The proofing got underway at Tetsui-san's place yesterday, Sato-san bringing the 'finished' block set with him. As I wrote the other day, I held back a bit, showing up in time for lunch. They certainly weren't finished when I got there - there are just too many colours and combinations in this print to wrap it all up in a couple of hours - but they had made a good start to the job, and we took the sheets with us to a nearby restaurant to chat about the morning's work while we ate.
Things had apparently proceeded without incident, and our designer Seki-san, and carver Sato-san had pretty much simply followed along with what Tetsui-san was doing - priming each block to take some trial impressions, getting a set of colours mixed that seemed like a reasonable palette, and generally getting the process under way.
We had a good lunch, and then headed back to work; Sato-san and I mostly just kept out of the way while our designer and printer sat side by side and worked through the block set, getting some complete samples done. (images clickable)
It was interesting to watch the interaction between the two of them. Because neither has much experience at this, and because they are both easy-going and polite, it was sometimes a bit difficult for them to 'decide' something - they were both too willing to defer to the other!
It took a couple more hours, but we ended up with our first few proof copies. You may be a tad disappointed in this, but I would like to hold back from showing it to you just yet. This is not because I want to promote 'secrecy', but out of respect for our work crew. The print is not 'ready'. The colour balances are still a bit clumsy, and the printing impressions are rather 'poor' - this is unavoidable in many proofs, because one can't take the time normally required for each impression to properly absorb into the paper and stabilize before putting the next one on top of it. Tetsui-san doesn't feel that it looks very good, and out of respect for that, we'll hold off showing this until we have something better for you.
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