Today's postings

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Postings made on [Baren] members' blogs
over the past 24 hours ...

Subject: Size matters - go with this, or ... ?
Posted by: Dave Bull

After the non-committal results from yesterday's 'strip' test, I tried something a bit different today. After the half-dozen sheets from the sizing run were dried, I cut some pieces from each one and headed down to the workshop to make a real test - using some of my blocks to make actual prints, not simply test strips.

This was much more enlightening. We can dispense right away with the kind of comment I heard yesterday - about how good I am at this. This is very poorly sized paper!

It was apparent right away, as I started moistening the blank pieces before printing. Parts of each sheet took up the moisture far too rapidly, while others areas were more like what I am used to. Even after letting them sit under cover for a couple of hours to even out, they refused to do so. It seems as though there are areas that are almost 'unsized', and those places just suck up the water far too much.

I waited until it seemed to have reached a basic stability, then made a run of half-dozen copies of one of the little Gift Prints I have:

And here we have another surprise ... Even though the paper was clearly not 'good', the resulting prints came out just fine. And after they were dry it was impossible to find the areas that had been causing problems with moisture absorption.

So ... I guess I can see where this is going. . . .
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This item is taken from the blog Woodblock RoundTable.
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Subject: Stains and colors
Posted by: Andrew Stone



I printed some sample proofs from my fresh keyblock.
The original idea was a simple black and white line drawing with the red blood stain on the white shirt. (I thought of carving different color stains --coffee, blood, etc but that seemed pushing it a bit too far).
But with some proofs on hand I decided to color some in with watercolor.
The one on the bottom R is my favorite;it would be sort of a halftone, bluegray--all the colors would be shades of grey except for the stain; the others are as can be seen above--I like the yellow tie more than the blue one.
The risk is that the subject--the blood spot--might be lost if too much energy and interest is directed at the necktie and colors.

The red stain will be cut off the key block and recarved so it will be much more noticeable. I'm also planning on adding a bit of alcohol to the color to make it seep a bit.

Any favorites/comments before I carve the next block?

This item is taken from the blog Lacrime di Rospo.
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