In the end all surplus gold or silver is removed by gentle wiping with
clean cotton. This is easy, as it will have fastened itself only to the
printed parts. If the impressions can be set aside for some days without
being wiped, it is better, and there is not so much danger of injuring
the brilliancy of the metal.
If gold and silver are to be printed on designs where there is other
color also, or where there is black, the print on which the metal is to
be applied must always be made first. Only when the sheets have been
gilded or silvered, pressed, wiped, and cleaned, is the black design to
be printed on from the next plate. That all this must be done with the
register marks previously described is, of course, self-evident.
So I close my description of the Relief method; and I hope that I have
made it all so clear that good results will come to all who follow my
directions.
CHAPTER II
INTAGLIO METHOD
This differs from the other in that the fat, which is to attract the
printing-color, is under the surface of the stone, the design having
been either engraved-in or etched, and then filled with fat.
Like the preceding method, it has several branches. The best are
these:--
I
THE LINE ENGRAVED STYLE
This is one of the most useful branches of lithography, and if the
artist has attained enough skill and the printer knows his trade, it
approaches very near to the handsomest copper plates, and at the same
time is about three times easier and quicker than work on copper. It is
splendidly adapted for writings and charts.
Choose a hard, uniform stone of the best kind. Grind it as finely as
possible. Etch with aquafortis and prepare with gum. This, at least, was
my early method, and it has remained in use in all printeries. Later,
however, I discovered that it is almost better to coat the stone with
gum without previous etching, because it can be more easily worked then.
Only in that case it must be perfectly clean and contain no concealed
fattiness. Immediately after the stone has been coated with gum (not
some hours later, as many do) the gum must be removed with water, that
it may not penetrate too deeply and thus cause a condition which will
prevent the finest lines from taking on color subsequently.
Then coat the plate with a tint made of gum solution and lampblack or
red chalk. Use a soft brush to make the coating very thin and uniform.
It has the double purpose, first, of giving the stone a color so that
the engraver can see his work, and of covering the prepared surface of
the stone with a protective coat that later will admit the fatty
printing-color only where it has been pierced by the engraving-tool. It
is evident that this latter property is increased according to the
amount of gum in it, yet only little gum must be used in it, the
permissible amount being only just enough to insure that the coating
shall not be easily wiped away during the work of engraving.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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