Category: learning

Figuring It Out

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Getting a clean print from my Golding Pearl #1 can be challenging. I thought I’d learned her secrets.

But, oh no. Yesterday and today made me scratch my head, take a break, and rethink the problem.

You can see the image on the right is blotchy. I assumed a packing problem, so I spent time changing thin to thick paper under the Tympan, even trying a piece of printer’s blanket I’ve ended up with. Some improvement, but not good enough.

Next, I tried more ink on the disk. Logical, right? Nope, I still couldn’t get a good print. After playing around for several hours, I decided to head home and try again this morning.

The first thing I did was to take the chase out of the press and try inking it by hand on the proof press. Bingo. That told me I wasn’t getting enough ink from the rollers to the type. I’ve had to remove and add tape to the rails many times, but this time I took it down to nearly nothing and printed. With the rollers getting closer to the type, it worked!

Why my other  metal type didn’t need so much tape removed is a mystery, unless– this type is fat, and the wide letters don’t print as well on my press? I’ve been using much thinner, lighter type recently, and I think that’s the difference.

The print still isn’t as clean as I’d like. My sweet little press isn’t great for getting solid prints from wood cuts, either, though. To get this ornament to print, I had to put the chase back in the proof press and print it separately. Plus the uneven texture of the print indicates my platen may need adjusting again. I haven’t had to do that for over a year, but I’ll consider that soon.

When I first brought her home, I struggled to get any good prints. A friend then told me to relax, that it would take a year at least for me to get to know her. Ha, he was right! I do love the problem-solving. And I’m also ready for a bigger press. I guess I’d better get ready for more of that :)

And people wonder why I only print a handful at a time…

A Swap….

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Hello people interested in letterpress printing,

I’m recovering from a bout of vertigo– not fun when you want to stand at the press all day.

I am participating in Ladies of Letterpress swap, which means I am creating 100 5×7 posters on my little press. Not only that, I’ve decided to do two colors. This means three passes for each poster- one for the tree, one for the leaves, and one for the poem. Oh, and probably a fourth since I want to put a colophon on the bottom. Seven gazillion hours later, and I’ll have 100 prints to share!

Like my drying rack?

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A Month

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FullSizeRender (24)The past month was difficult, but it’s over. I spent yesterday working in the shop, and I think I’m finally getting the hang of this. Each new print job meant more packing, less packing, more tape, less tape– because each form is different, depending upon whether I am using metal type, wood type, or polymer. I managed to get out a few holiday cards and a few quote cards. Yay me.

In two weeks I get to visit Jen at Starshaped Press in Chicago. I’m looking forward to learning from her. Nothing like being around a master! And so what if I’m still working on it at 63. I need to realize that’s pretty cool in itself.

Bliss

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I first heard of Joseph Campbell in college, which was more than half a lifetime ago. His words resonated so deeply. But I’m not sure I understood them fully until recently. Bliss. To me, bliss is more like “flow,” as in Csikszentmihalyi’s research.

“The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times… The best moments usually occur if a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.” ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

It’s what happens to me when I am working on the press. Last week a friend brought by some ink he didn’t need any longer. Not standard letterpress ink, but what the heck. I’ve heard of using other types of ink so I wanted to give it a try.

The first few attempts were bad. I ran down my list of possible problems: not locking up the type correctly, not enough or too much packing, too much ink. Nothing corrected the bleeding I was seeing. I assumed the ink wasn’t going to work. And then I had a flash- what if the brayer isn’t getting the ink on the type well enough? I was using my proof press not my platen press to test this. Bingo! After I cleaned up the press and tried a different brayer, the sample print was much better. I fooled around a little more with paper thickness, and then called it a day. Hours of trying this and that had flown by. And in the end, I felt as satisfied and full as I have after a delicious meal and wine.

Pure bliss.

 

Pushing On

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I always did something I was a little not ready to do. I think that’s how you grow. When there’s that moment of ‘Wow, I’m not really sure I can do this,’ and you push through those moments, that’s when you have a breakthrough.

Marissa Mayer

I am not sure I always did this. But at some point in my life, I wanted to figure things out. Printer broken? Take it apart. Need a room networked? Run the cables.
So I am trying to do this with my printing as well. But, wow, does it take time. There are so many variables that can go wrong- ink, lock up, type, pressure, humidity in the air. Each time I get ready to print, I check the packing, the placement of the base or the type, and even the different paper styles I use.

People wonder why I even bother to do this. “You can print whatever you want digitally now,” they say. “This looks like too much work.”

Yes, but it’s fun work. It’s the figuring it out that I love. And when I get a print that is nearly perfect (because nothing in letterpress is perfect), I smile with satisfaction.