First the tip before I forget.
You know those fake credit cards you get in the mail with an application for
credit? They are credit card sized and a bit thinner than your real credit
cards, made of handy dandy plastic which will not go into the shredder and
read "your name here". Okay, yeah, those!
Well, there are several uses for them around the studio, maybe someone else
can contribute with more:
-ink spreader for those quick proofing bouts
-cut in half and use to scoop out small amounts of additives such as miracle
gel or transparent base
-ruler guide for cutting smallish straight lines on your blocks
-kento guides for drawing your kento on the block, paste or tape it down and
you can use as cutting guide for kentos
-clean out inside of ink can by using as a spatula/scraper of sorts
-use (my favorite use) as a brace to protect your block from the shaft of
your burins or other engraving tools when engraving lines
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And now...the baren report. I just got back from a festival to find an order
for a largish print of mine, this one:
http://1000woodcuts.com/fullsize/uprooted.html
Great! I exclaim in glee as I peruse my flat files for the woodcut in
question...NOT GREAT! I curse as I find I am "out of stock" of the monster.
Drat, just what I wanted to do on the day after a back-breaking festival.
But business is business so I set out to print the print. This particular
woodblock (24" x 36"), incidentally, will not fit on my press bed, so the
barens and the muscle have to come out of hiding.
Anyhow, long story short, I have several barens and like to save my knuckles
and other body parts by switching off. This time, though, I paid attention
to how well each baren was performing. So here is the report, on a plywood
birch block with gooey oily Handschy umber ink pretty much straight out of
the can, no additives needed.
Ball bearing baren (from Baren Mall, the rough one) seems to give the most
"bang for the buck" in terms of easy printing of large flat areas. This
block, though, had low "stripes" running vertically due to the quality of
the birch, I guess along the glue lines from ply to ply. So the low areas of
the block did not print well with the ball-bearing baren because it is very
stiff, as in inflexible, as in steel disk.
Murasaki baren (medium coil also from Baren Mall) is a dream to print with
except my knuckles hurt the most using this baren. I'm not the delicate
type, by the way, so I put quite a bit of weight and muscle onto my printing
and tend to use my whole upper back, shoulder and arm. This powerful little
gem gave me the best prints and is flexible enough to "feel" and print the
low areas. Printing is a bit slower than with the ball-bearing baren, but
coverage and overall print quality are better. I even recovered it all by
myself after the third print as it developed a crack in the cover.
My own patented (not) wood mushroom baren(s) gave excellent coverage but
without the "feel" of the Murasaki baren. Pictured here:
http://1000woodcuts.com/Studionotes/Woodcut/shroombarens.html
These are easy to make in a jiffy and give excellent quality prints. Two
disadvantages against the Murasaki baren are: 1)no "feel" of the block since
the buttons and the block are both wood; 2)a bit rough on paper, again,
since the mushroom barens are hardwood they have been known to tear paper
when imperfections get in the way. Also, the wooden barens tend to really
flatten (and emboss) the paper, especially if damp, so I would not use them
when printing additional colors.
And that's the baren report! I printed 12 of the prints, each taking about
20 minutes from inking to hanging, and yes, I am sore today.
Maria
Maria Arango
www.1000woodcuts.com