BOOK COVER

Click on photos to supersize

Back at Uni now, first week back me and and another student did an exhibition for The Early Years programme, children were basically given paint, tools and a huge canvas and let loose with no interference from adults, we did the photography, invites and display boards and I did a book showing the process and theories. What a good excuse to use some wooden letters and have a play myself, used rubber based ink on grey board, can't show you the rest of the book because it contains pictures of the children - who looked just as messy as my print!

LETTERPRESS INK & WASH

I came across these Printmaking Suppliers who make their own ink, HAWTHORN'S, who have an online shop. Their inks are very strong and transparent so you may need to add transparent or opaque white to get the desired colour, they recommend the STAY OPEN INKS for letterpress which come in a mass array of colours including process CYMK and gold, silver and FLUORESCENT! They also offer a NON SKIN LINSEED INK which is the vegetable based alternative to the Stay Open Inks which also available in a multitude of colours plus process CYMK, both are cleanable with soap and water, white spirit or the washes below. It's also worth noting that a drop of cobalt driers may be needed to speed up the drying time if overlapping colours.

What I also really like is that they sell CITRI-WASH a citrus based cleaner for all oil based ink and safe to use in kitchens and also LINCOLN WASH which is just as easy to use as white spirit but much safer and according to the guy I spoke to doesn't smell and highly recommended for cleaning your rollers. If I hadn't already got my inks I would have liked to have tried these and if you have any questions they are very helpful, going to try the Lincoln wash then I won't keep stinking the house out with white spirit!
UPDATE
The Citri Wash didn't work on my Van Son Rubber based ink so that was a no go though did smell lovely! I'm not happy using Lincoln Wash on my wood type because you have to mix it with 50/50 water so I tend to stick with a low odour white spirit for both my rollers and wood type.
I clean most of my ink off using recycled paper/newsprint first so minimum solvents are required for cleaning up. I run the rollers over the inking plate with a pieces of recycled paper in-between to get rid of most of the ink first. Using this method I find I don't need to use much solvent.
Depending on the ink your using I recommend giving the Hawthorn washes a try, perfectly fine for your rollers!

INK SUPPLIES IN THE UK

Just added another supplier of letterpress ink in the UK to my Suppliers List (on the right hand side) http://www.greatart.co.uk/ who stock a German range of letterpress inks called GERSTAECKER which is a traditional oil based relief ink. Good range of colours in tins or tubes, they don't do the basic CYMK but if you got the COOL YELLOW, MAGENTA, COBALT BLUE, COOL BLACK, OPAQUE WHITE & TRANSPARENT EXTENDER that would be a good starting point for mixing colours. Developed for all types of relief printing it also suitable for Letterpress and polymer plates!

They also sell some water based lino printing inks that are interesting, one is a pearlescent and the other a transparent gloss, add a bit of sparkle to your Christmas cards or some SPOT UV to your artwork! I would imagine these would dry very fast so maybe hand inking your forme would be better.

ADANA QFB - Quarto Flat Bed

I spotted this on eBay and just couldn't resist even though it's not a looker! It's an earlier model of the Adana QH. You can see more pics here on my flickr

After reading through John Ryder's Printing for Pleasure in which he talks about this machine I really fancied one, never thought I'd find one!! I should be able to print up to A4 size now with my wood letters and hopefully some lino cuts (when I get the time).

I have a mentor John who's a retired compositor who's helping me with my presses so I took my Kelsey and the Adana over for him to take a look at, the Kelsey's working like a dream and I was doing everything right but it took us a while to get a good impression on the Adana. We tried all the packing techniques it said in the manual, make ready, everything but just got inconsistent results until John came up with the idea of using some spongy old litho blanket and then an off cut of some vinyl cushion flooring (with the spongy side facing the type) which worked even better!

I printed this card for my friend (who by the way looks fabulous and not a day over 30) and I did a few extra to try in my shop when I finally decide on my name!

The manual for this press is available on Briar Press

Juicy colours from Khadi Paper

I have working on a placement in Warrington for the Last 3 weeks and my computer has needed to go to the hospital and I've lots to blog about, so while I get organised and take photos here's some hot colours available from KHADI PAPERS in India. 100% cotton rag available in large sheets, A3, A4, A5 and A6 plus matching envelopes, lots of other tempting paper too. You can order online and postage to the UK is a flat £6.00 no matter how large your order!