Baren Digest             Wednesday, 2 October 2002     Volume 21 : Number 1979


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From: Mike Lyon <mikelyon#mlyon.com>
Date: Wed, 02 Oct 2002 07:04:27 -0500
Subject: [Baren 19386] Re: Baren Digest V21 #1978 

Hi, Linda -- finally saw your post when the digest arrived just now...  At 
the risk of repeating what Julio said earlier, those little thin lines you 
are talking about are much easier to _print_ than to carve (which takes 
some care and patience and maybe a little skill), but inking and printing 
them is pretty much the same as for solids -- the cool thing about Japanese 
technique is that you brush the pigment all over the printing area -- not 
just rolling up the surface -- so that's no big thing -- when using the 
baren, you generally want to use more pressure when printing large flat 
areas and less pressure as the amount of printing surface 
decreases...  down to feather weight pressure if there is only a fine line 
under the baren with a lot of cleared area around it -- think in terms of 
more or less equalizing pounds per square inch of pressure on the printing 
area under the baren...

For analytical types: If you push down with 20 pounds of pressure on the 
baren and all 10 square inches of block under the baren (assuming the baren 
is about 10 square inches in area) is supposed to print, then you are 
pressing the paper into the wood with about two pounds per square inch of 
pressure -- But if you push down with the same 20 pounds of pressure on the 
baren and there's a lot of wood cleared away under the baren so that 
there's only 1/2 of a square inch of block surface intended to print, then 
then you will be pressing the paper into the wood with 40 pounds per square 
inch of pressure (20 times more pressure!) and the ink will go into the 
paper 'differently'...

But you don't really 'think' about it after a while -- you just adjust your 
touch unconsciously...

Mike

  At 08:48 PM 10/2/2002 +0900, you wrote:

> From the video Mike Lyon sent me, it looks like large areas aren't too much
>of problem.  Large empty areas are a bit tricky because you have to leave
>support for the paper but this can't be inked.  But what about thin little
>lines?  When I think of hanga, I think of the Japanese prints with their
>colored areas neatly seperated with thin black lines.  Are they hard to
>print nicely?  Where the heck do you put the pigment and paste on them?
>
>Linda


Mike Lyon
mailto:mikelyon#mlyon.com
http://www.mlyon.com 

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End of Baren Digest V21 #1979
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