5 ms·

Experiments in Printmaking, Part 1

65 points by chmaynard 3y ago

HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
This shows up at a rather opportune time for me. Just last night I was explaining to one of my kids that the reason I had the "fancy paper" he used to make someone a birthday card was because it was left over from a printmaking course a long time ago and that I should start making prints again. Maybe this is the kick in the butt I need to get going :-) Also, what's with the 1-2-3 block in the background? Hobby machinist also?
- threesevenths 3y ago
  Everyone should be provided 2 of these when they graduate high school. They are useful for measurement and reference, a simple weight to hold something down, a holder for your writing instruments, a cheap toy when combined with a dowel, a bore when using a punch, and there are undoubtedly many further uses.
itronitron 3y ago
Neat, might I suggest just 'posterizing' the red and yellow layers instead of half-toning them?
- wnissen 3y ago
  Yes, this is a really neat project. I found the halftoning to be not that obvious at all, definitely noticeable compared to, say a typical magazine advertisement but not, say, Lichtenstein-esque. Happy to see folks using the Affinity suite; as someone who likes to own software as well, and isn't using it every day (or month) it makes a lot of sense to me. Now what I really want to see is taking these separations and making letterpress out of them. Dare I hope for that in Part II?
giantrobot 3y ago
One thing you can do to pull out only the chroma like that in post is duplicate the background layer then go into the separate color channels. Adjust the levels on just the channel you want until you've got the definition of the shape you want. Wand select the white background and then invert your selection. Undo the level changes and go back to the composed duplicate layer and create a Reveal mask from your selection. Everything outside the selection will be knocked out. Then you can adjust the levels on the composed image to get your desired brightness/color/contrast. Do the same for other output color layers like the yellow in this example. For the Luma convert the color space to HSL and copy the Luma layer then adjust to your desired definition. This lets you create your "plates" for each separate color. Using masks instead of blend modes on the layers will get you the plate separation effect you want. Once you've got your "plates" knocked out apply the mask then you can add all your other effects on the layer like the halftone. Switching color modes and level adjusting is also a good way to do knock outs with the want selection. For instance doing a selection and getting wispy components like strands of hair. Look through the color channels where there's the best definition and adjust levels to bring out the desired contrast. Select that and then apply it as a mask to the composed RGB layer. You can then paint into the mask to knock out extraneous bits outside the bounds of the subject. Modern wand select tools have a lot of little features like adjustable sensitivity and sometimes can create masks directly. But the above method tends to work well in software with Photoshop 5 quality tools. It's a bit easier to do all the work in post than with the camera. Obviously if you want to do the work optically ignore the above.
throwaway14356 3y ago
in stead of the ring light what you want is diffused light. You can buy fancy screens to put between the studio lights and the subject but the cheap way is to hang some shower curtains around and have your lights beam onto as much of the surface as possible. I use gimp, if the image may consume this much time and effort i just take a lot of pictures from the same angle with different settings and light. I load each image as a layer, duplicate some and change their contrast colors temp etc then add/remove each layer by playing with its transparency and use the eraser to get rid of unwanted parts of the layer. Then when the result sucks I repeat all of the mistakes from scratch.
- 48864w6ui 3y ago
  Bounce lighting is another cheap way of getting diffuse illumination.

65 points by chmaynard 3y ago

This shows up at a rather opportune time for me. Just last night I was explaining to one of my kids that the reason I had the "fancy paper" he used to make someone a birthday card was because it was left over from a printmaking course a long time ago and that I should start making prints again. Maybe this is the kick in the butt I need to get going :-) Also, what's with the 1-2-3 block in the background? Hobby machinist also?

threesevenths 3y ago
Everyone should be provided 2 of these when they graduate high school. They are useful for measurement and reference, a simple weight to hold something down, a holder for your writing instruments, a cheap toy when combined with a dowel, a bore when using a punch, and there are undoubtedly many further uses.

itronitron 3y ago

Neat, might I suggest just 'posterizing' the red and yellow layers instead of half-toning them?

wnissen 3y ago
Yes, this is a really neat project. I found the halftoning to be not that obvious at all, definitely noticeable compared to, say a typical magazine advertisement but not, say, Lichtenstein-esque. Happy to see folks using the Affinity suite; as someone who likes to own software as well, and isn't using it every day (or month) it makes a lot of sense to me. Now what I really want to see is taking these separations and making letterpress out of them. Dare I hope for that in Part II?

giantrobot 3y ago

One thing you can do to pull out only the chroma like that in post is duplicate the background layer then go into the separate color channels. Adjust the levels on just the channel you want until you've got the definition of the shape you want. Wand select the white background and then invert your selection. Undo the level changes and go back to the composed duplicate layer and create a Reveal mask from your selection. Everything outside the selection will be knocked out. Then you can adjust the levels on the composed image to get your desired brightness/color/contrast. Do the same for other output color layers like the yellow in this example. For the Luma convert the color space to HSL and copy the Luma layer then adjust to your desired definition. This lets you create your "plates" for each separate color. Using masks instead of blend modes on the layers will get you the plate separation effect you want. Once you've got your "plates" knocked out apply the mask then you can add all your other effects on the layer like the halftone. Switching color modes and level adjusting is also a good way to do knock outs with the want selection. For instance doing a selection and getting wispy components like strands of hair. Look through the color channels where there's the best definition and adjust levels to bring out the desired contrast. Select that and then apply it as a mask to the composed RGB layer. You can then paint into the mask to knock out extraneous bits outside the bounds of the subject. Modern wand select tools have a lot of little features like adjustable sensitivity and sometimes can create masks directly. But the above method tends to work well in software with Photoshop 5 quality tools. It's a bit easier to do all the work in post than with the camera. Obviously if you want to do the work optically ignore the above.

throwaway14356 3y ago

in stead of the ring light what you want is diffused light. You can buy fancy screens to put between the studio lights and the subject but the cheap way is to hang some shower curtains around and have your lights beam onto as much of the surface as possible. I use gimp, if the image may consume this much time and effort i just take a lot of pictures from the same angle with different settings and light. I load each image as a layer, duplicate some and change their contrast colors temp etc then add/remove each layer by playing with its transparency and use the eraser to get rid of unwanted parts of the layer. Then when the result sucks I repeat all of the mistakes from scratch.

48864w6ui 3y ago
Bounce lighting is another cheap way of getting diffuse illumination.