{"id":1605,"date":"2016-12-19T19:05:41","date_gmt":"2016-12-20T03:05:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/?p=1605"},"modified":"2016-12-19T19:05:41","modified_gmt":"2016-12-20T03:05:41","slug":"yachats-trees-block-print","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/yachats-trees-block-print\/","title":{"rendered":"Yachats Trees Block Print"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Color<\/a>

Yachts Trees Final Print<\/p><\/div>\n

This is a seven color hand-pulled print 6×6 inches (15.2×15.2 cm). There are\u00a010 prints in this edition.<\/p>\n

Some projects take a long time to complete. I worked on the first six colors over the course of several weeks last Spring. Then the project sat on the shelf\u00a0for six\u00a0months until I figured out how I was going to print the final black layer.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In my previous printing project (Sun Over Mountain<\/a>) I figured out how to print by hand\u00a0a six color print using inexpensive materials. My goal this time was to do a seven color print with texture and detail. Also, I wanted to try using stencils as well as foam plates.<\/p>\n

I looked through my personal photo archive and decided to use a photo I took 15 years ago on the coast near Yachats, Oregon as my reference.<\/p>\n

\"Yachats<\/a>

Yachats Trees Photo<\/p><\/div>\n

I cropped it to a square to fit a 6×6 inch plate. My first plate was made of Peel and Stick foam stuck to foam core and sealed with Minwax Polycrylic. Here is a photo of my setup.<\/p>\n

\"Light<\/a>

Light Blue Plate<\/p><\/div>\n

Notice I’m using the same jig I made for my last project with homemade registration pins at the top. I hand printed 10 prints with this first color of light blue using Golden Open acrylic paint. I used a one inch flat brush to apply the paint to the foam, placed the paper face down over the plate, and rubbed with a spoon and my hand to transfer the paint to the paper.<\/p>\n

I used another foam plate to do the second color, blue gray.<\/p>\n

\"Blue<\/a>

Blue Gray Plate<\/p><\/div>\n

The next color, yellow, had just a few simple shapes. I decided to use a stencil cut from overhead transparency material. I aligned the transparency stencil over the face of each print using the registration pins, and applied the paint with a sponge dabber.<\/p>\n

\"Yellow<\/a>

Yellow Stencil<\/p><\/div>\n

Green was my next color. I used another foam plate.<\/p>\n

\"Green<\/a>

Green Plate<\/p><\/div>\n

I used another stencil to add brown.<\/p>\n

\"Brown<\/a>

Brown Stencil<\/p><\/div>\n

Gray was my last color before printing black. This time I used a thin styrofoam plate.<\/p>\n

This slideshow requires JavaScript.<\/p>

<\/div>\n

At this point I stopped to think about how best to do the final black layer. I wanted it to have a fair amount of detail which would be difficult if not impossible to do using either a foam plate or a stencil. Then I got involved in other projects and put this one on hold. Six months later I bought a new Epson WF-7610 wide format printer\/scanner. I wondered if I could use it to print the final black layer. I ran some tests and figured out the registration problem and decided it was worth a try. I scanned an ink drawing and placed the image file on an OpenOffice text document sized to 9×12 inches (the size of the existing prints). That way I could measure the distance from the left and top edges and place the image precisely on the page. It worked. I didn’t know until I printed one how the Epson ink would look over the existing acrylic paint. I lucked out. The ink is somewhat transparent. So, there is a nice unanticipated variation in the value depending on whether the ink is printed over the white of the paper or a color. Also, I was worried that the ink might not stick to the acrylic paint, but again I lucked out. It did. You have to be willing to try things.<\/p>\n

Here’s an animated GIF showing the step-by-step process.<\/p>\n

\"Yachats<\/a>

Yachats Trees GIF<\/p><\/div>\n

And here is a shot of the edition of ten completed prints. Each one is printed on a 9×12 inch sheet of Scratch Art SUBI Block Printing Paper. As with any hand printed project, each print has some slight variation.<\/p>\n

\"Seven<\/a>

Seven Color Edition<\/p><\/div>\n

For the artist, process is more important than the product, but in the end, the image is what counts. I rather like this one. It has a strong graphic appeal and yet is representational.<\/p>\n

Jim<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is a seven color hand-pulled print 6×6 inches (15.2×15.2 cm). There are\u00a010 prints in this edition. Some projects take a long time to complete. I worked on the first six colors over the course of several weeks last Spring. Then the project sat on the shelf\u00a0for six\u00a0months until I figured out how I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,36],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1605","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"hentry","6":"category-art","7":"category-printmaking","9":"no-featured-image"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3xTIN-pT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1605"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1605\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1637,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1605\/revisions\/1637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jimblodget.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}