Final Screen Prints - 2 Colour + Spot Varnish
As with the other secret 7' submission I wanted to push the brief further and experiment some more in the print room. This was mainly because I would like to keep pushing my printing skills and improve my practice whilst I have access to all the equipment at Uni. I found this print was much easier to register than the 'Get it on' album cover as there was only 2 colour layers involved with this design. The print came out much smoother in this run and there was only a few prints with streaks on the black layer. Ideally it could of done with a bit more ink in the mixture or possible doing a 2 pulls on the black layer.
I decided to use the Snowden paper to print my designs on as the stock was a decent thickness and took the ink very well. I was considering using the Somerset paper however that would of taken on far too much ink and allot of the vibrancy would have been lost. I am happy with the registration on the majority of these prints and am also pleased with the spot varnish. I definitely think that this print run went allot more smoothly than the T-Rex designs. Overall I am happy with the outcome of my prints, I think I will now try and digitally print both album covers out and create some real album sleeves.
Lino Prints - 2 Colour
As an extra task I decided to experiment with lino printing, after seeing other students in the print room creating lino designs I was intrigued to give it ago my self. I noticed that the inks they were using were oil based and created a much more rich shiny image that gave off a really vibrant finish. With this in mind I went and booked myself a lazer slot, and tool my file down to the workshop. I loaded my document onto the computer and then rasterized the image to burn the negative space on each layer. Originally I was going to cut right through the design and try experimenting with the different pieces however the technician thought that it would be too fiddly so I stuck to 2 separate layers.
Unfortunatley I spotted a problem after I had watched it on the lazer cutter for over an hour,... I had forgotten to reverse the image so that it was back to front. This meant that the type on the TV would be back wards and so would the symbols. I decided that instead I would just cut the screen out of the TV and just leave a blank space as the message was still clear with the imagery, and the symbols didnt matter too much as they were still recognizable when back to front. This made the image abit more obstract but still has the desired effect. One other error that came about was that the negative space had not burnt down far enough so inky marks kept being transferred onto the parts of the lino that were not supposed to be printed. However I really like the effect this has given, it has essentially given the image a more 3D quality highlighting the edges of the flames and also accidentally creating a white noise like pattern on the TV screen which works equally as well as the type.
Printing has a massive learning curve, the more you do the more you understand, you will always make mistakes, but once you have made them once they are hard to forget. Its not as simple as just pressing the delete button like on the Mac, printing is all about the preparation. It is important to make sure everything is ready to go, the inks need to be at the right consistency, the stock needs to be evenly cut and the process needs to be smooth and even in order to get the desired effect. I had loads of fun doing this lino print, and I am really happy with the finished product, the oil based inks make the image pop off the page allot more than the water based inks.
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