Baren Digest Thursday, 6 November 2003 Volume 25 : Number 2432 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Sharri LaPierre Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 09:40:08 -0800 Subject: [Baren 23301] Re: Baren Digest V25 #2431 Bette, Take a break from flogging yourself - I was taught (years ago) to set my brush on its little bristles to dry! Now I'm told, DON'T DO THAT. No wonder I need therapy. Anyway, I think the wood just splits in some and not others. There are elves, spirits, gods and goddesses that inhabit all studios, and they are very unstable creatures. What is perfectly acceptable one day will be cause for havoc the next. A little wire, a little twine, a little varnish and you're back in business. And, now I have to insert little eyes in my brushes so I can hang them to dry. Yeegads. Cheers, Sharri ------------------------------ From: David Bull Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2003 08:39:01 +0900 Subject: [Baren 23302] Announcement page ... A small update to the [Baren] website today, one that might make your 'access to information' a little bit easier ... _if_ we can 'train' [Baren] members how to use it! :-) Notice the Subject line of this message? It begins with the tag [ANN] - signifying that this is an 'announcment'. This does two things: - - it lets readers know that something is being announced ... (duh!) - - it signifies that the content of this message will automatically be added to a page on the website where all announcements are stored: http://barenforum.org/announcement So if members start to use this [ANN] tag on messages with 'announcement' type content: exhibitions, call-for-entries, exchange sign-up starts, etc. etc., then we should be able to get into the habit of just checking that web page when we need that kind of information. (The Announcement Page is of course linked-in clearly from the front page of the website, so you can always find it easily ...) This all happens automatically - _any_ post with the [ANN] tag at the beginning of the Subject line, will be added to the Announcements Page within seconds of being posted ... So no big deal, but perhaps another way to help us keep track of things; we'll see if it turns out to be useful or not ... Dave ------------------------------ From: David Bull Date: Thu, 6 Nov 2003 08:42:25 +0900 Subject: [Baren 23303] Re: Announcement page ... Notice the Subject line of this message? It begins with the tag [ANN] - signifying that this is an 'announcment'. Oops! It seems that the Majordomo server has other ideas about allowing this! (red face ...) Get back to you later on this one! :-) Dave ------------------------------ From: Bette Wappner Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 18:48:06 -0500 Subject: [Baren 23304] Re: Baren Digest V25 #2431 >Bette, > >Take a break from flogging yourself - I was taught (years ago) to set >my brush on its little bristles to dry! Now I'm told, DON'T DO THAT. >No wonder I need therapy. Anyway, I think the wood just splits in some >and not others. There are elves, spirits, gods and goddesses that >inhabit all studios, and they are very unstable creatures. What is >perfectly acceptable one day will be cause for havoc the next. A >little wire, a little twine, a little varnish and you're back in >business. And, now I have to insert little eyes in my brushes so I can >hang them to dry. Yeegads. > >Cheers, >Sharri sharri....i luv ya girl! we can go to brush-therapy together! you and barbara have convinced me that wood is wood and will split, but i guess i'll try that 'sitting sideways' factor as well. anyway.....thank you for reminding me of the little nature spirits that have their way with our creations. a way of humbleizing us...reminding us that we are not in control! good luck with the little elf eyes. thank you! bette :) ------------------------------ From: "Chris Bailey" Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 20:37:42 -0700 Subject: [Baren 23305] my new press Greetings everyone, For those who are interested, following the instructions posted here a few weeks ago, I have built a book press. I modified a few details to make the press more suitable for woodcut printing instead of book binding. Pictures of the new press are here: http://www.supportlocalart.com/Calgary/Chris_Bailey/press.htm Changes that I made are 6" pipes instead of 12", this allows the press to come fully down instead of stopping a few inches above the bottom. I also added a removable tray to allow the wood to be inked and paper positioned without having to fiddle in the space between the base & platform. In order to be able to register colour prints, I decided to add a couple of small dowels in the middle of the tray. They only stick up about 1/4", so before printing I will drill two holes in the back of my carved wood blocks. This allows me to remove and replace woodblocks into the exact same place each time. Of course, for colour & reduction prints this wouldn't be very useful without being able to re-position the paper too. For this I added 2 longer dowels outside of the 'pressing' area. I positioned these on top of a 1/2" piece of maple, so that the paper will be held at the same height as the top of the woodblock. The size and position of the longer dowels matches a standard hole punch, so I can either punch the paper before printing, or attached a punched sheet (possibly mylar) to the printing paper. I haven't tried this yet, but I think it should work ( I least I hope it's going to work :-) Surprisingly, the most difficult part of the whole project was the getting the 1-1/8" inch hole drilled through 2" of maple for the center press screw. I ended up having to buy a $18 boring bit and getting the store to drill the hole on a professional drill press. Luckily, I needed a 1-1/8" drill bit for my MAME arcade machine project... but that's another story.... ___________________ When printing I used a couple thin pieces of craft felt above the paper, and the prints turned out pretty well. It was definitely much easier than the ol' wooden spoon. I'm new to this type of printing, so I don't know if felt is a good thing to use, or how much to use ..... any suggestions? :-) Thanks everyone, Chris ------------------------------ From: "Robert Canaga" Date: Wed, 5 Nov 2003 20:23:10 -0800 Subject: [Baren 23306] Re: my new press What a great project! How much do you charge:) Do you have a felt on the underside of the "down"? The on I used at school had one and it helped stabilize the face on the block. RC ------------------------------ From: Charles Morgan Date: Wed, 05 Nov 2003 21:45:08 -0800 Subject: [Baren 23307] Re: my new press Congratulations Chris. Looks like a nice project, well executed. Keep us posted on your experiences with it. Cheers ...... Charles ------------------------------ End of Baren Digest V25 #2432 *****************************