#projectsnail

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So, my first foray into home printing!

Slowly over the week different packages have been arriving, and poor Dave has seen the back room turn from a cosy place to sit to more and more like my little hobbit hole, full of more art things. I may need to purchase another storage box!

I started #projectsnail on Thursday, copying one of my #inktober designs onto my newly purchased and very new smelling vinyl.... I chose the green side again to work on.... Japanese vinyl is two sided, green one side, blue on the other, and was recommended by Jacqui and Christine as a good surface for beginners, so I have stuck to it, although I will have to try 'proper' lino at some point. However, I digress..... #projectsnail also halted here as I had made a mistake ordering the wrong cutter..... so the snail sat until Saturday.....

Dad has also made me some superb cutting boards to fit onto the dining table I am using, and I have a bit of non-slip matting too for under my vinyl and under the cutting board. (A very handy hint picked up from LinoCutBoy's website. (Hopefully my link should work to take you to his page - very impressive stuff and lots of handy hints!)

The cutting started in earnest, well.... once I had returned from a lovely shopping trip in the morning and then spent a lovely afternoon with some friends. Amongst this the correct Speedball cutter had arrived (hooray!).... so once Dave had gone to work, thoughts turned to lino...... This time cutting was done in shorter parts - the stages were punctuated with a long telephone call and some other bits and bobs, and this made it easier on my hands (I think I am still too tense and need to relax a bit more - this improved over the course of the cutting though). My soundtrack for cutting on the Saturday evening was 'I'm sorry I haven't a clue: Humph in Wonderland' a present from a dear friend :-) Concentrating on listening and cutting on an evening was hard work, but the perfect thing to listen to :-)and then the cutting was finally finished today.

I have only bought black ink as a starter, choosing to use the same product - Daler- Rowney Block printing ink - as we used on the course as I wanted something quick drying and easy to clean up to start with as we are still working out spaces for me to work in, although I seem to have taken over the back room! Ink is *another* area I need to venture into.... little steps though and all that ;-) so this was only going to be a mono-print.

Armed with my trusty spoon and cheap roller/brayer to help print (I watched the lino cutting man very closely on Landscape Artist of the year on Tuesday), and a slightly more expensive roller all inked up I was ready....

The first print wasn't right, not enough pressure and I probably needed more ink.... through trials I found the spoon did create a better print than the brayer/roller, and as the paper I was using was just some sketchbook paper it was not too thick And I was able to see when the ink had started to take properly to the other side of the paper. Also with the added pressure I think it helped with the print quality. I finally decided to finish once I had two much crisper and darker prints. Then the oven alarm went off to let me know tea was ready, so I hastily cleared up! The lino has been washed and dried, and once I have some better quality paper I will be printing it (him/her) again.

I am already starting to think about my next print....