SPRING CARD

I set up and printed my first big project today, after the warm-up of the Thank You card. It's a spring card I designed in Illustrator. To make it a two color print, I had two magnesium print plates created. Here's a step-by-step in pictures:

Locking up the first magnesium plate into the chase. It's a 8x5" chase, and my card design was 6x4", so I only needed a little bit of furniture and the metal lock-up bars, which I could screw into.

Mixing up the inks was more challenging than I anticipated. Such a small amount of color goes a very long way. Something I need to keep mindful of in the future.

Applying the ink to the plate.

All inked up after many many cranks on the lever... I'm going to get a very strong left arm!

Chase in place, getting inked up by the rollers. Paper laying in gauge pins ready to get printed.

Second plate/color all ready to go.

I even printed my return address on the flap of all the envelopes. :)

Finished cards all ready to mail!

FIRST PEEK

I've been busy collecting ink/paper/envelopes/etc and making designs, so I haven't really ramped up my blogging yet. I have two projects that I want to print in the next week: one very simple to get the press and myself warmed up, and the other more of a challenge.
Here's a peek at the first project. A simple "thank you" card. I hand-carved the design into a 3x2" linoleum block (hopefully for a rustic, and not just messy feel)...

And the other is the spring-inspired card I'll be sending out to many of you. I made the design in Illustrator, asked Nate to write a poem for me to center it around, and sent off my digital files to Owosso Graphics who made me a magnesium die mounted on a wood block. It's going to be two colors, so I had two different 6x4" dies cast. This one should be very crisp and detailed when printed, if I do everything right!