Here is one of my prints that "didn't work." It's of corn drying out in a corn crib. What went wrong? Well, my guess is that it might be too detailed for it's size (4X6in). Also, perhaps a keyline plate would help. There seems to not be enough separation between the various tonal values to show the various structural elements. It was printed on a basswood board, and one of those boards has a beautiful warp to it. Yep, disasters seem to be endless with this print. Anyway, what do you think could be done to save this print?

Here is the present image I am working on to convert to a woodblock intended to be sent off to the KIWA exhibition. That is if it comes off as an acceptable print. As you can tell by now, not all of my prints turn out as "dazzlers." At present my prints are based on photographic images. I have a great passion for large format black and white film photography (I do own a digital camera, but rarely admit it). At present, I am using woodblock as a means to combine my love of printmaking and photography. I am attracted to photography's ability to catch the reality of life, but want to offset it's intense perfect capture with the humanness of the hand. Sometimes it works, and sometimes . . . Figuring out how to make the transformation remains a quest.

These are water lilies, that successfully fulfilled their life cycle, and are now face down in the reality of a snowy and harsh Wisconsin winter. Even in death, they display much of the beauty they had in life.

On my second attempt at producing an edition of this print, I first corrected the problems with the image that existed in the "black" plate by using "wood filler". When I tried it the first edition I printed, the wood filler would bust off the plate under the pressure of the baren. This time after adding and shaping the wood filler, I coated it with a 50/50 solution of shellac/denatured alcohol. It seemed to work as I had none of the previous problems of the wood filler busting away from the plate. I also tried using less of the methyl cellulose binder this time to reduce the amount of mottling in the inked areas. The first edition was printed on Torinoko paper, and this second edition print was printed on Echizen Kozo paper. A simply beautiful paper that I feel added to the quality of the image.