To print we use a squeegee to push the ink through the mesh and onto the paper below. The squeegee must be held at the correct angle so only the corner of the blade is in contact with the screen and paper below and correct pressure must be applied (too little pressure and the print will be faint or patchy, too much and the ink may bleed) As the ink is acrylic, printing must be done swiftly before the ink dries in the screen. This is very important as the different screens need to be printed one at a time, lined up precisely each time. ![]() The frame is hinged to allow the screen to be lifted up and down, keeping it in exactly the same place each time it’s lowered. The screen is locked in to place by the frame on top of the bed. We print all our paper prints on a small manual screen bed in our studio. We’re gradually building up a collection of swatches we’ve mixed and samples of colours combinations, its fun going through them and taking inspiration for new prints… We’re both still learning about colour theory, and enjoying experimenting with colour mixing. We spend quite a lot of time mixing and testing colours before printing, a tiny drop of one colour in the mix can completely change the feel of a finished print. ![]() They’re better for our health than oil based inks (no solvents!) whilst still being long-lasting and giving great ink coverage. We mix the ink with a screen printing medium which helps the ink to flow and extends the drying time whist printing. We use high quality water based acrylic inks to make our prints. A final blast of UV light to solidify the image and the screens are ready to print… When the screen is then rinsed with water the soft emulsion washes away, the hardened emulsion remains and the image is revealed! A separate screen must be made for each positive/colour of the print. When the light hits the screen the black areas of the positive block the light and the white areas allow the light through to harden the emulsion. A strong vacuume holds the screen and positive tightly together whilst UV light is shone through the positive at the screen for a set amount of time. We then place the screen and positive onto our UV exposure unit. Light can pass through the paper but will blocked by the toner during the exposure process.įirst the mesh of the screen is coated with a thin layer of UV sensitive emulsion and left to dry. We then scan everything into the computer for any final tweaks and use a black & white laser printer to print the final positives onto thin copier paper. To make our positives we begin with hand made paper cuts, and use ink on tracing paper to create fine detail (you can read a more detailed description of our design process here). ink or pen on tracing paper, cut out paper shapes, thin objects like fabric or leaves. A positive can be made of anything that will block light, e.g. This is a bit more time consuming but gives a really crisp and durable stencil which we can print through many times. For this type of stencil we first need to make a ‘positive’ which is a high contrast black and white image, one for each colour layer of the print. The black areas of the positive will create space where the ink can be pushed through the mesh, and the white parts of the positive will be blocked. We mostly use a photographic process to create a stencil on the screen. Shapes can also be masked out with tape, or anything thin and flat really! You won’t get many prints before the paper breaks down, but its a great way to experiment and try out ideas. Images can be put on the screen in a variety of ways, the most straight forward way is to simply cut a stencil from paper and place it on the back of the screen before printing. They’re tightly stretched with a fine nylon mesh the finer the mesh the greater the detail that can be achieved. You can have a go at screen printing at home by stretching a bit of open weave fabric over an old picture frame (happy childhood memories for me right there, and lots of tutorials on the internet to be found!) The screens we use are made of aluminium, they’re strong and sturdy and won’t warp or crack with repeated washing and drying. ![]() The screens used for screen printing are usually made from wood or metal, and the mesh can be anything that ink can pass through. We love screen printing for it’s ability to layer colours & textures, the density of the print, and the way we can print onto a variety of materials pretty much anything as long as its flat! Our prints are made by screen printing which is a stencil based printing process. We often get asked about how our prints are made, so we thought we’d share a bit about our process.
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