Introducing polyester plate lithography
After having a go at paper litho I am trying out polyester plate lithography.
The principle is the same, but the polyester plates are specially made for lithography and are stronger and easier to use than freezer paper plates.
How does polyester plate lithography work?
Lithography is a resist process, based on the fact that oil and water don’t mix.
The surface of the modern polyester plate is made hold water. When you draw, paint or print on it with waterproof materials these block the plate and make waterproof areas which will attract oil-based ink, while the wet areas will repel the ink.
The un-inked areas are helped to hold water by washing them over with a weak gum arabic solution. When the inky roller passes over the plate, the plain wet areas don’t accept any ink, but the ink is deposited on the drawn lines. When you print the plate on paper the printed image looks like the drawing on the plate but in reverse.
Answers to some questions
“I’ve heard of Lithograph prints but not sure what they are….?”
Lithography was developed in the late eighteenth century as a way of making multiple copies of images. The original process involved artists drawing on heavy smooth limestone slabs using grease-based media. After various stages of etching the stones and curing the drawings hundreds of paper copies could be reproduced from the original drawing.
Because the prints had a wide range of tone and faithfully reproduced the quality of the original drawings large editions of fine art lithographs were produced by artists during the 19th Century, as well as posters and illustrations for magazines and books.
Artists still work with stone lithography, but the process is quite involved and specialised equipment needs hefty lifting. This traditional process has been made much easier and safer with modern materials, particularly polyester lithography plates which you can use rather like paper for drawing or photocopying on to, and then print with an etching press.
“It seems complicated – why do you want to do it?”
It isn’t really complicated – just different from the more common relief and intaglio processes you may be familiar with. This is one of those techniques that you have to do to get the hang of it – just reading or even watching it does not always give you the whole picture.
Using photos and text
Polyester plate lithography is a way of incorporating photos and text into hand printmaking. Because plates can be made from laser prints it is easy to adapt your photos into litho plates and print them.
This image shows a polyester litho plate on the left, with a black and white laser copied image of coral. The image on the right is a print on paper taken from the plate.
Reproducing drawings
It also enables you to reproduce drawings which retain the quality of the original pencil or ink lines. When I started exploring it, I felt excited by the prospect of using images from my sketchbooks.
Because you can make plates from laser copies the plate can be an exact copy of the original drawing. Lithography retains the natural dynamism of quick sketches whereas other print processes seem move the image away from the original spontaneous marks when you try to convert them into a printing plate with, say, lino cut.
The image shows a laser print of part of a larger drawing on a polyester litho plate on the left, and a print from the plate on the right.
As part of a ‘one minute drawing‘ warm up I did a brush drawing of a shell on paper and wanted to create a polyester litho plate from this. the image shows the original drawing in brown, a laser copy (slightly reduced in size) and below that the litho plate and the print from it in green.
This is a great way to take your quick sketches into prints and develop the work in different directions.
Polyester litho experiments
I feel I am just at the beginning with polyester plate lithography, but have got hooked on it after a short while of playing.
Here are some of my experiments with a brief explanation of what I did – I hope these may inspire you to have a go yourself.
Drawing materials
In this sample I used a sharpie pen, a roller ball pen, a china marker crayon and a big marker pen.
All these are waterproof, and the china marker is greasy like an oil pastel. They all printed very successfully from the polyester lithography plate.
I would suggest doing a test plate with samples of the pens, pencils and crayons you have, before embarking on a detailed drawing as some pens don’t come out when printed.
Here is the print from the test plate. This shows the variety of line quality you can get by using different materials. (The two lines next to the sharpie were done with a soft graphite pencil.)
Painting materials
To paint directly on the polyester lithography plate you need waterproof materials. I used shellac (shown as ‘knotting’ here) this was very successful and I splashed it on to get random blobs. See the drawn plate below for an example.
Gloss medium totally sealed the plate and also worked well when printed. (don’t use it too thick – dilute with water before painting) The heavy lines on the left of the plate below are done with gloss medium.
Acrylic ink was easy to use and successful. I wiped and scraped some lines in it before it dried. This is shown in the strip along the bottom of the plate below.
Adding text to prints
I left a plain area on the litho plate with the drawing of the shell – this was to make room for some text.
Lorca’s poem ‘Seashell’ seemed just right….
I almost forgot to reverse it!
The poem is laser printed directly onto a polyester lithography plate. I inked this up in a contrasting colour and overprinted it onto the shell print.
Printing on different types of paper
You can print polyester litho plates on all types of paper, as well as on fabric.
I find it works best to make the paper damp if you are using thick or textured paper, (eg watercolour paper).
However, if your paper is very thin or smooth dry paper works fine. The image shows the coral plate printed on Hosho paper, and the tree s are on lens paper. Both of these are great for chine colleé.
The polyester lithography plate inking process
I bought my polyester lithography plates from Handprinted, but various other places on line also sell them.
To see the inking process in action here is a link to Handprinted’s video of it using the polyester lithography plates they sell.
More ideas and examples please!
I am just getting started with polyester plate lithography, and I feel it has so much potential . I am keen to have a go at combining it with other printmaking techniques, like mono prints and collagraphs.
If you have experience of lithography and have tried any interesting experiments, or have any handy tips to share I’d welcome any input you may have on this subject. Please leave your comments below.
(nb the comments are moderated so may not show up immediately.)
12 thoughts on “Polyester plate lithography”
Thankyou Emily for introducing me to the polyester plate. I have just come to a crossroads with my printmaking where it is becoming more difficult because of arthritis to carve my lino prints. Polyester plates offer me an exciting alternative. The whole process (I remember the heavy litho stones from college days) will be a relearning curve but a fun challenge!
Please keep your blogs coming.
I am sure you are not the only printmaker looking for techniques that are less hard on your hands – I do hope this one works for you, I think it has lots of potential…..
Thank you Patricia for highlighting this as a technique that may help us with arthritis and other illnesses that are affecting our ability to make prints.
I’ve looked at both paper and polyester lithography and had not thought to cast that lens over the processes.
I have a lot of laser polyester plates (a matt and a shiny side), I used for making screen printing positives, they were expensive so I do hope they work for this technique.
Thanks for your comment Jenny – I feel some research into ‘arthritis friendly printmaking’ coming on!
Hi Emily
I do so enjoy your emails and the experimentation that you do with printing. I am planning to have time to concentrate on printing soon. I have had my printing press for ages and not made enough use of it. Thank you so much for sharing your process. Your work is wonderful and your ideas never stop. Thank you! Kind regards Caroline
thanks Caroline – I hope you get round to using your press soon, once you get going you may not be able to stop!
Fabulous! For my next project I thought i was going to have to use aluminium photo-litho plates and all that jazz. But these sound that it’s all so much simpler, can be done easily at home. Etc. Wow.
Are the plates double sided? How re-useable are they? How floppy are they when wet – especially in the full size? If really floppy, it would be a pain to get registration right…
I’m glad to help make your printmaking life simpler!
The polyester plates from Handprinted are the same on both sides, it sounds as if there are also plates with matt and shiny sides (see previous comment) which may be a bit different. I’m not sure if you can re-use the other side, on mine it got mucky and I imagine the grease from handling and inking would have spoilt the surface but I could be wrong.
They are flexible but tough, I wouldn’t describe them as floppy really, a bit like an acetate for an overhead projector. if you hold them at opposite corners the other corners don’t drop down, being wet doesn’t alter this. I used A4 size as I was laser copying onto them and registration wouldn’t be a problem, bigger ones may need some planning but should be ok.
Sounds brilliant! I’ve an A3 etching press shamefully gathering dust – but I’ve been so absorbed doing line drawings that it’s been forgotten. Wanting to get back to tone, I see in your shell print, areas that look like tusche work that lithographers can get on stone (poor dears). How does a polyester plate do that? Or perhaps you’d put that on paper already…. I thought it would be necessary to go to the Edinburgh Print Workshop, refresh on their photolithography course, and have to use their plates, lighthouse, chemistry and so on. But now I am free!!
Hi David
i think you were looking at the plate when you describe the tonal area – this was acrylic ink and that particular brand didnt show up when printed on paper unfortunately. I agree with you – the challenge is to get some good tonal ranges. I have read on line that you can use laser toner powder mixed to varying consistencies (in alcohol?) and then heat fixed with a hairdryer or heat gun. I intend to give this a go unless you beat me to it!
Well, that’s amazing! Some very complex line drawings transferred absolutely perfectly. I did find that the sponge took off some of the laser ‘ink’ on the plate. Perhaps they need a bit of heat curing? I found slices of car washing cellulose sponge was softer on the plate and left a better water film than the sponge-on-a-stick brushes.
Tone: I wonder of Indian ink is sufficiently ‘particulate’ to do the trick. Not tried that yet. For some architectural photos, I half-toned them in the puter using the free software Gimp. Early days. It very nearly worked. I might try different amounts of gum arabic in the water. Or a softer sponge still, Or even a misting spray… or a more thickened ink… Incidentally, posh lithographers insist on magnesium carbonate powder (‘mag’ to them). In fact, calcium carbonate powder is every bit as good, and apparently in wide use in commercial circles….
I printed in colour, so that I could judge how the place was inking up. It’s jusy occurred to me that plates could be chopped up, either by scissors or computer, and the sections coloured up separately, reassembled on the press, and run off…
Etc. Head spinning.. Lol
Hi David
another suggestion is to make the gum arabic water more acidic by adding citric acid or vinegar – this helps to avoid the ink scumming on the surface of the plate.
I started using a water spray bottle instead of sponges and found this helps avoid smudging the ink.
it sounds as if the quest for half tones continues!