Business Card/Poster Process Pt. 6

I'm blasting through this blogging thing because I'm super busy. A bit more goes into what I'm showing but you'll get the idea.

After the screen dries, it's placed inside the press...


I then line up the paper with the screen so both are centered...


The first color, metallic gold is added to the screen...


Not the best pic but a flat bar pushes ink over the screen in the direction of the arrow. This is called a "flood," or flooding the screen with ink...


After the screen is flooded, a squeegee lowers and pushes ink through the screen. This is called a "pull"...

The screen then raises up, at which time I inspect the print to make sure it looks even, etc...


Each print is then placed on a rack to dry. When screen printing anything other than a t-shirt, each color is printing one at a time. I'll repeat these steps for the last color, red-brown and do it all again for the poster version.

Business Card/Poster Process Pt. 5

A very bright ultraviolet light is activated to cure/harden the emulsion that is not being blocked by the black on the film positive...


After about one minute in front of the light, the film is removed and the screen is taken to the washout booth (large sink) and sprayed with water. All the areas that were black on the film are now starting to soften and the image is becoming visible...


More water is sprayed on the screen until all the unexposed emulsion washes away, therefore making a stencil. The screen then goes back into the dark room to dry in front of a fan. Next up...printing.

Business Card/Poster Process Pt. 4

Now that the design is done, the art is output in black on clear film from my Epson printer...


Film positves of the first color, gold and the second color, red-brown. I'll be printing 40 cards per sheet of paper.


In the dark room, a clean screen is coated with a photo sensitive emulsion...


After about an hour, the emulsion is dry and ready for burning. I use a red emulsion for the gold and a high resolution green emulsion for the red-brown. The film positve is then taped to the screen to hold it in place...


The screen and film are put inside a table with a vacuum suction so the film fits tightly against the screen.

Intermission

I've always wanted to be a rock star, but not the typical kind. If I were in a band we'd play soup bowls residing on lunch tables around the globe. I'd dub myself David Lee Broth and my backing band would be The Oysterettes. My stage costume would be merely a vest and women would swoon over my chicken noodle arms. We'd limit our set to one hour as to accommodate lunch breaks worldwide. It would indeed, rock.

Business Card/Poster Process Pt. 3

I've decided to with this typeface because it's simple with a bit of style and feels like a good fit with the rest of the art. It'll also reduce nicely for the business card and look good large for the poster.


At this point I trace all the type which allows me to tweak the letters if necessary. In this case, the letter "L" needed a little sumthin' sumthin'...


Pic of Lucky to be taken into Photoshop and turned into dots so it'll reproduce when screen printed...


I added some dots behind the buckin' bunny to provide contrast. Also added a bird at the very top because the space between the 'Y' and the 'B' didn't look right. I intended to have my full address at the bottom but the design seemed to be missing a bit of humor. So I went with "worldwide" because my impending world domination amuses me. And I decided to go with just my email address. Next steps, the printing process. For the business card, I going with a metallic gold background and will print the art using a dark red-brown like the poster I did for Peeping Tom. The great thing about screen printing is printing on colored paper so I'll look through some sample books and choose something for the poster version.


Sometimes you just want a cookie after designing. Oatmeal raisin...

Business Card/Poster Process Pt. Deux

Background and foreground scanned and combined in Photoshop. I resist the urge to clean up my sloppy line work because there's beauty in imperfection and I like the feel.


Redrawing my bunny head using straight lines. I also redrew my buckin' bunny art to make it less clean in order to fit better with the other elements...


All elements combined, thus far. The space on the right will feature a halftone of my bunny, Lucky, if she'll stay still long enough for a pic. At this point I'll begin looking through type books and pick typefaces that have the feel I'm going for.

Business Card/Poster Process Pt. 1

I'm gonna post a blog here that originally appeared on my Myspace page last summer. I think artists who pretend to have secrets, can't and don't talk about their work are fucking lame. Sorry, there's no magic monkey painting pictures for people. Most artists hide behind a veil of mystery because of insecurity and whatever else. Like there's not enough bullshit out there in the (art)world. If that works for them...cool. But that's not how I roll. Just because someone knows a technique doesn't mean they can do what you do. The recipe for Maroger's medium isn't going to make an artist paint like Titian. Everyone is an artist these days and because of this web thing, people are stealing each other's stuff like crazy, aping styles, etc. My artist friends complain about this quite often and yes, it sucks. My take on it is that a person can't be or think like another person because of one's life experience, etc. It's about ideas and having a voice, first. Execution, second. In order for work to not be some superficial, stylistic jerk-off, it must have a voice. I too like stuff that looks cool, but I also like stuff that has a voice, soul, or the undefineable thing that leaves an impression. Sorry, that turned into a bit of a rant.

It's been a good two years since I've had proper business cards and done a promo poster so rather than recycle an old design, I've decided to do something new. I'll document the process from the the artwork creation, through the printing.

Basic markers and white out, nothing fancy...


Those leafy things are parsley, Lucky's favorite...


Lunch...


Lines and more lines for background...