Re: Gum printing technique

[Katharine Thayer <kthayer@pacifier.com>]

Hi Laura and All,
I don't usually follow links to youtube, since I'm still on dialup  
and it takes forever for videos to load, but Laura's comments got me  
curious and I downloaded this and watched it this evening.  Some  
thoughts:

Yes, it looks to me there's glass over the negative; you can see  
reflections in it from the light.  The glare is more like the glare  
off glass than the glare you'd get off film.

As to someone else's question about what he prepped the wood with,  
I'd say it's almost certainly gesso, as surmised.

I couldn't be sure but it looked like he moved the printing platform  
under the light to compensate for the  size of the light;  I do that  
too to avoid fall-off at the edges when I'm printing larger images.

"Tonal inversion" can serve as a strong image element; who knew?

More seriously, I think this is a good illustration of the truth that  
immaculate  technique and effective work exist on independent  
vectors; one doesn't necessary follow from the other and vice versa.
Katharine





On Dec 18, 2007, at 3:03 PM, Laura Valentino wrote:

> >                         Maybe there's something to discuss in this  
> > video..............?
> I found it very interesting to watch and would love to see more of  
> this
> type of video!
>
> Interesting bits:
> printing on wood
> eyeball measurements
> powdered pigments
> rolling on the gum mixture
> 3 part negative (and the fact that you do see the lines in the  
> finished
> print, but in this case the image is strong enough to hold its own  
> IMO)
> size of bank of lights compared to size of print
> Is there glass covering the negative during exposure? I can't tell. If
> not, that would be interesting too.
>
> This isn't a "how to" video for beginners, but an example of someone's
> process, so the no gloves doesn't bother me...but interesting that he
> doesn't wear them. Must be a "live dangerously" kinda guy.
>
> Laura