100

This is my 100th post on my blog and it coincides beautifully with what I am going to post about!

Since May until September this year I have been working on illustrations for a poetry book called '100 Australian Poems You Need To Know" for Hardie Grant Publishers. The book has poems from all through Australia's history and I really enjoyed reading them all when starting out the project because I knew very little Australian poetry to start with.


Yesterday, in the post, I finally received my copy of the book and it is lovely, a really beautiful object even before you've even opened it! Well designed, well put together, great poems and as for the illustrations, well, for me it was quite strange to see all my drawings and etchings in there, but very satisfying.

The book will be available from 1st December, I'm not sure where from yet, I'm trying to find out myself because most of my family will be getting a copy for Christmas!

I've found a review for the book here and info about it on readings website here and I've found a site where you can pre-order a copy here .

Tomorrow we move out of our house, but unfortunately, due to things out of our control (because real estate agents are supposedly in control, but not doing a very good job) we have nowhere to move into. Homeless! So if you see Jeremy and I walking the streets in the next few weeks please invite us in for a drink and a friendly chat, thanks!

Don't forget to enter my blog give away competition!

Print Gocco, Layering.

I thought this time I'd mention how to layer exposures. By this I mean printing one screen, perhaps in colour, then printing a second screen on top, perhaps the outlines in black. It took me a few attempts to get this right the first time.
A few things I realised were -
*Cut down your images to fit the print bed when exposing the screen. This helps you to keep registration correct. (When I say 'registration' I mean one layer fitting perfectly over the next layer.)
*Also cut down the paper you are printing on to fit the print bed, this also helps with registration.Without this I find it is pretty much impossible to get registration correct.
*Use a light box to make sure both images fit well on top of each other. I use a thick perspex sheet balanced on top of an ikea lamp because I don't have a proper light box!
* I sometimes use photoshop to figure out my layers. I first scan in my drawing, then on photoshop I make a new layer and basically colour in the drawing. Then I hide the original image and print out just the coloured in layer. I then sit this printout onto my lightbox with a blank sheet on top and, using the gocco carbon pen, I trace onto the blank sheet. This will be the image I expose first.

This is the carbon drawing for the first exposure, I will print it in three colours. I used the foam blocking tape in between colours on the screen, this stops the colours from running into each other, although it still happens slightly. I think it is part of the charm of print goccos.

So, this is the result of the first exposure. Now I want to make the outlines and a bit of detail. This I take from my original drawing traced in carbon pen. This is the result printed on a blank piece of card just to show the image. For some reason the end of the tail didn't expose onto the screen very well. This is possibly due to only one of the lamps flashing, make sure both lamps are screwed in completely. This may be the reason, but it may not be. It's still a bit of a mystery to me. If anyone has any other possible reasons for this happening I'd love to hear! To correct this I have bought a dark grey ink and I will draw in the tail with my dip ink pen on each print.

This is the final result. It is a haddock, an illustration for one of my mum's recipes for her cookbook. Below is another sequence for an illustration of a pheasant and a chicken.

The First Illustration

My mum, back in Northern Ireland, owns a successful coffee shop. It's called The Bay Tree. She has owned it for about 10 years now, and she worked in it for about ten years before that. She has built it up to what it is today, which is a very well known, very well regarded eating establishment! My brother and his wife also work there so it has become quite a family business. I feel a bit left out over here in Australia!

My part to play in the Bay Tree story is connected to The Bay Tree Books that my mum has written, well, she wrote one a few years ago, and is currently in the process of writing the second. They are cookbooks and are full of delicious recipes that she regularly uses in the coffee shop. My job is to illustrate the cookbooks and I've just completed my first of many illustrations for the new book. Here it is below.

It was made on my trusty print gocco machine, which I am still in love with!

So, if you are ever in Northern Ireland and feeling a bit peckish, I highly recommend The Bay Tree Coffee House and definitely try the famous cinnamon scones. These scones are so delicious people come from far and wide for a taste. Seriously.



Just thought that I should add that once the new Bay Tree Book is out I'll post the fact on here, it may not be until next christmas though. But my mum is thinking of going onto etsy to sell it to a wider audience. Maybe she should do that for the first one too? I'll mention it to her! Keep an eye out on my blog for it!