Mucking About With Drypoint

and Engraving 10 Dec 05

The copper plates, when you buy them, are very shiny on the front side which is protected by a plastic film and the other side is less shiny and not protected. I use both side of the plates but the back side gets knocked about quite a bit so I usually use that side for experimenting with. This is what I'm doing here. I've always wanted to get more of a pencil look to my etchings. I find that the etched lines look too even and perfect.

Also I have problems with Aquatint which I find flattens very quickly. Maybe I'm doing it wrong but I find that after a few prints the Aquatint tone has almost gone. So what I've been trying is to etch the copper without any resist so that you get a matt finish which retains some tine and then I drypoint into that.

So this picture started out as a very bashed about reverse side of a plate. I used the lines that were aready there and developed this picture (whatever it is). The final one was done in Red Ochre which I think looks a bit like the red drawing crayon you can get. I also used sand paper to score the copper and create those swirly line that you can see. There are no etched line on here. All the lines are either drypoint or engraved with a Burin. I like the burin but it's slow work. I also used a burnisher and scraper to lift and shade some of the lines and tones.

If you look further down the page you can see some of the steps in the process. Unfortunately the original print which I made straight from the plate without any working at all was thrown out accidentally. Also the dog stood on one of them so you can see a muddy footprint on one print. So much for doggy appreciation of my art. I wouldn't like to say whether the final print is better or worse than some of the stages. I quite like the "Lost edge" look of some of the intermediate ones.

 

 

	Stage 1
	Stage 2
	Stage 3
	Final stage in black

 

 

 

 

 

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