Let’s See That Printed: Dead On Paper’s Extraordinary Tarot Card Prints

Posted on October 28, 2016 by Rebecca Miller

As soon as Chris Ovdiyenko’s masterfully intricate and eerily beautifully illustrated Arcana tarot card designs passed through our platemaking department, we were eager to learn more about the project and how it was to be printed. Chris from Dead on Paper filled us in on the gorgeous work (and let us know where we could snag a print or two)!

All prints are 11×14” on Stonehenge Natural White, printed with Van Son Universal Black. I’m printing them on a 1907 Peerless platen press. As you can see from the images, I’m using a Boxcar Base (love it!!), and gauge pins from Boxcar Press also.

In order to get good coverage, I’ve cranked up the pressure a fair amount and hand turn the fly wheel. Although my press is motorized, with the increased pressure the motor and belt assembly isn’t able to make it through a full cycle as it takes a fair amount of effort to get it through to the point where the platen touches paper.

There are 45 different designs with a total run of 3000 prints. At this point, I’ve completed about 1800 of them. The most difficult part, as you would imagine, are the ones with large areas of flat black. Luckily I have the technique down to where there’s only a minimum of “salting” which actually adds some nice character to the prints.

Just a quick word about the plates – they are amazing! I started out relief printing with laser etched wooden plates, and what a world of difference photopolymer plates have made for me! I outfitted my press from Boxcar and love the high-quality plates, excellent service, and speedy turnaround!

Huge round of thanks out to Chris at Dead on Paper for letting us get a closer look at these brilliant poster designs! And be sure to snag a print here!

Important Numbers to Remember in Boxcar Platemaking 101

Posted on August 16, 2012 by Cathy

Everyday at Boxcar Press we throw around these numbers on the phone, in emails and to each other. Some of us have even been known to mumble them in our sleep at night. What makes them so special above all others? See if you can guess what each one stands for.

94, 95, 145, 148, 152, 175: all of the plate types sold by Boxcar Press. The higher the number, the thicker the plate. 94 and 152 are available as both plastic backed and metal backed plates. If the number is followed by “SB”, it is a steel backed plate, not the number of stolen bases.

1:00: the time designated as the cut off or deadline for ordering same day rush service – 1:00pm EST to be exact.

6:00: the cut off time in the evening (again, Eastern standard time!) for creating a job ticket and submitting files for one day turnaround.

17 and 22: the largest plate size we can make in our platemakers that will fit on our Vandercook proofing press. If your files measure greater than 17″ x 22″, break them up and submit 2 files. You can always put them back together on your press to make letterpress love.

62 and 67: pricing per square inch for platemaking – $0.62/sq. inch for plates with the number 94 or 95 in their plate name; $0.67/sq. inch for plates with the number 145, 148, 152 and 175 in their plate name. And for some of you, ’67 may have meant the summer of love in San Francisco.

30: minimum charge for platemaking – $30 per job ticket. Also the cost of overnight air shipping via UPS in the US.

.35 and .25: the minimum guaranteed line thickness for our plates measured in points (pt). Lines should be .25pt for 94/95 plates and .35pt for anything larger. Remember, dotted lines are considered dots and not lines. Dots have their own special numbers and shouldn’t feel slighted at all.

1 and 1.25: preferred dot thickness for our plates, also measured in points. Proper dot thickness helps those individual, stand-alone-by-themselves dots to stand firm and tall and press boldly into your paper.

0.5: the number in inches we add to your platemaking dimensions for the height and width. This half inch is needed for the platemaking process.

.875 and .853: the thicknesses for the standard Boxcar base and the deep relief Boxcar base. And some really good bowling scores after 3 games.

.918: this is an easy one. This refers to type high, or the standard height of type. However, it also could refer to the Porsche 918 Spyder or the name of a letterpress club at the Lancaster Heritage Center Museum Print Shop in Lancaster, Pennsylvania (the 918 Club).

Now these numbers will have special significance for you too!

Workspace Spotlight: The Arm

Posted on May 8, 2012 by Cathy

As studios go, The Arm in New York might be one of the best hidden secrets. If you go before it opens, you might wander up and down this Brooklyn street wondering if you are in the correct location. There is no sign, just some apartments, empty-looking warehouses with metal rolling doors, and a small corner store. The street number is right but still nothing to say “here it is”. But minutes before the 11 am hour, a couple of people wander up. They carry paper and what could be a plastic printing plate.

This looks promising. And on the hour, a skateboarder arrives, unlocks the door, rolls up the metal rolling cover to show a big picture window and its welcome to The Arm. Here there are the presses, the notices on the window. The activity begins as many more printers arrive in succession.

Daniel Morris of The Arm describes what’s inside.

THE PRESSES: I am a bit of a freak for late model Vandercooks. I have two SP-15s, two Universal Is and two Universal IIIs. For smaller work there are a couple of C&P Pilots and a Kwikprint 86 foil stamping press. Because I also recondition presses there are often one or two others in some state of restoration at any given time. The equipment has been chosen very carefully to be safe and suitable for a shared work environment.

SIZE OF PRINTSHOP: 1500 square feet

THE LOCATION: The Arm is on the ground floor of a renovated nineteenth century stables building in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The studio takes up the bulk of the ground floor. I built the glass shopfront so that it opens 8 feet wide — getting equipment in and out is a breeze.

FAVORITE THING ABOUT THE SHOP: The way I have laid out the space, the press room is visible from the street, but the type room is tucked away. This was to make sure that passers-by could see what was going on from the street, but also to make sure that people weren’t too distracted when composing type forms.

TYPE OF SHOP: Community + educational. I set it up specifically to be able to share it, my presses and my knowledge of printing. I teach classes from the space almost every week and make the presses available for people to use for their own projects. We’ve got quite a community of printers here in NYC. It is far more fun in the space when there are a few people in working.

MOST VALUABLE SHOP TOOL: The trusty .918 roller setting gauge.

FAVORITE INK: We use the Van Son Rubber Base Plus system and maintain an inventory of all the base colors for the Pantone mixing system. With these inks, a Pantone book and a scale you can’t go wrong.

SOLVENT OF CHOICE: I use Gamsol for washup. It is an artist’s grade mineral spirits. We keep it in Justrite plunger cans and make sure all waste rags end up in our sealed Justrite waste cans. I’m a bit militant about shop safety protocol, MSDS sheets, etc.

PLATES AND BASE OF CHOICE: I am very fond of the standard base and the KF95 plates. I don’t like the deep relief plates, but do have a couple of small deep relief bases for people that bring them in. There must be nearly a dozen Boxcar bases here at The Arm.

FLOOR PLAN TIPS: Make sure your press is situated where you feel comfortable and have good light. Get yourself a good anti-fatigue mat (I love the 2×6 Uline Cadillac mats for Vandercooks) and your feet, legs and back will thank you.

PIED TYPE: I am proud to say my shop has no pied type. As one of the owners of The Dale Guild Type Foundry, I love to work with metal type, but my policy is to sort the good stuff and melt the bad. May as well turn it back into something useful- we can smelt old foundry type to make new type and Linotype metal, Monotype, etc. we give to our machinist to melt down to make fishing sinkers. You’ve got to keep your machinist happy.

ORGANIZATION ADVICE: Down time is critical. Sometimes you just need to take everything apart, clean like crazy, and put it all back together.

PRINTING ADVICE: Coffee and good records are key [to making the space feel creative and comfortable]. But it is important that the music isn’t too loud that you can’t hear when the press is trying to tell you something.

Big round of thanks to Dan Morris for letting us get the grand tour of The Arm!

Threaded

Posted on March 23, 2012 by carrie.valenzuela

This is a photopolymer plate mounted on our Boxcar base, the handy-dandy metal slab that brings the plate to standard type height. The lovely modern design is Bella Figura‘s Threaded by Tara Hogan. To see the printed piece + more info, go to Bella Figura!

Microscopic View

Posted on January 30, 2012 by carrie.valenzuela

Here is a part of a very common printer’s tool. Can you identify it? Here’s a hint: rhymes with coin fee.

Say hi to some of our pressmen!

Posted on November 28, 2011 by carrie.valenzuela

It’s Tim, the back of Lou & peeping Dave – all letterpress printers here at Boxcar Press!

Boxcar Talk With Kseniya Thomas

Posted on November 9, 2011 by Rebecca Miller

Six years working at a cozy letterpress shop– especially one that’s basking in sunny Pennsylvania — is going to create some nifty pieces and fine design. Or at least it will inspire an entire weekend devoted to the art of the letterpress, ala The Ladies of Letterpress conference. After working in Mainz, Germany for a half-year of traditional typesetting and printing before opening up shop (Thoma-Printers), Kseniya Thomas’s love of letterpress is founded on skill, encouragement, and a big scoop of care. Here, Kseniya weighs in on the letterpress community, printing adventures, and her love of miniatures.

LIVE, WORK & DIRECT I’m Kseniya Thomas, and I’m a recovering English major from Salt Lake City. I currently live and work in Pennsylvania, where I’ve been happy to call myself a letterpress printer since 2005. I own Thomas-Printers, a commercial letterpress shop, and, with Jessica White of Heroes and Criminals Press, am the co-director of Ladies of Letterpress. I’m crazy for the Tour de France, old houses, running, newspapers, and anything in miniature.

INSPIRED BY GUTENBERG After graduating from college, I had a fellowship to study and work in Germany for a year. A friend and I happened to go to Mainz one weekend (I loved movable type, but didn’t yet fully understand the implications!), where the Gutenberg Museum has a working letterpress print shop. I wrote and asked if they accepted interns, and they did, so I moved to Mainz. I worked there for six months, and learned how to set type and print from guys who had spent their whole careers in print shops as pressmen, stonemen, or compositors before offset printing edged them out.

It was great: the shop has hundreds of lead typefaces, and I could print whatever I wanted. I also once printed a birth announcement for a princess, which was neat. I had no idea at the time that I had found my calling in life; even after I returned to the U.S., and realized that letterpress was happening here, I still only knew the basics of the history of printing and the craft of letterpress. And I knew nothing about running a small business!

A SUNNY SHOP My shop is located in the corner of an old shoe factory, with a room for shipping, receiving, and communications (ie, email), and a pressroom with a loading dock. The best thing about it is the tall, south-facing windows; in the summer, the only light I need is my color-correct lamp. I don’t think I’ll ever have another shop so sunny. It’s not decorated per se, except in a paper-stack, envelope-inventory, sample-shelf sort of way. It’s more workshop than showroom, so I don’t worry about hanging too much on the walls.

CARE FOR YOUR BUSINESS My best business advice is to learn to love your customers like family. They need care and attention just like family, and are the single thing, even more than hard work, that will keep you in business. Also, if you’re just starting out, don’t get caught up in playing catch-up with more established printers; there is no right way or one way to get where you want in this business, so your way is as likely to succeed as anyone else’s.

DESIGNED FOR PRINT I’m a printer who can design in a pinch, but I work with several great designers who can handle it when things get complicated. It’s nice being able to have designers who are familiar enough with the letterpress process that the finished product is going to print up great.

THE DAILY GRIND I do print full time. And when I’m not printing, I’m doing the 1000 other things a small business owner must do. Chief among them: worry, answer emails, write estimates, talk with clients, and a host of other pre-press, post-press, finishing, and ordering duties. Every day is different and yet comfortably similar, and now that I’ve been doing it full time for six years or so, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

ADVANCING A COMMUNITY I’m proud that Thomas-Printers is surviving the economy and doing well. Most recently, I’m proud of Jessica and I for organizing the best conference I’ve ever attended. The Ladies of Letterpress conference was such a happy, fun letterpress-fest, and it was thrilling to see so many ardent letterpress supporters and printers in one place.

It was also encouraging to see that letterpress is still going strong, new people are starting to print every day, and people are loving what we make more than ever. I cannot wait for a repeat next year!

BOXCAR’S ROLE It’s not an exaggeration to say that, without Boxcar, neither Thomas-Printers nor Ladies of Letterpress would exist. I got my start setting type, but setting type for every client isn’t a good business model for me. So the Boxcar Base is as important and valuable a tool as the press itself. Aside from the base and plates, Boxcar is the friendliest, fastest, nicest supplier I work with; the positive attitude and enthusiasm of the owners and staff has in turn contributed to the good-feeling and camaraderie in the letterpress community.

PRESS HISTORY My first press was a 12×18 Chandler & Price that I bought from Bill Welliver through the Letpres listserv. I used it for everything, large and small, for almost three years, until I bought a 10×15 C&P that allegedly only had had one owner and then sat in storage for 30 years. I also have a treadle-powered 8×12, which is handy when the power goes out. C&Ps are great presses, simple to use and relatively readily available, and are capable of a lot of fine work.

WHAT’S NEXT Ladies of Letterpress will be at the 2012 National Stationery Show for a third year with a new, super, wonderful, talented group of printers. And the second-annual LOLP conference is happening again-stay tuned for more details.

We’d like to give bigs thanks to Kseniya for taking the time to give us the scoop on Thomas Printers!

Field trip to Platemaking

Posted on November 1, 2011 by carrie.valenzuela

Greg peels a plate off the washout unit on the platemaker. In the water are brushes that have taken off non-inking areas of the plate.

Early letterpress block

Posted on October 26, 2011 by carrie.valenzuela

Here is a piece of Harold’s metal cut ( or illustration ) collection: A bride in classic form.

Boxcar Press: Letterpress Tips on Youtube

Posted on October 18, 2011 by

We may be into letterpress printing & doing things the old-fashioned way around here, but we’re into modern technology, too — did you know we’re on Youtube?? We’re sharing some of the printing tips and techniques we’ve learned along the way. We’re always looking to share new ideas, too, so get in touch if you have some tips to share! The video below gives tips on how to use 1 plate to print multiple colors, but that’s just a sampling of what’s in store (so be sure to visit)! And don’t forget, we’re on Facebook & Twitter, too!

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