Re: Polymer Plate: was Gravure Pigment Tissue
Great to hear Mark. I'm amazed to hear there are copper gravurists that
believe they can't tell the difference (strike mark notwithstanding).
Can you post some high-rez scans of your PT/PD next to the same image in
Polymer Gravure? I'd love to see them and how they compare up close --
even virtually.
BTW, your recommendation for the Copper Plate Photogravure: Demystifying
the Process book was a good one. It has some excellent advice on how to
prevent scratches when inking plates (inking with brayers and
cheesecloth instead of mat cards and tarlatan). Much of the advise is
applicable to polymer. I've adopted much of it in my workflow and
haven't scratched a plate since! Some say the cheesecloth picks up too
much ink, but I believe it's just a matter of being more sensitive to
that when wiping.
Still no luck finding a good aquatint screen vendor since Peter and Copy
Graphics moved on. The one company in Denver who would do the work was
providing inconsistent screens. Who are you using for your aquatint screens?
Cheers,
Jon Lybrook
http://intaglioeditions.com
ender100 wrote:
Loris & Jalo,
Last Winter I purchased an American French Tool press and began
experimenting with the Toyobo PrinTight KM73 photo-polymer plates —it
has been both a fun and a fascinating experience. I just got back
from teaching in Santa Fe/Albuquerque and while in Santa Fe attended
APIS—and showed some of the prints I made with this process.
Obviously they are a different animal than copper photogravure plates,
with a very different workflow to create them. They also differ in
how they can be hand worked. I am not advocating for them over the
traditional copper plate method. I hope that Dick Sullivan or someone
is successful in making tissue available so that the traditional
method can continue to be practiced—it would be a terrible loss.
I don't yet know how many prints can be pulled from a polymer plate
compared to a traditional copper plate—especially one that has been
steel faced. I think that has yet to be proven—but certainly enough
to handle the smaller editions that most people do. It will probably
be the folks doing commercial printing for others, that will suffer
the most if a new tissue is not produced.
Given the above, I think the primary drawback is that the Polymer
plates can be scratched. I am sure that properly hardening them helps
avoid this, but I think you just have to be careful with them to avoid
micro-scratches in the lighter print tones when inking and wiping.
When using the two exposure method, with an aquatint screen, these
plates are capable of making very high quality prints, with great
detail and very smooth tones. I cannot help compare them with
Platinum/Palladium printing, my other favorite alt process, and I am
getting very very close to the same detail and smoothness in tonal
transitions. As far as tonality, the last calibration I did printed
25 steps (log 2.5) on a 31 step tablet, which is more than my usual 2s
mix of Na2 & Palladium prints. Quite interesting to me, the same %
contrast curve produced by Curve Calculator II for polymer produces a
print identical to the same % contrast curve for platinum/palladium.
Side by side, you cannot tell the prints apart except for the plate
mark. By seeing this, I don't mean that the two mediums should or
need to look alike.
I have done some consulting with Paul Taylor of Renaissance press and
Willis F. Lewis of Santa Fe, both master photogravurists. I have
given them both a print and the original plate so they could print
them themselves on their press and handle them just like a copper
plate and they have both been extremely impressed with the results.
In fact, I spent a couple of days with Willis in his studio and
watched him print one of my plates—I will be doing the same with Paul
Taylor this fall. They both feel that it is impossible to tell the
difference between the polymer and traditional prints—if anything, the
results from the polymer looks a little smoother to them. They like
it enough to have decided to take it up at least for smaller editions
of their work. The traditional work that Paul and Willis are doing is
really beautiful.
I think that one of the biggest variables is the aquatint screen used
to make the polymer plates. I have been doing a lot of work on that
and have about 24 screen variations here to test now. The screen
makes a huge difference in the appearance of the print and the
calibration. Once I finish these tests, I think I will be able to
improve my printmaking further.
Best Wishes,
Mark Nelson
--
Jon Lybrook
Intaglio Editions
http://intaglioeditions.com
303-818-5187
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