As an artist, many years ago I used to also build jewelry as part of my living but have spent most of my recent years printmaking and teaching at a university. I had a well-equipped shop doing constructed and centrifugal lost wax casting; working in both gold and sterling on commissioned piece - as […]

  Planning Making the Press The concept of using only metal where the pressure needed, can help it easier and cheaper to make presses. My small press is convertible to either etching or lithography – even having linear offset system for litho. My press is much more complicated to build and uses a drive motor. […]

Early designs for litho presses as shown in De Capo Press reprint of Senefelder’s book There have been questions on other forums asking for information on building ones’ own press - etching or litho. I have heard of printmakers designing and building their own press more directed to how they print - whether they printed […]

For a number of reason I have chosen to get a new service provider and have had help from my son (who is an IT type) to make the move over. It is not as easy as the new provider claimed - maybe because of the special setup we have been using - but it […]

Over the last couple of weeks, my forum has been overloaded with member registrations, which tend to be spams and introduction to porn sites and the like. Only a few actually post articles and links in the message, so most just join and do nothing. From their origins and funny names, they certainly seem to […]

Ink Slabs Last week I broke the glass on my ink slab for the second time in 20 years. I have leather rollers for printing colors hanging from the floor joists just above the ink slab - somehow I managed to disturb one as I was reaching for something on the shelf. As I was […]

I have been communicating with two European etchers who have been using my copper sulfate mordant for as long as ten years on zinc plates at large print studios. When it came to the disposal of the spent mordant, one group was told by a chemist to add sodium carbonate which would remove the zinc […]

I was alerted about a discussion on a blog forum concerning if the use of copper sulfate mordant was a good alternative to nitric acid. As I read the comments, I realized that was much confusion on the chemistry of using this safer mordant because either some had not studied thoroughly the articles available on […]

For those who are interested in the CDRom, which has now become a DVD with too much data to fit on a CD, it can be purchased though PayPal in the Main Menu. I am having a problem of publishing blogs using Windows Live Writer, so this is just a short note to let printmakers […]

Bonnie Sheckter in Toronto has a Hunter-Penrose 30 x 40 inch offset proofing press she no longer needs. It looks like a terrific press that should make some lithographer more productive. As you know, I believe the quality of prints done on an offset press are much better, with less stress on the printer in […]