Monday, October 26, 2009

Part 4 - Care & Storage of Photopolymer Plates

This is the the final of four photopolymer plate sets of instruction that I will be posting. If you have purchased a Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate kit from me, everything you need to know is contained in these documents.

Part 4 – Care & Storage of Photopolymer Plates

This lesson covers guidelines for care and storage of photopolymer plates. The information contained is for your own personal use and may not be copied or distributed in any way without permission. If you would like to link to this lesson, please link to this post and not directly to the PDF. Thank you!

Download Photopolymer Plate Instructions Part 4 – How do I use, clean & store my photopolymer plates?

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Part 3 - Developing Plates With Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate Kit

This is the third of four photopolymer plate sets of instruction that I will be posting. If you have purchased a Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate kit from me, everything you need to know is contained in these documents.

Part 3 – Developing Plates with Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate Kit

This lesson covers guidelines for developing plates with your Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate Kit. The information contained is for your own personal use and may not be copied or distributed in any way without permission. If you would like to link to this lesson, please link to this post and not directly to the PDF. Thank you!

Download Photopolymer Plate Instructions Part 3: Developing plates with Two Olives Studio Kit

Two Olives Studio, Copyright 2009

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Thursday, August 20, 2009

Part 1 - Art Requirements for Photopolymer Plates

Thank you all for your patience, comments & support as we have been working the bugs out of these instructions.

This is the first of four photopolymer plate lessons that I will be posting. If you have purchased a Two Olives Studio Photopolymer Plate kit from me, everything you need to know is contained in these documents.

Part 1 – Photopolymer Plate Instructions, Art Requirements

This lesson covers guidelines for choosing the artwork and directions for printing on photonegative film. The information contained is for your own personal use and may not be copied or distributed in any way without permission. If you would like to link to this lesson, please link to this post and not directly to the PDF. Thank you!

Download Photopolymer Plate Lesson 1: Art Requirements

Two Olives Studio, Copyright 2009

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Tuesday, March 03, 2009

Photopolymer Plates Part Two:  How to use a Stouffer Gage

In order to determine how long an exposure should be, the printing industry standard is the Stouffer Gauge. This is a piece of continuous tone film that is 1/2” x 5”. The first step shown is #2 which is a light grey, progressing up to #21 which is a very saturated black. Photopolymer plates each have a target exposure on the Stouffer Gauge for optimal results. For a 145HSB plate from Boxcar Press, the 21-step exposure scale target is 19-20. The way to determine your length of exposure is to cut a 1/2“x5” piece of photopolymer, weight the film strip ink side down under glass, then expose your strip at an initial time. Wash your plate out after your exposure under tepid water using a soft brush. The image will be solid up to a certain number on the scale, then it will start to have pinholes and disappear entirely. If 1 hour yields a result of 3 and your goal is 12, you have to multiply by 4.0, so you would need to expose for 12 hours.

Rules for Increasing Exposure Time:
To increase by 1 Step, multiply original exposure by 1.4
2 STEPS X2.0
3 STEPS X2.8
4 STEPS X4.0

This is the answer to getting consistent great results with your photopolymer plates. Check back for Part 3 soon!

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