Adobe Photoshop Express for iphone/android

Original amended on phone
Whilst playing with Photoshop express on my phone I experimented with exposures and levels on the first collage that I made for the 'Babel' brief. There were no specific intentions but I was interested in the outcome posted as it posed such a complete contrast to the feel and aesthetic of the original. I may now review the original in Photoshop on the Mac' to consider the change in feel of the visual content.

Relief blocks laser cut from synthetic rubber lino

Block print from synthetic rubber cut on laser cutter
I previously posted on laser cutting perspex for relief printing blocks. The prints form these were successful although the hard surface of the perspex was unforgiving as a print surface. Pressure needed to print in the albion press from correct inking was quite high resulting in rather obvious block impression in paper. I was interested to test the results from the same approach but using the synthetic rubber sheets used for lino cuts. The print surface from this material was much better and the flat areas of image achieved a better ink resolution. However, due to the nature of the laser cutting process and the material properties there seems to be a small 'lip' of rubber left around cut detail; this has the effect of causing a slight blur to detail in the image.

On a positive side, the process of laser cutting these blocks has some inherent qualities that show up in the print which are quite interesting. There is a faint zig-zag herringbone edge to the cutting, almost similar to the 'dot's or serrations evident in rotogravure, industrial intaglio print. Another quality apparent due to the shallow cut set for the laser cutter is some slight background printing - similar to cut lines in lino and block cuts.

This process that I have tested clearly works and further experimentation with materials and the laser cutting settings should provide further assessable results.

The image posted from above is from a coarse line halftone - 21 lines per inch. I have also experimented with dot half tone at the same line count. One issue with the laser cutter was that when halftones were taken to 33 lines per inch or above, morais patterns started to appear in the cuts as the cutting scans clashed with the halftone line count.

Screen printing K onto Digita CMY

Screen printed 'K' onto digital 'CMY'
From earlier posts you will see that I was becoming frustrated by the idiosyncrasies of digital printing. Having set up printing profiles for relevant the program, computer, paper and printer it remained frustrating to find that on a different day, with the same settings that the printed outcome could be visually different. Clearly there could be issues such as temperature cartridge levels affecting results. Over and above these issues I was conscious that the ink jet black from cmyk prints was never 'rich' in halftone output. Therefore I tested the idea of printing CYM from digital print and overprinting the 'K' black by screenprinting. I set this up as a trial print on small dimensions. Indeed the resulting black from the screenprint gave a much fuller contrast of black. The image posted here may not show this terribly well - (I only photographed it on my phone) - but the results re there to compare in the paper versions. In carrying out this testing it has reminded me that with the right image output to film, that screen printing allows for fuller control over colour and contrast.

Photo graphics

Have only just had the chance to sort and process images captured on a recent visit to Paris. Carrying on with the same theme adopted for the greek images posted a couple of months ago I have concentrated on 'viewfinding' the images of signs/surfaces at the point of taking and also considered further cropping to achieve balance at the processing stage. I feel that this approach is similar to that which I take when building and manipulating the space in my collages. I have collected here a group of nine images to show as examples of an edited larger set. I intend to print each of these images separately in the same style as the Greek images onto photo-lustre paper.

A collage a day - Randel Plowman

Looking at further artists' work came across this guy, Randel Plowman from Wisconsin USA. There is lot's of good stuff in his blog - http://acollageaday.blogspot.com/. I don't think that his work matches the quality of Martin O'Neil or David Wallace but I like most of the work he does - although he does seem to get fixated with old bird illustrations in many of his 4" x 4" collages which for me gets rather repetitive.

Book reconstruction/regeneration

Alongside the other investigations I have been working on I have been gradually putting together a book reconstruction; the donor being 'The ABC of Gardening' from 1946, the regenerated content coming from 'random' scraps of text and images left over from collages and other work developed for the 'Babel' brief. There is no intention to build a narrative here but an opportunity to assemble loosely connected images with the statements and words cut from the 'Library of Babel' text to explore the potential outcome of the whole book.

As mentioned in a previous post, whilst the image and text building has been going well, the bulk resulting from the folding of pages - to achieve the hexagonal effect - and the addition of image and text paste up has caused the individual book section s to swell and I now have to reconsider ways in which I rebind and cover the resulting book. Not so easy to calculate with already used and pasted paper which makes each page irregular. More when progress is made... for now some images above of some of the spreads.

A2 folded books

Following some testing and considerations for this approach to I have included here some images of the samples I have made to test alterations to folds etc to ensure linear continuity of pages ie so that al can be read the same way up as the pages are turned. The images give some idea of the books in their folded and unfolded state. Text and images included on these are at draft stage and do not necessarily reflect the final content of these books as I make them. There are a few adjustments to measurements needed but other than that I can now concentrate of further speculation on content to create a short series of these books. Other considerations will be the addition of front and back covers to add some weight to the product and to give an insight to the content maybe. The structure and format of these books is interesting and should allow for many opportunities to consider content relating to the brief.

Foil blocking relief prints

Following the success of the releif prints from prespex cut on the laser cutter from raster TIFF files I explored the idea of heat transfer of foil onto the prints using foil transfer film and a heat press. Initial results were poor. However, experimenting with time/temperature in the heat press some outcomes were achieved. I explored this further by taking photo copies of the prints and testing the foil process again. This gave much more reliable results. I have only tested this with metalic foils but have now ordered some flat colour foils to experiment with multicolour outcomes realised from the heat transfer of these materials. Images posted are not of great quality (from my phone) but show the idea.

Books from an A2 sheet... and some catch-up

Having spent the past week dealing with a major case of man 'flu, I have fallen behind with posting progress. Above are examples of the flat art put together for the pages of books folded from one sheet of A2 paper. I will post pictures of the folds as they are made. This approach gives a great deal of scope for inclusion of image and/or text and I now have to consider how I will make covers for these. The images above show three examples based on either text or image produced to explore the format of the folded book.

Pagination (where story text is used) needs to be considered for continuity. The image shows how text blocks need to be rotated to remain in the correct orientation for the book.

The bold text in the second page has been aligned so that pages in the book are made up of individual cropped characters which should still remain readable in their own right within the pages of the book.

The grid marks for folds and cuts for the book were over-printed in pale blue/grey for assembly purposes and cannot be easily seen in these screen images.

The images in the top page have been put together randomly from some of my original collages. The intention being to occupy all page spaces with some continuity of image orientation and readability of the image on each page in its own right. ie each page in the book can become its own 'new' collage.

Prior to this I have investigated relief printing from perspex blocks cut on the laser cutter from raster image TIFF files based on collages from the Babel brief. Results from this were successful - and I will post results as soon as I have taken photos/scans. Although successful in outcome I felt that the perspex blocks were rather unforgiving in terms of exploring alternative pressure in the Albion press and am now investigating cutting a block from a rubberised material used for lino prints; in fact I have just cut these blocks on the laser and will print an a day or two to compare results from printing from different materials. I will include images of results for this work shortly.

In addition to the work listed above I am currently bringing to a conclusion a book reconstruction. Having folded pages and included pasted in images/text the bulk of the original sections are proving difficult to re-bind. I am at the stage where I will need to d-construct the original book further in order to facilitate a successful reconstruction!. Alongside this I have been assembling my original collages for the Babel brief into a reconstructed 'filofax'; firstly to group a record of this work together and secondly to utilise the original format/dimensions of the collages which were based on the original standard 'filofax' dimensions.

Laser cutting relief print blocks

After experimenting with some further settings to get depth of cut and detail acceptable I have now cut some sample test blocks from perspex on the laser cutter. I have tested halftones from both dot and line screens to consider the most acceptable effects. Having reviewed the cutting, both have worked successfully and whilst I am now going to print from these blocks it will be interesting to pursue this process and investigate how refined I can make the halftones and still achieve a successful cut from the lasercutter. The halftone I have used at this stage are from 300dpi images processed into 21 lines per inch halftone screen. On this basis i should be able to reduce the dpi resolution and still achieve enough detail for the cut. My previous test was based on a 33 lines per inch halftone. at this resolution the laser cutter was having difficulty resolving the image and odd, herringbone morais patterns were appearing from the laser cutting. I will post some of the printed outcomes as soon as they available.

In addition to cutting these perspex relief blocks I have also experimented with a rubber/vinyl sheet (used as a synthetic lino for lino-printing). This seems to cut well on the laser cutter and I will print a test piece to judge the success. It seems to have achieved the same level of detail as the perspex with a quicker scan/cut time. If this is successful, this will be a preferred material as the material is flexible and will provide an improved print surface to the perspex.

Some images above of the laser cutter at work.

For screen prints or digital prints

I am continuing with developments from the collage illustrations to consider suitableabstract imagery for prints. The image above has been developed from the 'In my youth I have travelled' collage and explores keeping some texture from halftone and 'mezzotint' filtters as well as overlays of flat colour/ These should work equally well as screen prints or digital prints. I aim to continue to develop these abstract images alongside the more image based prints such as the one illustrated in the previous post.

Some on-going influences

Scott Campbell
Rowena Dugdale
James Rosenquist

Patrick Geroux
Pat Steet
Morning Breath
Morning Breath
Matt Springman
Estelle Flores
Emma Clayton
Cecil Touchon
I have included here some other collage artists who I have found that show some inspiring and alternative approaches to use of image/space.

developing collages into print

Taking other image and print ideas forward from collages I have been looking other artist/designers approaches to graphic image development. I have been particularly interested in the prints/paintings of 'Morning Breath' the New York duo who deal with imagery from old ads, graffiti, comic strip etc. Alongside their graphic design practice which is mainly focused on the music industry they produce prints and paintings which combine underlying collaged/painted in/out imagery with overlaid line drawings in comic strip style.

I am beginning to experiment with my initial collages as backgrounds and as providers for line images imposed over. I have considered and tried constructing the drawings with pens and markers but have found that drawing digitally over images in Photoshop with live traces in Illustrator create more reliable outcomes. I have include an initial piece of work here and intend to take this further.

Laser cutting tests and outcomes

I have now started the tests for laser cutting halftone relief images into perspex acrylic sheet. Some initial trials showed that the cutter could not resolve halftones that were any finer than around 21 lines per inch. I experimented with cutting speeds, cutting lines per cm and heat intensity.. The final tets had a setting of: 5mm perspex, 60mm speed and 85 laser power. This gave a result where I felt that I could achieve a relief print. Having now carried out intitial print tests it is clear that this process will work. There are issues around materials though: in cutting the halftone the laser seems to burn cutting debris which 'sticks to the halftone cut in the perspex. The result is therefore imperfect. To resolve this I am trying to strengthen (make coarser), the halftone structure and consider a linear halftone to compare with the dot screen. Having said this, the printed halftone gives a feel for coarse newspaper halftones before the advent of digital and litho preparation. I am going to persevere with the perspex; additionally I am going to test other materials in the laser cutter, such as MDF and some synthetic rubber/acetate material (which I'm not sure of the name of at present) used for lino cuts. My aim is to achieve bold, high contrast images which can then be either hand coloured, screen printed onto or collaged back into further image developments.

Laser cutting relief/intaglio blocks

Bitmapp for lasercutting
To extend my exploration of print from my 'Library of Babel' collages I am going to investigate the process of laser cutting relief and intaglio blocks from acrylic sheet. I have used the basic greyscale image taken from the collage and converted to a half tone bitmap at a coarse screen of 21 lines per inch. I have used this screen line count in order to keep a bold graphic impression from the original image. Additionally to keep laser cutting time to a minimum I have cropped the original image to a square format. Once I have the print blocks produced I will experiment with and consider, hand tinting of printed outcomes.

Frustrations of digital print

Bitmapped halftone
Flat colour and mezzotint tones
Mezzotint textures
Image deconstruct
This last week has seen a frustrating series of events for me. In developing the Babel collages to compare printing methods - screenprinting/digital - I have experienced a succession of failed attempts to output colour matched digital prints of my designs developed from my 'There are official searchers... inquisitors' collage. These problems have been due to mis-calibrated screens and printer profiles both on Hewlet Packard and Epsom kit. I now seem to have resolved these issues by calibrating both screen and profiles for my Mac' and am beginning to get print results that I might expect from the screen images. Experimenting with paper stock has also provided alternative results; ranging from plain, average quality cartridge paper to Epsom coated high white water colour paper. To some extent I prefer outcomes on the plain, lower quality paper.

Additionally, to cap all these print frustrations.... I rather foolishly left a folder of my initial prints at UWE after a tutorial on Tuesday of this week. Therefore I have had to re-print each example. In some ways this has had its benefits, it has allowed me to further consider and investigate the control of digital print output and results are improving.

After this series of frustrations I am now becoming sick of the sight of this piece of work! So.. I am now planning just a few extensions to this work before moving on to other material: experimenting with screen printing the final K separation on top of inkjet output CMY and also after an introduction to the laser cutter the idea of burning/cutting the K separation on top of the inkjet CMY. One extra investigation might be some lasercut relief/intaglio printing blocks from the grayscale halftone image.

A short break then onwards...

Edouardo Rueda
Edouardo Rueda
Edouardo Rueda
A short break in studies last week to visit Paris. Whilst there, two major disappointments.... couldn't get into the Jean-Michel Basquiat exhibition at the Musee de Art Moderne at the Palais de Tokyo and the Musee Picasso was closed - for two years for a total refurb. Still managed to pick up a good book in a discontinued print shop on Boulevard St Michel on Edouardo Rueda. I has seen some of his work some years ago but with my current interests in collage, his work seems more relevant and inspirational. He lists the many well known's as his influences such as Schwitters, Cornell, Hoch, Brownfield and there is evidence in his work of this. I was interested to see his 3D 'collage' and division of space with textured metal/wood. Some further ideas here to consider.

The visit also gave me the opportunity to collect more ephemera and photographs of abstract street graphics; using the camera to viewfind type/signs and textures. As I process these I will post at a later date.