Eleventy : handmade design

Typography Tuesdays: The Initial Post

2010-03-09T08:21:00.000-08:00

NE of my ideas for this blog when I started it over a year ago (hey, I forgot to do an anniversary post!) was to do weekly posts specifically devoted to things typographical. I'm now implementing this practice, beginning this week, with our very first Typography Tuesday. And what better for my "initial" post than to report on a blog all about drop caps? (Drop caps of course being decorative initials, used as the first letter of the first word of a chapter or paragraph, so named because they usually drop below the baseline of the first line of text – as in the example of this paragraph here!)

I am giddy over finding this project by typographer and illustrator Jessica Hische called the Daily Drop Cap. In September she decided that she would illustrate and post a decorative initial every day ("or at least every work day"). That is quite a commitment! From Jessica's site: "The project will continue for approximately twelve alphabets and are available for non-commercial use as drop caps on your personal blog." Wow. I'm so glad I caught onto this when I did! (If I calculate correctly, we're about half-way through the fourth, with seven and a half to go.)

If you have time, also check out her portfolio site – I'm loving her book covers, and she has some great original typefaces on there too.

What the world is up to these days

2010-03-05T10:42:00.000-08:00

I've been buried this week in updating my professional web site (not finished yet...I'll post a link again so you can see the "after"!), and playing catch-up on some wedding program orders that I'd fallen behind on because of said web site update.

So this morning I decided to catch up on what the blog world is up to these days. I forgot how much I enjoy sitting with my coffee and Google Reader and just running down my feeds of inspiration. So, I thought I'd share "blog roll" with you guys, and in return, ask you to post your favs in the comments so we can all freshen up our lists.

I'll keep this list short – just the ones that I follow most faithfully, and the ones that I have stumbled upon most recently – so I can write a little bit about each one, and share a pic from this morning of something that inspired me today.

So, here they are, in alphabetical order (because that's how my reader presents them...):

But Does It Float:

This blog is pretty much all pictures (with very strange post titles), and these guys never fail to present you with something you've never seen the likes of before. A lot of it is contemporary art, but often, they manage to dig up something from art history that has a striking relevance to today's aesthetic, which is always a treat. This photograph is by Emmet Gowin, posted here.

Death by Kerning:

I just picked up on this blog recently. I ran across the name in some other blog roll and it just cracked me up, so I had to check it out. I have a feeling it will become part of my regular rotation. This hand-lettering is by Alison Carmichael of oh joy!, posted here.

Design*Sponge:

The stand-by of all stand-bys for any designer, it seems, is Design*Sponge. Grace and her blogging team is so prolific that at times I get overwhelmed... Then, I have to remind myself that it's okay not to ready every post! They cover pretty much all types of design, but if I were to pick I'd say their focus is on domestic interiors. Their before-and-afters and DIY tutorials are particularly easy to love. These numbered stairs from Lois Keenan are from this week's wrap-up post.

Happy Mundane:
I think this might be my favorite blog. The name says it all – Jon has a talent for pulling out the beautiful in the everyday, with just a touch of whimsy. Plus he posts about once a day or two, so there's always a treat but I never feel behind! This masking tape made from old books can be found on Nothing Elegant's Etsy shop, and this post here.

oatmealandcinnamon:
Sarah at oatmealandcinnamon took a break from her blog a little bit ago, and I'm so glad she came back. Her blog focuses on hand-lettering, and I absolutely love every post. Like this one, which shares a fun print from Esther Aarts.

Oh My Golly!:
This is the blog of one of my really good friends Nicole. She's passionate about fashion, and also shares bits of her life. Since she loves reading, cooking, and art, so you can often pick up a good book recommend or a new recipe, in between the beautiful pictures of what's on the runway these days. Like this craziness from Sasha Pivovarova, photographed by Craig McDean, and posted here.

poppytalk:
I may be a little off here, but I sort of think of poppytalk as the Design*Sponge of Canada... Their coverage overlaps some, but there's certainly plenty of different stuff on there to enjoy.

This blog is another one that I sometimes end up with 73 unread articles, and I just have to click the "mark all as read" button, with the niggling feeling I'm missing out on something really good that I'll now never know about... I am glad I tuned in today for this feature on Color Me Katie.

Roe's World:
I feel kinda funny including this one in my list, because it's totally just a family blog that my sister-in-law/BFF keeps up about my little niece Monroe, but it is one of my very favorite reads! And, I like it when I get a little window into the life of a blogger, so, there you have one on me. Plus, this particular post about their latest construction paper crafting is actually very on-topic! (Monroe got a little scissor-happy with the C3P0 so her mom had to make a backpack for Chewbacca to carry his parts in...)

Thrivacious:

My friend Gina just recently started this blog. One of my favorite things about blogging is that everyone has something worth saying, something to bring to the global table. Gina's personal interest is in health of mind and body, and her blog is full of great tips that are relevant to anyone with either of those things... Today's post was on the lighter side of the more informational and practical things she usually shares: a "video break" in celebration of today being Friday!

We Can Cook That:

This blog is a brand new undertaking of my friends Amanda and Romeo, and let me tell you it's got some real potential. The concept is that every week they visit an LA restaurant, and then go home and try to recreate something that they ordered. They take you through the whole process, starting with a mini restaurant review, then an account of their cooking experience, the recipe, and a rating of how they think they did. They've already gotten a write-up in Modern Luxury. The above "theirs/ours" comparison from their post about Bottega Louie. Keep this blog on your radar!

Hope you've found something new on this list that you want to check out. Feel free to share your latest blog discoveries!

I don't remember Art History Survey being so much fun...

2010-03-01T10:52:00.000-08:00

Two vids in a row!

Why does it seem like the awesome stuff always gets posted on Vimeo instead of YouTube? I guess that's where all the cool kids and the hipsters hang out or something.

70 Million by Hold Your Horses ! from L'Ogre on Vimeo.

I love how they toy with the 3D/2D space and the textures and everything. It seems like they really took into consideration each artist's point of view and the context of the various "-isms" they represent. Plus they obviously had a blast making this.

Freakin' cool video: The T-Shirt War

2010-02-26T10:53:00.000-08:00

Thanks for the link, Melissa!

The T-Shirt War from Ibrahim Nergiz on Vimeo.

I want one of the shirts! (They sold out of the originals but you can get a replica...less sweaty anyway... :-) )

Virtual cramped quarters

2010-02-17T14:15:00.000-08:00

So I haven't posted since I got my new camera, which is odd because I thought I'd be clogging your inbox/feed-readers with pictures of everything within my reach that is remotely blog-related. But, one thing about a camera that takes 15-megapixel photos is that you need many more megabytes to hold them all. And since my computer and my external hard drive were both already bursting at the seams, we had to go out and get another hard drive:

Today my task is to figure out how to use it. (I want to partition it so that part of it is for backup of our computer hard drive and part of it is for photo storage...not even sure if that's possible, but it sounds like something I should be able to do, right? Or at least, that "one" should be able to do...)

And after that I can get all my pictures off the camera and up on this blog! I have some fun stuff I want to share, but I've been waiting to be able to showcase everything in full mega-megapixel glory.

(PS: A big thank you to everyone who gave us Target gift cards for Christmas! They all got pooled together to buy us this hard drive. I'm so lucky to have in-laws with an affinity for those little red and white plastic keys to retail heaven...)

It's here! My new precious!

2010-02-05T15:02:00.001-08:00

I must now wait for it to charge (as you can see) so I can play with it.

Hm, must think of a name for her. (Now that it's here I can tell she is a girl...but maybe that's just because I haven't seen it fit with a super-tele-photo lens yet :-o !)

Well, my iPhone is Harold, my external hard drive is Regina, and my iPod Shuffle is Gertrude. Perhaps the new Precious is a Karen. Or a Denise maybe. Shame she's a she...I've been wanting to have a device named Jason.

Fun with boxes

2010-02-04T13:23:00.000-08:00

Last August for Mike's birthday I bought him a gift certificate to go horseback riding under the Hollywood sign – something he'd been talking about wanting to do since we moved to California. I wanted to something cute to put it in, so I found this tutorial about how to make a gift box out of a cereal box. With a few modifications (mainly the tab in front to keep the top aligned correctly in the closed position), I turned out this fun little box:

I found it easier to decorate the box before I folded it, though I had to visualize which panels were going to end up on the outside and in what orientation, before penciling in a simple wood-grain pattern for a bit of a "ranch" theme. I thought the little horsey on top was also a nice touch. :-) (For some reason I had a little collection of plastic farm animals laying around!)

On the inside, I wrapped the gift certificate in a bandana, which I had picked up along with it at the ranch.

You would never guess this box used hold our Honey Nut Cheerios!

Some day my prints will come...

2010-02-02T11:59:00.000-08:00

I can't wait for Friday! Not just for the usual reasons (I'm not even working this week)... But because this Friday we get our new digital camera!

See...there it is, right there in Keasbey, NJ!

Mike and I decided last year that our Christmas present to each other would be getting a nice digital SLR. Since we moved to California we've been trying to visit as many national parks as possible, and we were tired of coming home from these majestic and stunning places with lame little point-and-shoot photos. And I've wanted a nice camera for a long time just for my work, and for this blog since I started it, too.

We didn't actually get it in time for Christmas, but in January we actually started researching what we wanted, and decided on a Canon EOS Rebel T1i.

We found the best deal on BuyDig.com (which I had never heard of, but after a quick background check it seemed legit). I was glad to get the low price, but it took them like a week to ship it so I'm impatient to have the thing in my little hands!

In the meantime, the camera bag that I bought the same day off eBay arrived quite promptly:

I loved the retro look. The colors and the little mountain label remind me of some of the camping gear and luggage that we had when I was little. Also a big thing I read about was that you don't want a bag that screams "camera bag," i.e. "steal me," so I steered way clear of the all-black with a big "Canon" logo. The cool thing I didn't realize until I got the thing in the mail was, it also converts into a backpack!

Perfect for hiking. Eventually we'll need a bigger bag to store additional lenses and equipment we plan to buy, but this will still be great for taking just one or two out at a time.

So, after Friday, prepare yourself for greatly improved photography here on Eleventy!

What I've been up to at my day job

2010-02-01T11:04:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, playing around with yarn and ink and paper doesn't quite pay the bills... But that's okay, because I like my day job pretty well too. I freelance as an art director and graphic designer, and over the past several months I've been working a gig that I am very lucky to have been a part of. Most of the time I work on magazine ads, TV commercials, billboards, or online banner ads, where a company is basically interrupting your life to tell you about themselves. But this last project I worked on was to create content that people would actually be interested in enough to voluntarily go look at. Which, I think, not only makes it more effective, but also in a way, more polite. It's the difference between someone barging in and yelling something at you, and someone saying, "Hey, if you have some time, let's talk – how about I buy you lunch?" Except in this case, it's "how about I make you some cool documentary films about some of your favorite musicians?"

The company was Gillette, and the agency that hired me was called Greenlight. They're associated with Red Light Management, an artist management company with a long roster of big names, including Dave Matthews Band, Tim McGraw, and The Decemberists. With their understanding of both the ad business and the music business, Greenlight helped Gillette create and promote a short film series called "Uncut," about how different famous musicians prepare themselves for performance. The films actually turned out to be pretty good little documentaries. What I worked on mostly was the print and various online promotions of the films, and the website that housed all the films and a bunch of extras, like band photos and other behind-the-scenes clips that didn't make it into the films. They also have these funny little shaving "tutorials" so you can learn how to "shave like a rockstar."

Here's the trailer for the films, and if you have time, check out the site!

Wall calendar, brought to you by The Letter 'A'

2010-01-29T11:33:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to share this, and now that January's almost up, so I feel like a 2010 calendar will soon be old news!

A friend of mine recently acquired the initial "A" (via marriage), so for Christmas I made her this calendar:

It was a fun chance to play with my Dremel tool, and a nice way to get some more use out of a silk screen I'd already burned with the 2010 months and days.

I started with a sheet of plywood with an oak veneer from the hardware store, stained it with some Minwax in "Ebony", and made a rough tracing of where I wanted the 'A' to go. I then pulled up some examples of circus-y lettering off the 'net, and freehand Dremeled the letter. I must admit I impressed myself with my on-the-fly typography! I filled in the yellow and purple spaces with acrylic paint, and went over the engraved parts in cream-colored acrylic. As I mentioned, the numbers and months were from a silk screen I'd made for a different calendar, and I just laid the screen over and did a one-off print with regular opaque screen-printing ink. Finally, I looked at the thing and realized I'd forgotten to put the year! Duh... So, I improvised that bit at the bottom, using the same technique as for the 'A'. Glad there was an ample margin down there!

I'd like to put something up on my shop like this, where you can order a custom letter. But, obviously it's a little late for a 2010 calendar. Maybe I'll get some chalkboard paint and make noteboards. Other ideas?

How every Warner Brothers movie ends (no spoiler alert)

2010-01-27T00:24:00.000-08:00

Why don't we end our movies with a "The End" title card anymore? It's such a grand way to close a story. Plus, it allows us to effectively carbon-date a film based on just six letters worth of typography – thanks to this collection I stumbled onto while chasing some internet rabbit trail today. Nice work!

These next two remind me of Ed Ruscha paintings. (I realize that what I mean is the Ruscha paintings remind me of the old movie titles.)

This one makes me think of Mike Teavee:

That last one looks almost modern, doesn't it? Only by comparison – it's from 1964 (John Ford's Cheyenne Autumn). Of course, there is the Marlboro man there in the background isn't there?

Okay, The End!

I'm (almost) back!

2010-01-20T14:22:00.000-08:00

Howdy folks! I've been rather quiet lately so I felt a little update was in order.

After the craftsplosion that generally characterizes my pre-holiday preparations each December, we headed to my in-laws for Christmas. Upon our return on New Year's Eve, as I reflected on what I wanted to accomplish in 2010, I was surrounded by the carnage of Dremel dust, carved rubber stamp shavings, and scattered screen-printing supplies from all my gift-making. I decided that part of the problem was that my workspace was not conducive to my project flow. I am a big believer that "a place for everything and everything in its place" is essential to keeping tidy, and that wasn't happening in our upstairs office-studio area.

But perhaps an even bigger problem, I just didn't find the place creatively inspiring. Thus I constantly found myself bringing projects down to the living room or dining room, where we've taken more care to make the rooms aesthetically pleasing. And as long as I was spreading my supplies all over the house, not only was I messing up our living spaces, but it was making it impossible to keep things organized upstairs as well.

So, since then I've been head-down concentrating on redoing my studio to be both more organized, and just a pleasant, inspiring, creative place to spend time. I'm now close to the end of that project, and I look forward to returning to the real world, where I try to focus on more than one thing at a time – including posting on the blog! (My tendency is to want to completely immerse myself in a single task at the expense of the rest of my life, but I decided to make an exception for this project, because I think my husband was getting close to imposing sanctions on my crafting.)

So, stay tuned for some fun features of my new studio space, and perhaps you'll get inspired for the re-organization projects on your own list!

In the meantime, here's a sneak peak of a pegboard I made to organize all my sewing stuff:

Holiday sale, sold!

2009-12-13T21:53:00.000-08:00

Well today was the big day, and a good time was had by all. The crowd was modest -- mostly family and close friends -- but who better to share with in the holiday joy, right? And they were good customers. I think that all of us sold at least a few things. I found buyers for a few of my t-shirts, cards, and calendars. It was fun to watch people shop my stuff in person. You never get to hear what people think when they're browsing your online store!

Here's me with my setup and my niece of ultimate cuteness, Monroe:

I think her favorite item at the sale was the free pigs-in-a-blanket!

Christmas memories: Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas

2009-12-11T12:47:00.000-08:00

I love how Christmastime makes everyone nostalgic. It seems like every year one or two memories rise to the surface and hover there for the duration of the holiday season. Usually it's a different one each season, and it adds so much texture to life when that happens. This year for some reason I can't get the Jim Henson special "Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas" out of my head. You know how when you were little, whatever random movies or cable specials your parents caught on VHS become ingrained in your mind? Well this one was on our tape of recorded TV Christmas specials that my Dad brought out every Christmas, and then packed away at the end of the season with the Christmas decorations. Having it out only a month out of the year motivated us to watch it over and over, even more than kids usually do with their favorite videos. As the worn out tape got more and more warbly each year, the images and songs remained clear as sugarplums in our little heads.

As I'm writing this I wonder whether the seed for this muppet memory was planted by my recent viewing of The Fantastic Mr. Fox. Though that used stop-motion-animated puppets instead of live-action muppets. Either way, there's nothing like a hand-made fox, otter, weasel, or catfish to bring a smile to the face of any human, regardless of age.

Brown paper packaged tied up with string

2009-12-10T11:08:00.001-08:00

This morning I was feeling warm and happy (and maybe procrastinating a little on my upcoming deadline of Sunday's sale...), so I decided to do something a little bit extra special with the packaging on a custom Etsy order I was filling (a set of stationery and stamps).

An Unlikely Illumination: R. Crumb does the Book of Genesis

2009-12-08T11:18:00.001-08:00

Every morning on my way to my current freelance gig, I pass the UCLA Hammer art museum. Recently, I've been intrigued by the displays featuring illustrations of the Book of Genesis by underground comics icon R. Crumb. I have yet to get myself to the gallery, but this morning I checked out the Hammer's website and watched this great video about the exhibit:

I think I'll make plans to go on Jan 24th for the lecture/walkthrough which I noticed advertised on the site.

I've had a vague awareness of R. Crumb from a young age, having grown up with two older brothers and a couple of cousins who were all way into underground comics. My vision of him was solidified by the 2003 movie American Splendor, in which Paul Giamatti brilliantly plays the comic book author Harvey Pekar. Crumb is portrayed in that movie as a sort of guru and collaborator to the main character. Still, I have pretty limited knowledge of this incredible artist, and I can't wait to know his art a little better through this ambitious project of his.

In an interesting way, it seems to me to represent how the relationship between art and the Bible have come full circle, with the supposedly recent form of the graphic novel actually playing a central roll throughout the past several thousand years. The graphic novel, which straddles the two worlds of art and literature, has struggled for full recognition in both. Which is odd, because its roots are intertwined with the legitimized academic histories of art and of literature. I remember several days in darkened art history classrooms learning about "illuminated manuscripts," which seems to me to be simply an art-historian term for the graphic novels of the Middle Ages. Virtually all the slides we were presented in class were of biblical themes. In more recent years, graphic novels have tended to be anything but biblical. Which makes the subject of this exhibit initially surprising, but with any further thought, it makes perfect sense. Not only does the incredible literary drama of the Bible, especially the Old Testament, naturally lend itself to graphic representation, but there is such a rich history in the marriage of pictures and the words of that particular text.

Well, thanks for indulging me if you've read this far – I suppose being taken back to art history class in my mind must have triggered a reflexive launch into "essay mode!" ;-)

Miniature S'mores

2009-12-07T09:51:00.000-08:00

Tonight, I made this fun little recipe that my family came up with in theory a few months ago, but I was the first to have the chance to try it out:

They're miniature s'mores, and the recipe is about as simple as can be: one Teddy Graham, one chocolate chip, and one mini-marshmallow. I don't remember exactly how we came up with the idea – I just remember a conversation with my dad and my sister-in-law and I in which we were discussing having a miniaturized cookout, including kebabs on toothpicks with a single pea, a slice of baby corn, etc., and for dessert, these mini-smores. (This was on my same trip back to Texas that my girlfriends and I ate at Tillman's and had their famous table-side s'mores, which are simply amazing, by the way.)

So this afternoon I had the perfect opportunity to test out our idea. That same sister-in-law (who was also at Tillman's that night) was having a potluck party and food drive, where everyone had to bring, in addition to some cans for the local food bank, a dish that has brought them joy at some point during the year. Between that trip to Texas, and the multiple camping trips we've gotten to take in California's great National Parks this year, this party-food version of s'mores was the obvious choice. Here's what I did:

I spread Teddy Graham crackers out on a cookie sheet, making sure they were all face-up (and of course eating the ones that were missing legs or ears). Then I placed a chocolate chip on each little guy's belly:

(I actually did a lot more than this for the party – these photos are from when my husband came home from having to work the weekend and miss the fun.) I ran them under the broiler for about a minute or two until the chips started to get glossy, so I knew they were softened. Then, I pressed a mini-marshmallow into each melted chip:

And ran them back under the broiler until they browned on top.

And that was it! They were a hit at the party, and a home run with Mike when he got them fresh out of the oven.

Though I won't stop making regular s'mores when I camp, these are a great little snack for at home. For one thing they are just so darn cute! Also, the chocolate melts, which is hard to achieve with a big s'more. (It is actually essential for these – I don't know how else you'd get them to stick together.) And, finally, there's their calorie content: I figured it up from parsing down the info on the nutrition labels, and each little s'more is about 9.2 calories!

Holiday sale Dec. 13th, and for a good cause too!

2009-12-06T20:27:00.000-08:00

Big news!! Our holiday sale is on. We had to change the date because of a conflict, so now it's at 11am this Sunday, December 13th, which means we'll be serving mimosas!

Also, we had the idea to use this chance to benefit the charity reDiscover, a group here in Los Angeles that helps teach both art and environmental responsibility to children. Companies donate their leftover materials that would be destined for the dump, and reDiscover uses them to create art projects for youngsters.

Here's the flier I made:

[UPDATE: a link to the hi-res version]

You can click to see it bigger (and pass it around!), but here's all the necessaries:

Sunday, December 13th

11am to 3pm

The Gallery at Radium/ReelFX

2115 Colorado Ave, Santa Monica, CA 90404 (map)

Parking in back of building or on street

Many thanks to my friend Linda for putting this thing in motion, and to Elle and Nian for teaming up with us. Can't wait to see everyone there!

I want this: At-home Letterpress Machine

2009-12-03T12:01:00.000-08:00

(Image from paper-source.com)

I saw this advertised a few weeks ago on Paper Source, and it's been on my mind but I haven't had the chance to look into it yet. If you can make custom plates, or have them made, this could be amazing.

Wedding Wednesdays: Kim and Zak

2009-12-02T12:05:00.000-08:00

(Photograph by Brooke Schwab)

For lots of reasons, a giant sector of the handmade design world is occupied by wedding stuff. Design is usually only produced by hand for small-scale projects, and those are often for personal purposes rather than commercial. And if you think about it, the only time in most people's lives when they would privately commission a designer is for their wedding.

So, I'm going to start a new series called "Wedding Wednesdays", to keep an eye on what's going on with wedding design. Often that ends up being a reflection of general design trends in the handmade world. Plus, weddings are fun.

And speaking of fun weddings, today I want to share pictures from the recent wedding of my friends Kim and Zak. Kim is a very stylish bride – an avid reader of many design blogs, she was keeping up with wedding design trends long before she was even planning her own wedding. Lucky for both of us, we're best friends, I happen to be a designer, and our other best friend Melissa is also incredibly creative. So I had the honor of helping Kim shape the look of what turned out to be an unbelievably adorable and fun wedding.

As with many weddings, the invitations were what established the look for the rest of the wedding. Kim knew she wanted to use a red and aqua color theme, and she also told me she liked "birds and banners". And, the main thing she was going for with everything having to do with the wedding was "fun". Here's what we came up with:

Since I live in LA and Kim in Dallas, we couldn't do the printing together, but I sent her the files and she printed all of them herself on her Gocco machine, as well as lining the envelopes and assembling everything. She did a bang-up job, too, despite the design being very touchy when it came to color registration.

The four-page programs took the "fun" theme a step further:

(A side note: Kim was kind enough to let me sell these designs on my Etsy shop, so they are now available for customization for other weddings. In the last few weeks I've had to silkscreen more of the invitations myself because brides have been requesting samples – it felt funny to be making them after the wedding already happened!)

The rest of these photos were taken by Kim's talented wedding photographer Brooke Schwab, who did a wonderful job capturing the ultimate cuteness that we created!

Melissa sewed the table-runners, and punched the thousands and thousands of confetti circles. Kim had the idea of getting a bunch of button-style pins made to put out as favors, so I used the typography from the program to design a set of three. A group of us got together and made "moustaches on a stick" as props for the photobooth Kim rented. Also, from the photo at the top of this page, Kim made the adorable bird wedding topper, and printed the little flags on the cupcakes with her Gocco.

If you can believe it, this is just a slice of all the stuff that we made for this wedding. To see more photos, check out this post that Once Wed recently devoted to Kim's wedding (awesome!), and on photographer Brooke's blog.

Handmade Holidays

2009-12-01T01:21:00.000-08:00

So I have a sister-in-law Kelly who owns this fab vintage shop in Pensacola, and for years she and my brother Andrew could only come for Thanksgiving either a few weeks before or after the actual holiday, because of the retail high holy day Black Friday. Of course the whole family understood, but now I think I get it even more. When you're a seller and not just a buyer, the craziness of the holiday season is multiplied by a hundred.

Of course the advantage of having your shop online is that you can do a lot of the work ahead of time, readying your new merchandise and promotions as early as you want, and set it all to post in time for Black Friday and its online equivalent, Cyber Monday. In my case, though, this year during that time, I was busy getting my shop up and running in the first place, and I didn't get to do much in the way of kicking off the holiday shopping season. (I've also had a slew of freelance work come in, which is fantastic, but just ill-timed as far as my shop work is concerned.) Oh well, at least I've got a shop at all, and I'll have another chance next year to do more special promotion for the holidays.

I do have one thing that I'm working towards this year which I'm really excited about. I'll tell you more about that later, but LA folks: save the date for the evening of December 10th! Stay tuned for details... [update: it's actually December 13th...info here]

May I never end up here: Regretsy

2009-11-24T12:37:00.000-08:00

This site is hilarious. Crappy stuff found on Etsy. No further explanation needed.

regretsy.com

The super amazing Fantastic Mr. Fox

2009-11-21T23:37:00.000-08:00

I just saw the new Wes Anderson film and I was BLOWN away!

Fantastic Mr. Fox is a full-length stop-motion animation feature. Meaning, it is an insane undertaking that only someone like Wes Anderson would take on. Every single thing in the film was made by hand. Just imagine such a creative mind having complete control over each detail of every frame of an entire movie. As Jason Schwartzman narrates in this little making-of featurette, "For the filmmakers, half the process of making the movie was figuring out how to make the movie without going nuts."

(worth heading over to Apple to watch in hi-def, along with the trailer and other extras.)

So, at 24 frames per second, and 87 minutes long...that's 125,280 individual hand-set frames? Wow. (I should also mention that, aside from the merits of being a staggering work in handmade design, this movie was everything you would expect from a Wes Anderson film. Impeccable writing, directing, acting, everything.)

I'm so glad that the torch of filmmaking by hand is being passed, after the stunning film Coraline made by Laika. Let the creative genius keep coming! (One twenty-fourth of a second at a time...)

THANK YOU THANK YOU nicely nicely

2009-11-18T11:23:00.001-08:00

I'm so excited about the cards that I added to my shop today:

I've been wanting to do these for a long time – thank you cards inspired by the classic plastic bag design. You know, the kind that you get from small businesses that don't have their own printed bags. The design is just so iconic, and nostalgic too in a way.

Also, doing these gave me a chance to experiment with how to put my shop info on the backs of greeting cards. I wanted it just my logo and shop url in black, with a single line stating that they are hand-printed on recycled paper, which I think makes the cards feel a little more special for the person that gets one.

But, I didn't want to have to spend a lot of extra time doing that part. Usually (as I explained in my last post in case you missed it among the three hundred other things I covered...) doing two colors requires a separate pass for each. But in this case, the logo being on the back, when the card is flattened out the red and black areas are very isolated from each other. So I tried out using two separate squeegees, one for each color, and running them both in a single pass.

It worked out pretty well. I was able to turn out several dozen cards in one evening.

I'm selling them with khaki envelopes, as singles or in sets of five.

Screen printing: Traditional silk screen vs Gocco vs Yudu

2009-11-17T23:20:00.000-08:00

I love printmaking. Whenever you give away an edition of a print, you don't have to say goodbye to it completely – you still have its brothers and sisters! At the same time, unlike a photocopy or computer printout, each edition is a unique handmade object of art.

One of the most effective and accessible printmaking methods for a designer is screen printing. About $100 can get you a rough setup with everything you need to multiply your work by the hundreds. Or, for just a little more you can buy either a Gocco or a Yudu. Both are small table-top devices that are designed to give hobbyist printmakers a compact home setup that's both easy to use and space-efficient. So which path do you take?

I've tried all three, and I definitely see the merit in each.

Since this is a very long post I'm breaking it up with internal links so you can bounce around. I'll start with some background about traditional screen printing, the Gocco, and the Yudu. Then I'll dive into a detailed explanation of how the methods differ, followed by a comparison chart summarizing the differences. I'll end with a final analysis of the pros and cons of each method, and recommendations for who might choose which one.

The one thing that I will not be covering in this post, but that I plan to address in a later post, is ink. That just adds a whole other level of stuff to discuss, and this post is going to be way more than you wanted to know anyway.

BACKGROUND:

(skip to: How the Methods Differ, Comparison Chart, Final Analysis)

Screen printing is a process by which ink is pushed through a very fine screen onto a surface, like a t-shirt or some paper. On parts of the screen, the holes in the mesh are blocked, so the ink only goes through where your image is.

Probably the most common ways to block the screen is to coat it with a product called photo-emulsion. After it's air-dried, photo-emulsion washes out with water, as long as it is kept in the dark. Once you expose it to light, it hardens and and can only be removed with special chemicals. So, where you want your image to print, you cover up your screen to protect it from light, and then shine a bright light on the rest of the screen. You can then wash out the unexposed emulsion from the protected areas. Your image will appear as sections of bare screen, surrounded by areas filled in with hardened emulsion. This process is sometime referred to as exposing or burning the screen. After your screen is burned, you can push ink through the bare areas of the screen onto your printed surface. And that is pretty much how traditional screen-printing works!

You need two work areas, one where you can burn your screen and one where you do the printing, and there's a variety of ways to set them each up. Here's what my printing workspace looked like when we lived Dallas:

(I burned my screens in a bathroom, where I could make it dark when I needed to, and also wash out the screen when it was ready.)

In the late 1970s, a company in Japan came out with the Gocco. The Gocco is a little device made of brightly colored plastic that looks a lot like a toy, no more serious than a Play-Doh Fun Factory.

(image from feltcafe.blogspot.com)

But beneath its fun exterior is one serious little printing machine, condensing both the exposure unit and the printing setup into a device the size of a toaster. (There are also larger versions that allow for a bigger image, but I'd say the smallest is the most popular. It's big enough to print a wedding invitation, and the compactness is kind of the point.)

Gocco screens are coated in a heat-sensitive material, and where you want your design to print, the machine burns off the coating. So the idea of creating a screen that's filled in except in the image area is the same, as is the concept of printing by pushing ink through the open mesh.

Gocco was way popular in Japan for a while, and eventually gathered a cult following in the West. And then, they discontinued it. There are still loyal followers who seek out the supplies where they can for their beloved little machines, but they are a dying breed. Eventually all the necessary supplies made to go with the Gocco will run out. So sad.

Recently, an American company has tried to fill the void of the discontinued Gocco with a device called the Yudu. (I know, who comes up with these names?)

(image from whatdoyudu.com)

In many ways where Gocco differed from traditional screen printing, the Yudu is a return to the traditional method. But like the Gocco, it condenses the exposure and printing setups to a compact table-top device. It's not quite as small as the Gocco, but of course the trade-off for that is a much larger printable area.

All three methods share one advantage over some other printmaking processes: you can perfect your image before you transfer it to the screen. You can even do it in the computer, so you can be uber-precise, and use type and stuff.

So, traditional screen printing, Gocco, and Yudu are very similar in concept. The main differences occur in the details of how they're carried out.

HOW THE METHODS DIFFER:

(skip to: Background, Comparison Chart, Final Analysis)

Now that you have an idea of the basic steps of screen printing, I'll compare how each step is carried out using the three different methods. Again, while I'm going into some detail here in order to draw distinctions between the processes, this is not really a tutorial. (So if you try to follow it like one you might miss some key info!)

1. Get a screen.

Traditionally, screens consist of a piece of fine-mesh fabric stretched very tightly over a frame. The frame is usually either wooden or aluminum, about an inch-and-a-half thick.

(Image from printersedge.com)

You can buy a frame with the fabric stretched over it already for about $20 or more, depending on the size, and they can be used over and over again for a long long time, as long as they are cared for.

Yudu sells their own special screens that work with their machines. They are basically a compact version of the traditional screens – the metal frame is only about 1/8" thick. Also, their frames have a hole in each corner. These fit onto pegs in the machine, and they're used throughout the process help with keeping accurate image placement, a process known as registration.

(image from whatdoyudu.com)

Yudu screens sell for $28 each. They last a long time too, but I did some cosmetic damage to mine the first time I used it. (While the frame looks like solid metal, it's actually covered in a plasticky metallic tape. One one side of my screen the tape got partially pulled off. Oops.)

One major difference with the Gocco is that their screens are only made to be burned one time. You can print whatever image you burn into a screen as many times as you want, but since the screen won't be cleaned out and reburned, the frame is just made of cardboard. For registration, one end of the frame is notched to fit a corresponding part on the machine.

(image from paper-source.com)

Gocco screens vary in price since they are no longer in production, but right now the ones that fit the small machine run about $6 each on eBay.

2. Prepare the screen.
This step only applies to traditional screens or Yudu screens, and it involves coating the screen with photo-emulsion. Gocco screens come already coated with their own heat-sensitive chemical.

With a traditional screen, you use a special scoop to pull liquid photo-emulsion evenly across the screen.

(image from screenprintingsupplies.com)

This must be done in the dark, or under dim yellow light.

Yudu tries to simplify the process, and eliminate the need for a scoop coater, by selling sheets of dried photo-emulsion packaged between sheets of plastic backing.

(image from whatdoyudu.com)

Applying the emulsion sheet to the Yudu screen is a lot like applying a temporary tattoo. You wet the screen, peel off one side of the plastic backing from the emulsion, and lay the sheet emulsion-side down on the wet screen. Once it's dry, you can peel off the other plastic sheet, and the emulsion is left stuck to the screen. You do have to be very careful that the screen is evenly wet, and that no air bubbles get trapped under the emulsion sheet when you lay it down. Otherwise your screen won't expose right. Just like with the traditional method, this is done in the dark or in yellow light, but their emulsion seems to be a little less sensitive, because you can actually get away with just regular dim light if you're quick about it.

I actually prefer the traditional method over Yudu's "simplified" version. Though it does require that you invest in a scoop coater (around $20) and some liquid photo-emulsion (about $20 for a quart), it is much much cheaper in the end. The Yudu emulsion sheets are quite expensive – around $10 a pop. And that's for each time you burn an image! You can burn hundreds of images from a quart of photo-emulsion. Also, the Yudu emulsion sheet may be easier for a first-timer to apply, but I've found that after just a few tries with a scoop coater, you have a much easier time getting an even coat.

Here's the cool thing, though: while Yudu (conveniently) discourages you from using any materials that are not made by Yudu with their machine, I've heard that you can actually use a scoop coater and apply liquid emulsion to their screens.

To complete the screen preparation, you have to let the screen dry in the dark, and it must be horizontal so that the emulsion doesn't run or get thicker on one end. Here the Yudu does have a one-up, because it has a built-in light-safe drying rack with a fan.

Of course, with their ready-to-burn screens, Gocco wins the overall "easy" prize in this step.

3. Prepare your image.
With traditional screen printing or a Yudu, you print your image that you want to copy onto a transparency in opaque ink. The transparency will be layered with the coated screen so that the printed area blocks the light from those areas of the photo-emulsion, allowing them to be washed out later.

Transparencies are relatively easy to obtain, even ones that you can print on at home using an ink-jet printer.

Because Gocco screens have a heat-sensitive coating, you need a way to heat only the areas you want to burn out. This is done by printing your image onto plain paper using a carbon-based ink, and placing that under your screen. When the heat hits the carbon from above, it's reflected back up onto the screen, burning out the coating just in those areas.

It happens that carbon-based ink is also easy to find – both laser printers and photocopiers use it.

4. Burn the screen.

Here, the main issue with the traditional method is that you have to get together your own lighting set-up, which can get somewhat involved. You pretty much have to create a dark room with an exposure unit, but I won't go into all the details here.

Also, you have to figure out how long to expose the emulsion to the light. Too long, and the entire screen hardens, blocking out your image. Too short and you will end up washing out the whole screen, because none of it hardened. There's no formula because there are so many factors (the type of emulsion, the intensity of the light, the distance from the light to the screen...). You just have to get your set-up together and run some tests. Fortunately, once you find the key time for your set-up, if you do it the same way each time the exposure time should remain the same.

Yudu has an a built-in exposure unit. Also, if you use their emulsion sheets, they provide a pretty reliable exposure time on the packaging.

Gocco uses special flash bulbs to expose the screen to heat and burn out the image. These are for one-time use (they burn out with the first flash), and they're not cheap to replace. They are sold in packs for about $3 per bulb, and it takes two bulbs to expose one of the screens for the small unit. Also, just like the screens, they are discontinued, and therefore the price is unstable.

So, for burning your images, Yudu is easier than the traditional method, and more cost-effective than the Gocco. The traditional method is for those who like a challenge. (And who have an interior room without windows that can be tied up for a while as their dark room!)

5. Wash out the screen.

This is another step you get to skip if you're using a Gocco. (The burned-out coating on the Gocco screen actually sticks to the carbon-based ink on your master image, so when you pull your page away, the screen comes out clean already.) For both Yudu and the traditional method, you just have to rinse the screen with water while rubbing it with a soft sponge. Not hard to do, but kind of wet and messy.

6. Print the image.

Traditional screen printing and the Yudu both use a squeegee to deposit the ink. The Gocco has a neat way of trapping a layer of ink on top of the screen, and just by pressing down on it you push the ink through the screen.

The squeegee method actually requires two passes – one to spread the ink across the open areas of the screen, and then another to push it through. Both passes must be made with even pressure using the right amount of ink. You have to re-ink between each print, and if you're not careful, the ink can dry into the screen, requiring you to pause everything while you clean it out.

The Gocco method is comparatively fast and foolproof. The machine keeps the pressure even across the screen, and one application of ink lasts for several prints. Also, while the ink can dry and clog the screen, it doesn't happen as fast. Because the ink is trapped in that layer inside the machine, it's not exposed to air from all directions. This also makes the Gocco cleaner. So unless you're re-inking or you touch a wet print, you're not very likely to get it all over you. And getting ink on your hands isn't just annoying – it will ruin any print that you unwittingly handle before you notice it.

The one other thing you have to pay attention to in this step is where the image ends up on your print. Usually you're trying to center the image or line it up with something. There are two factors that could cause misalignment, or poor registration: the placement of the screen, and the placement of whatever you're printing on. The Yudu and Gocco have mechanisms to help with both of these issues, but with a little extra work and forethought, you can achieve proper registration with a traditional printing setup as well.

7. Printing multiple colors.

Registration really comes into play when you are printing something with multiple colors. If your one-color image is a couple of millimeters off from the center, but it has a two-inch border all the way around it, you're not going to notice the misalignment. But when you have two colors that are supposed to butt up against each other, a couple of millimeters really shows. This makes the extra help from the Yudu and Gocco even more important.

There are situations in which printing multiple colors is significantly easier. If all the colors in your design are spaced pretty far apart from each other (like if the closest distance between two different colors is, say, a quarter of an inch), you can expose them all onto the same screen. This is true for each method. With traditional printing and with the Yudu, you still have to do a print run for each color, blocking the other color areas with tape. But, not only are you saving screens (and the time it takes to burn them), you are keeping the screen in place while you switch colors, eliminating one of the two factors in registration. (You still have to make sure that what you're printing on is placed correctly.)

The Gocco has an even cooler trick up its sleeve. When multiple colors in your image are spaced apart, you can print them all on one screen, all in one pass! This is again because of the Gocco's special way of containing that layer of ink. It can be subdivided, as long as there's enough of a border in between. And when you press straight down on the machine to print, all the ink colors stay in their little divisions. (If you were dragging a squeegee across the screen, you can imagine how the colors would inevitably mix together.)

This ends up being a huge time-saver. A Gocco can cut printing time for a two-color print in half; a three-color design will print in one-third the time, etc. Really, you save even more time, because each time you have to register one color to another it gets more and more difficult.

COMPARISON CHART:

(skip to: Background, How the Methods Differ, Final Analysis)

So, that's A LOT of information to get through. I think a chart is in order, to help process everything. Let me see if I can pull out my old HTML skills from like 1997 and remember how to create a table...

	Traditional	Gocco	Yudu
average basic setup cost	$130¹	$200	$300
cost of additional screens	$20	$6	$28
screens are reusable	yes	-	yes
cost of additional emulsion (price per application)	less than $1	-	$10
cost of new bulbs for each exposure	-	$6	-
maximum image size	no limit	3-1/2"x5-1/2" ²	11"x14"
what you can print on	any flat surface, any size or thickness	can exceed image area, but must be thin enough to slide into the machine	can exceed image area, but must be thin enough to slide into the machine
combined exposure and printing unit	-	yes	yes
built-in drying rack	-	-	yes
easy registration	-	yes	yes
prints multiple colors at once	-	yes	-
ink application method	squeegee	press	squeegee
screen prep requires low light	yes	-	somewhat
availability of supplies	regular distribution in art supply stores, screen printing supply stores, and online	discontinued - limited availability in specialty stores and on auction sites	regular distribution in craft stores and online

Notes:

This rough estimate includes a screen frame, scoop coater, emulsion, glass, flood bulb, transparencies, tape, spatula, squeegee, hinge clamps, and ink
This information is for the smaller PG-5 unit, a replacement for the earlier B6.

FINAL ANALYSIS:

(skip to: Background, How the Methods Differ, Comparison Chart)

Ultimately, what you're probably hoping to get from this is whether you should invest in a traditional setup, a Gocco, or a Yudu. Or maybe you have one of these but you're considering switching. Everyone's needs are a little different, so I'll try to explain what I like and dislike about traditional screen printing, the Gocco, and the Yudu, and give examples of who I think would prefer each one.

Traditional screen printing

pros: least expensive option; most flexible with print size and technique

cons: takes longer to master; equipment takes up more space

who should buy: serious artists and designers who want a setup with the greatest range of options; hobbyists who want to make prints larger than 11"x14"

Gocco

pros: fastest and easiest to use; extremely compact

cons: discontinued, making it hard to get supplies; limited print size

who should buy: collectors; people who plan to do only a limited number of runs; people with very limited storage space

Yudu

pros: somewhat easier than traditional method; considerably more compact

cons: most expensive option; somewhat limited print size

who should buy: hobbyists, or artists/designers who only need to do basic printing; people with somewhat limited storage space

I hope that you have found this review helpful!