Secondary Research - Letterpress

Let­ter­press print­ers were tra­di­tion­ally trained by other let­ter­press print­ers through appren­tices. As com­mer­cial let­ter­press has declined the oppor­tun­ity for per­sonal tuition has got smal­ler. We’ve guides here to help you with the let­ter­press basics: get­ting the type together; using the press; select­ing paper and clean­ing up. We also cover buy­ing a press and type; and look­ing after it all.


Setting up your Frame (Composition)

It’s a won­der­ful feel­ing to have a metal chase in front of you filled with type, know­ing that it’s only held in with the wooden and metal spa­cing and the expand­ing metal quoins you’ve used. It’s a dif­fi­cult thing to mas­ter, but prac­tice is your friend.
You need to start by assem­bling the type in a com­pos­ing stick, then trans­fer­ring this to a level sur­face to ‘lock up’. There are some addi­tional bits and pieces you’ll need
This is an iter­at­ive pro­cess and you’ll have to go over set­ting type and lock­ing up mul­tiple times before you can be sure it’s safe to attach to the press. The steps are out­lined in this guide to lock­ing up
Where the type meets the impres­sion of the press there’s the tricky busi­ness of makeready: get­ting all of your type, blocks of images and other things to be prin­ted to be per­fectly level so that you can get the right impres­sion on the press. 


Some top tips for next time –

• Remem­ber that there’s a lan­guage bar­rier. Just as web design­ers wince when novices talk of using tables for lay­out; print­ers share their own lan­guage with its own nuances — the point and picas, lead­ing, formes and founts are all spe­cial­ist terms. Give your let­ter­press guide a sense of your enthu­si­asm by using the right terms
• Set some para­met­ers for your­self. It’s easy to acquire all man­ner of things and you’ll very quickly run out of space. Work out what you need to get hold of and where it will go when it’s home. In terms of fin­ances cheap presses can soon escal­ate in cost when rig­ging and mov­ing is included
• Soak up the let­ter­press resources on the web

How Letterpress Works?

Traditionally, letterpress printing involved arranging individual blocks of 'moveable type' into a caddy, forming words from the combination of letters. As this type was used to make the print, all the characters were moulded in reverse, and the words had to be similarly arranged in reverse. Images could be included in letterpress prints, but needed to be etched in either wood or metal, making it a time-consuming process.
Many of the typography terms and phrases we’re now familiar with originate from the combination of moveable type and the letterpress process. 'upper case' and 'lower case', for example, refers to the storage of the different type forms in type cases. 'Leading', the space between two lines of type, refers to strips of lead placed between lines of moveable type to space them further apart.



Benefits of letterpress

• Prints well on all kinds of crap.  Paper stock selection is an important part of creating for letterpress. Unlike digital or offset printing, plain old commercial grade stocks such as Chipboard or Graphic Coverboard make intriguing material for letterpress work. 
• Some of the best letterpress work is printed in one or two colors. Good ideas, design, typography and paper choice can trump mind-numbing technicolor any time. This is not to say we frown upon color. Three, four or more pedantically chosen spot color combinations are very doable and spectacular.
• A dark and light side.  Letterpress inks are translucent. When printed one on top of another you get the appearance of a third color where overlapping occurs. Light colors can be printed over dark colors or vice versa to eye-catching affect. Plan for overlapping colors in your design, it doesn’t cost a thing to do.
• Throw stock color into your palette mix.  Unusual effects can be achieved when light ink colors are letterpressed on darker colored paper stocks. Keep in mind though that paper stock color will show through ink and change the appearance the colors.
• Bite is the depression or indentation that occurs in the paper’s surface when the image is letterpressed with a heavy impression weight. Bite often is what bedazzles people about letterpress and what sets it apart form other forms of printing. However, the amount of bite must be carefully considered when designing for letterpress. Too much bite can be dangerous.
• An lighter impression weight is called a ‘kiss’. This type of impression will cause the image to slightly break up and mottle. Kiss impressions, when planned as part of the look of the design, can be just as visually fetching as a bite. The mottling of a kiss impression will vary somewhat through the run. When used effectively this gives a letterpress printed piece a handcrafted, one-of-a-kind or weathered look.
• Forget the ink all together.  How about printing with no ink at all? With letterpress you can use an inkless blind impression where the image is created with just a bite impression in the paper surface. Just try to get your digital printer to do this. We must caution that on ordinary card weight stock a blind impression will show though to the back side of the stock and should be taken into account in the design. By far the best way to use a blind impression is on one of our Stocky Weights Board Stocks.

Cons to Letterpress

 

• Bite will bite back.  We all like bite but there are some who suffer from over-bite. Keep in mind that a heavy bite on the front of most paper stocks will show through to the back. This does not have to be a problem as long as it is understood and considered in the design. The thinner the stock the more the bite back. On text weight stocks it is unavoidable and most card weight stocks will have some bite show through. The only way to have no bite show through is to use one of our Stocky Weights board stocks if they suit your design. Think before demanding very heavy bite.
• Letterpress is not the same as offset printing.  Halftone perfection, flawless screened tints and flooded areas of impeccably solid color are qualities where offset printing excels and letterpress does not. Letterpress is fabulous for so many reasons but mimicking offset is not one.
• Don’t use halftones halfassed.  In the right designer’s hands letterpress halftone images can look quite spiffy. Unfortunately, when used poorly halftones can also look ugly as hell. Think very carefully about how you propose to use halftones. Halftones need to be 100 dpi or coarser and will print better on a smoother harder paper stock. If you are considering using halftones it may be best to call to discuss your ideas before completing the artwork. There is an additional charge for halftones. See Artwork Preparation for more information on using halftones.
• Tints can cause more pain than halftones.  A 100 line tint printed in letterpress is not a thing of great beauty. Tints work better as a smaller part of a rougher styled design. If you are after a smart refined style then an additional color may be a better approach than a tint. Any tints will incur extra charges.
• Solid states.  Larger solid areas can be tricky when printed in letterpress. Translucent inks, textured paper and a less sophisticated inking devices make letterpress printed solids appear quite different than those run offset on smooth coated stocks. Paper texture will show through letterpress solids. The printing difficulty is increased when a single color plate has both larger and finer areas in the image. If you are after very heavy solids it may help to discuss your ideas in advance of finishing the artwork. Alternatives such as additional color runs, double-bumping or offset lithography in combination with letterpress may be preferable for difficult solid images.
• Reversed type.  Throw some reversed type into your solid areas and the situation gets even nastier. Reversed letter forms do not hold up perfectly under the great force of a letterpress impression. The reversed type may become a little distressed. If this is acceptable in your design all is fine but if you wish to look at the type under a loupe and see no imperfections it’s just not going to happen.
• Try to keep type sizes 6 point or larger.  We know kids these days like illegibly small type. Letterpress does not reproduce fonts well at microscopic sizes. Besides our eyes can no longer read 4 point type.
• Tow the line.  Line art is particularly well suited for letterpress but not just any line. You are probably pushing your luck with lines thinner than .25 point or hairlines.

What Distinguishes Letterpress Prints?

Letterpress prints tend to have a very tactile quality, with a slight debossing effect evident where the ink has been laid. Occasionally letterpress also combines blind debossing, where a plate is made and used without ink purely for its debossing effect. As the process is very manual, letterpress prints tend to also be as much about the paper stock as the print itself, with the printer and designer working together to choose unusual, richly textured or heavyweight stocks.

These are both examples I have found in my research, I like how the bottom one has used die cutting also, and the gold pigment to letterpress with. And, then also i like how they have used more than one colour on the one above so this is what I am going to research into further now as we only had a choice of one colour on our induction on the letterpress here at Blenheim.


Two Colour Process

• Polymer plates are produced using a photographic process.  The digital design is output to a film as a negative (left), and then exposed to a polymer plate using UV light (right).  The polymer plate is made of a light-sensitive, water-soluble plastic with a clear backing.  The portions of the plate that are exposed through the clear parts of the film hardens, and what is not washes away.  What remains is a raised surface in the shape of the design.  A separate plate is produced for every color being printed, and the paper is run through the press at least once for each color in the design.  We send our designs to Boxcar Press, where they transfer your digital design onto a polymer plate.  These plates match a gridded Boxcar Base, a machined aluminum plate that raises the plate to type high.
• The plate is affixed to a machined metal base which is in turn locked into the press.
• Ink is mixed by hand.  When possible, ink can be weighed out to match a specific color recipe, but in our shop we mix everything by eye, often matching to a specific Pantone color.  We use oil-based, lithography inks.
• The press is inked.  Even the inking process has to be done carefully.  Too much ink will produce a sloppy print. Too little, and the color will not be solid.
• The ink is allowed to dry and the next day the press is inked up in red.  Differences in pressure and the amount of ink can dramatically affect the printed color.  Adjustments are made to produce the desired color, and the print run is checked periodically to be sure the color is consistent.  For this particular run, the red ink ran out relatively quickly and frequent re-inkings were required.
• All presses have a system of registration.  Consistent placement of every print on every sheet is a must for quality printing.  This design, like most we produce, has cross-hair trim marks made into the plate that serve not only as cutting guides, but printing guides as well.  After this print run dried, a third printing run was made on the reverse of the pages.
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Tips and Advice for Next Time.

Letterpress printing takes some time.  In our shop, each page is fed by hand, and each color of a print job can be several hours on press from start to clean-up.  Add to that designs that need to be sent out to be made into plates.  A two-week turn-around is common.
Letterpress excels at printing fine type and line work.  Letterpress printing is not ideal for solid fields of color.  Most large solid shapes result in the color printing ‘salty’, a term used to describe the texture and color of the paper showing through the ink.  Your printer can tell you what is possible on their equipment.
While letterpress was never intended to be printed with a dramatic impression, or deboss, into the paper, it is often the most desired feature today.  Printing like this will quickly damage wood and metal type, but polymer plates are more durable (and more easily replaced).  Certain papers show off this impression better than others.