Adders: The prints

It's more print yearly than print daily at the moment but one of my New Years resolutions is to get this blog up to date. I am writing this in Jan 2015 but back dating it to March.:)
These are the print developments for the adders


2 colour trial
 
3 colour trial.

The final print. 4 colour reduction. Hard work …
More about the print and its development here on my main blog. I do like adders

A Nadder Print.

I’m working on a lino cut this week and also trying to tie up all sorts of odds and ends that I have started in the last three months. Leaving things unfinished is a bad habit of mine as I rush on to the next exciting thing.

So, for this, it’s back to the adders.The old name was in fact a nadder but the “a” because attached.
I had got as far as some rough ideas a week ago.

And now I am just resolving one design. I’m working a little bit larger now and this one will be approx 11.75 x 9.5 inches. It needed some more working out and so I started with a rough and a tonal value sketch. I’ve reversed the image and redrawn the coils.

Re draw from first rough.

 
Tonal sketches for the adder lino.

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Two colour ideas for 3 col reduction. It will probably be very different in the end, but it’s a start.

…and starting to cut the block

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This is a vinyl block and I hope it will be a three colour reduction print. It may be less or more depending on how things go.

Adder woodcut: a bit more development

I have returned to the adder woodcut and made another plate to add some foliage to the image. It is, as Laura said, not a difficult process but it is a process, and requires you to work in a methodical set of steps, even before you get to the cutting.

My original idea was to look at the patterns of the grass, leaves and the snake’s markings but that had to be simplified for the workshop day.

 
Workshop day design with a shaded background. 3 plates 

Now I can add another plate and try different colour combinations.
That is the joy of making separate plates and not doing a reduction. I now have 4 plates. One background, one snake, one snake pattern and one leaves.

My new woodblock plate with foliage.

  

The new block proof. Background with leaves.

Four Block Print…. an many many possibilities