Owls.

Having used the owl stamp with open wings recently I thought that I might find a use for a stationary owl, so I set about carving one. It's a bit cartoonish with its big eyes, but it might yet find its way into some artwork.

Dragonflies.

I carved the largest dragonfly stamp some time ago, but I decided that I needed a range of sizes for a piece of work that I'm thinking about at the moment. Here are the 2 newest and smaller dragonflies that I carved today. The smallest one is only 5 cm from wing tip to wing tip, so it was a little bit of a challenge to carve. I might try an even smaller one tomorrow though.

Variations on a Theme.

 I wasn't at all happy with the moulding paste work from yesterday, so today I decided to combine the lino plate with stamps that I had made some time ago from Soft Cut.

 Although I was reasonably happy with the results, I can see that I will have to remove some more lino from around the central flowers, the gouges are a bit too obvious.

 I don't want to remove them entirely, as I think that they add some texture, but I need to tidy them up a bit.

             Here I have only applied the large lino cut to the lower two thirds of the gelatine plate.

 Some of these neutral coloured ones might be interesting inverted in Photoshop, or otherwise 'enhanced'.

 

                                                  I think that this one is the most successful.

                                      The stamps that I carved some time ago and used today.

Another Few Hours of Play.

                                           Definitely better without the solid bar at the top.

 I thought that it might be interesting to make a reverse plate from the lino cut. I used very thin wood which I sealed with 3 coats of varnish, then spread a thin layer of moulding paste onto the board when the varnish was completely dry.

  I think that I should have left the moulding paste to dry a little longer, as the result is very textured where the 2 plates were pulled apart.

 A great deal of the moulding paste ended up attached to the lino; I should definitely have left the paste to dry more. However, it couldn't have been too dry or I wouldn't get the result that I was looking for.

 The resulting textures are quite interesting, but the paste must have been lower in the middle as it is hard to get a print without a blank spot there.

These prints might make good backgrounds somewhere down the track, or I could just use the more interesting parts of them.

More Gelli Printing.

 It was worth going back and removing the top part of the lino, the print is so much better as a result.

In each case I've overprinted with the altered lino, but you can see the previous version underneath.
                        You can always see more detail by clicking on the image for a larger size.

Beating the Heat!

With the temperature sitting at almost 40°C it was imperative that we protected our summer vegetables from the scorching heat. All our veggie beds are raised and covered with wire cages, so it's relatively easy to cover them with the shade cloth that we have used for a few years now. It's a bit of an act the first time in the season, but after that we just roll them up and down as necessary. There are 8 beds all filled with growing food.....which as usual, the rats have now discovered. The cages keep out the possums and birds, but not the rats unfortunately and they have found the not-yet-ripe tomatoes.  Not content with just eating a couple of them, the rats take a bite out of each tomato which then begins to go mouldy at the bite site.  Read expletives here..........................!

Lino Changes.

 I decided that I didn't like the heavy bar of lino at the top of the plate, so here above I have removed it, keeping as many of the carved flowers as possible. Some I didn't like and some were just too fiddly to both with.

This is a quick print using a stamp pad to see how the lino removal is going.  Much better I think.

Lino and Gel.

 Today I decided to use my trusty lino cut with the Gelli Plate, just to see what sort of prints I could get.  The original one above looks quite delicate, almost like chintz fabric, but a bit wishy washy for what I wanted.

    This one above is the same print inverted in Photoshop, what a difference! I really like this effect.

        This is different print, O. K but not exciting.  The inversion didn't improve it either.

This one has many different layers, but again the inversion was not appealing. Perhaps these bland ones would benefit from some hand outlining with a metallic pen.