A few new bits

Just as I'm about to take off for a couple days of holiday I thought the time was right to do a quick little post before leaving.  I managed to get a very good start on my new project as well as take a shot of a larger work that I'm pushing along.

The first is a shot of the raw copper plate that I'm in the process of burnishing my apothecary image onto.  It's quite a complex image in terms of shading... particularly the glass.  I decided to show you the plate instead of the first proof as often with mezzotints you can see an image clearly on the plate long before it will ever be seen well on paper.  Initially proofs are very dark and even though they look well established on the copper it's a long process of developing each shade further and further with more burnishing.  This is after the first state of burnishing....

This second image is part of a more experimental etching that I'm working on.  It's unique for me because it's quite large.... the sheet of paper here is about 18"x24"... large for me at least.  It also makes use of a lot of different techniques... aquaforte, soft ground, sugar lift, pastello, and in the end it will be tinted with aquatint... and possible a little bit of spit bite for some atmosphere.  Anyways, it is totally experimental and on the fly... no sketch before, just working straight onto the plate from my imagination.

Anyways, enjoy!

Semolina

Continuing on with my kitchen series, I present the lovely Semolina. Not complete yet, but definitely in a stage nearing completion.

I wanted to run through the basic process of getting to this point step by step.

First, I draw the image in pencil in my sketch book... just as I would with pretty much any other drawing.

Next I carefully coat my polished plate of metal, in this case zinc, with soft ground. When the ground has been successfully applied I wrap the plate with thin tissue paper and begin redrawing my drawing exactly (or as close to as I can) in reverse onto the tissue paper. This is a delicate process as the soft ground is pressure sensitive, so any mark I make with my pencil or finger or whatever is a mark on the plate/design. Making sure not to press too hard or too light  with my pencil is also a bit tricky,... too light and i don't make enough of a mark, too hard and the line gets blown out. I tend to fall into a groove as I go and adjust my pencil weight as I go along. In this case, transferring the image took a full 24 hours of work.

When all of my drawing is complete and I'm absolutely sure I've covered all areas of shading & line I get to unwrap the plate like its Xmas morning. Beneath all of my pencil work is a delicately resolved transfer in the soft ground...

From here it's into the nitric acid for about 25 minutes. When I remove the plate from the acid I usually do a quick test proof to see how the soft ground etching turned out.

It's basically a one-shot deal, but from here there are many options to start refining the image. In this case my image turned out pretty well with just the soft ground, but the nature of doing this method produces a really soft image where as I need something that is going to have a real harmony of hard lines, soft lines, and a variety of tonal values.  In this case I use the initial soft ground etching as a starting point for hard ground etching.

After applying hard ground I use fine needles to add various elements of detail as well as to firm up some of the finer lines that I need in the image. Here are the progressions through a couple layers of hard ground etching...

Finally, I fill in all of the remaining tonal values with different levels of aquatint. Aquatint is a process by which i coat the plate with resin powder and then melt it to leave a very very fine layer of resin bumps on the plate. When I put the plate in acid, acid seeps into the spaces between the bumps producing a hole for ink to rest in. With more holes in the plate I can achieve darker tones. More time in acid = deeper holes. By putting the plate in the acid for different amounts of time I can get different shades of grey. Of course I need to block out areas that can't be effected each time i put the plate back into the acid. Here is the end result...

Anyways, that's how it's done! I hope to finish this one off soon so I can press on to the next.