT does at least make it more interesting- perhaps I will return to this sometime. 

Leaving well alone

I decided it needed to be etched some more- but I should have used aquatint ( but I don't like the acrylic spray aquatint which is what was available to me at the time) , and because I had started to play with the plate I couldn't resist playing with the blank space. Which was a mistake. 

A favorite image, in copper

And then I made it in copper to see the difference. 

A favorite image, in steel

I made this plate, just to see what my favorite lino cut would look like as an etching.

landscapes of the imagination series diptych

When I made the original etchings ( first etch) I always intended that there would be a real flow of line across the plates so that I could print 2 or 3 together. However, somehow I have rather lost this in the subsequent etches which have made the individual plates so much more successful- so I'm not entirely sure that I'm happy with this as a diptych.  

landscapes of the imagination series 4

Landscapes of the imagination series 3

Landscapes of the imagination series. 2

Landscapes of the imagination series. 1

So finally I have printed some work that I'm basically happy with.  I changed the colour combinations, and the way that I inked and wiped the plates, and all in all the results are far better . 

Registration problems.

This is a real 'how not to...'
having the attention span of a gnat I have returned to play with the plates I used  a while ago. They were a first etch- just to see what happened, and while I should print them first in black ( I guess) often they get  printed in what ever is already out- hence the fact that I started off using them with coloured ink.

I made 4 plates of the same size. I had planned to layer them up with coloured inks until I achieved something beautiful and which captured the feel of the image in my head, but it didn't work like that.

For anybody who doesn't print- you need to understand that 'registration' is what it's called when one plate is placed ( seamlessly) on top of another so that the composite parts form a single image. The 'seamlessly ' but is the difficult bit.
There are lots of different ways that this can be achieved

Firstly I tried the method of catching part of the paper under the roller ( so it couldn't move) while I changed the plate on the template ont eh bed. This is  generally pretty foolproof as you're only moving one element rather than 2. 
But that clearly didn't work for me today.
   .

And then I decided I'd revert back to my usual method where  both the plate and the print are moved and placed back in exactly (!!!!) the same positions. 
The result of this is below.

As you can see the plate registration is basically OK at the bottom, but look what has happened at the top. I thought the plates are the same size, but they're not- so I can't use one of these plates i this way. need to check the other 2 for congruence. 

I'm not even going to comment  on the colour combination here- they are colours that work together well- on some plates- but these aren't plates where they do.

The other thing I'm pretty sure of is that I need to re etch all of these plates, they are a bit weedy ( no pun intended!) 

Beyond the plate

I tried something different with this one, letting the lines escape the plate,  but unfortunately because they are beyond the plate boundaries the pressure isn't as great, so they didn't print as well as they might have done.  Not sure  why I didn't think about this before I rolled it through the press, as it's obviously really.  

Lay lines 3

Lay lines 2

 I think this one is  a bit boring. 

Lay lines 1

New colour combinations 3

New colour combinations 2

New colour combinations

Moving into some new colour combinations. I’ve also used this plate the opposite way up ( not simply loaded the image upside down) . It was always my intention that these plates would be sufficiently abstract that I could do this and they would still look basically like landscapes. 

Blue and green

Different plate, similar problem. I quite like the colours I’ve mixed here (using Indian yellow and Prussian blue for the green) but I need more practice in how I apply it to the plate, it’s been a while since I’ve sued colours as bright as these. 

Having another go

So I’ve re-polished this plate, and it feels smooth to my hand, but I’m still getting a bit of inexplicable sticking with the Prussian blue. Not quite sure how to rectify this, but I’ll carry on, can’t imagine not using this, I think it’s probably my favourite colour. 

More problems with Prussian blue.

Unfortunately I had already inked this plate up before I discovered I had an issue. Clearly the ink if it's this plate too. 

Problems with Prussian blue.

Well, lets ignore the issues that I have with this plate over its composition. It is a fact that sometimes a plate which looks rubbish in one colour looks significantly better in others. So I tried colours based on prussian blue  which is the colour paint and ink I'm most attracted to- a 'go to' solution as it were, the colour I can most easily make work.
I was printing this in Uni, a new tube of blue ink. But it stuck!
Now I know that it's not the plate, as if the plate was the problem the one I posted yesterday would have stuck too.  Don't understand why, printing is like this- sometimes things just happen. 

Sometimes it's just wrong!

I have vowed that I will post stuff that doesn't work as I think it's important that people realise that for every finished piece there are a lot of things that really don't work. This print is a case in point. What was I thinking?

Re polishing

Same plate as yesterday, happened to be using a different colour ink, but since I made the initial print I have re-polished the surface so it cleans up better. The ,marks therefore are more distinct ( or would be if I had used a darker ink) 

Not all steel is created equal

I have been experimenting with deeply etched steel. But  one important thing I have learned is that not all steel is created equal.

This scrap of steel was put in the same etching bath as the deeply etched pieces, on the same day at the same time ( ie MOST of the variables were the same- apart from the steel)  I posted a few days ago, it was left for a slightly shorter time, but the etch is totally different. The steel has cracked and crazed. It has produced some interesting textures- but it has proved quite unpredictable. 

A lesson to learn from this. 

Layers of colour 2

Well the colour is better, but something weird happened. If you look closely it has a mottled effect. Now if I'm honest I quite like this, but the thing is I don't know how I made it. My only thought is that it happened because I mixed up etching ink with relief printing ink. It was an accident- , the tubes look much the same. So the white kink has driers in it, and it might be this that caused the specking. 

This is only a single plate, where I have applied the ink into the plate, and then rolled colour over he top. It has however been etched twice, as it was rather boring when I first took it out of the acid.  Again the pressure of the press is a bit much, so next time I print this I'll take one of the blankets off the top as I've been printing on a press where the pressure can't be varied any other way. 

Layers of colour 1

One of my aims in the next few weeks is to play more with colour in my etching. At the same time as I  made the last 4 plates I also made some simple etched plates which I intend to use as multi plate prints as this is something I haven't dome for a while. 
Once again this post is about what went wrong rather than what went right. I had problems with so many things in this print. For a start, while the plates appear to be the same size,  clearly there is a slight difference ( cut by hand not purchased at a specific size). Secondly there  was too much pressure from the press which you can tell if you look closely at the edges of the plate as the paper has sort of cracked. And then there's the whole issue of the colour- which is muddier than I intended. I wanted bright shades. 
To be honest when Iook at this I relaise that I'm not at all happy with the 'back' plate. I'll probably re etch that to give more lines.
More work needed.    

Number 4

Printing this plate on cartidge paper showed up some problems. the white marks on the dark wide lines are places where the damp paper stuck. I've tried to rectify this problem by re polishing with carborundum paper before I print it again. 

Plate number 3

I quite like this plate. The lines flow better than the second plate, but it's harder perhaps to see the original etched lines.  I can already see ways that I might print this. 

The second plate

This is the second of the four. All the same things apply in its making. I think it's the least sucessful of the 4 plates in aesthetic terms, and it will be a far bigger challenge to  make something  from this which I like the look of.  

The first of 4

This is a print from a series of  4 plates I made recently. To be honest it wasn't meant to look like this, but as this IS what I've made I'm learning to love some of its qualities and see what I can do with what I have. 

I started off making a simple etching , which was too simple, so added some shading with a sugar lift. When I printed that plate, it was a bit bland. So I decided that I'd play and see what happened if I made some really deeply etched marks. I've been experimenting with how to achieve a wide but fluid line which is deeply etched, and have been experimenting with some quite strange materials in doing this. It seems that the big challenge is to protect the plate surface while it sits in thw acid bath for any thing over a couple of hours.   Here I used stop out, but when I applied the stop out it felt a bit odd and grainy, and the marks which are visible are the brush strokes where part of its protection broke down. Had I known it would do this, I would have thought more about how I was applying the stop out, but  as we all know, hindsight is a wonderful thing. 

I do however think that it's quite an interesting print.  

Adding colour 2

Another try with the same plate, and a first attempt at applying colour 'a la poupee' . Again, something I really need to spend time and effort working at before I make a print using this method.