Printmaking Intaglio Printmaking Dry Point Week 3 Shahid

Printmaking Intaglio Printmaking Dry Point Week 3 Shahid Malik

Drypoint is a printmaking technique of the intaglio family, in which an image is incised into a plate (acrylic sheet) with the help of a hard-pointed "needle" of sharp metal or diamond point. In principle, the method is practically identical to engraving. Its result is comparable with the print coming out of a metal plate acid based etching.

Preparation of Plate First of all cut the plate in desired size and remove the outer paper coating.

Filing the plate The next step is to file the plate with the help of foiled. Filing helps to protect the paper during printing, leave an angular impression, and pass through the press smoothly. Keep the filer angular at the angle of 45 degree while filing the plate.

Selection of reference The next step is to get a reference that you want to draw on the plate. It can be either a digital print or your hand drawing. However in all cases it must be a line drawing without shading so that you could have a better idea what needs to be drawn.

Fixing the reference Place the reference under your acrylic sheet and tape it so that It couldn’t misplace.

Tools for drypoint You can use a variety of tools for drypoint. However it should be kept in mind whatever you use must be very sharp and pointed. Otherwise it will slip on sheet. You can take a steel nail of about 5 inches and make it sharpen at both sides from any workshop as well.

Carving the plate The procedure is to incise the line on each line you see in reference. You must not put too much or too less pressure while doing this. You must not scrap the plate. In any case line shouldn’t lose its identity.

Restricting the ink When you feel work is done remove the reference and place the black sheet under your acrylic sheet to see the lines clearly. Wherever needed add more details.

Adding the ink with the help of stencils End result should be looking like this