OUGD504. Design Production. Rossington Street Embossing session.

Today we had a session in the other building about embossing and debossing. What you emboss has to be weaker than what you emboss with.

Whether the emboss is In Relief or deboss(Americanism) . Can be on certain woods, mdf, metals, cards. With wood it can't be too thick because then the emboss won't work. The stencil to emboss with has to be in reverse. 

Metal works better with embossing. It depends on the time left for the embossing to be right. 

Etching doesn't do cleanly it's more rough 

Have to catch it at the riht time so enough is exposed but not too much is cut away. 

If making a book cover you have to emboss it all so that the back side of the card isn't too thick compared to the flattened front. 

You can get photo etching for embossing but can't have halftone has to be binary format image. Tiny fonts don't work - nothing below 10 pt and generally sans serif because serifs can get lost. 

For business cards make a grid instead of single ones.

Can't really achieve colour with embossing because the colour doesn't stay in the well so the card doesn't make contact with the ink but if you rolled ink over the plate. You can get a background colour. 

Have to make sure the plate is clean and smooth. 

Then you've got to degrease the surface and rinse it. Then you've got to blot the plate because it's the best method of drying. 

Then place the plate on the press.

Then use light sensitive paper 

Then lay it over the surface of the plate and lay an acetate over it and put the blankets down and using the press as tight as it goes the film gets crushed to the copper plate. Don't touch the film or acetate while on the plate because it will mess the process up. 

Then wind it back through the press to seal it further. And then it should be completely sealed. Using the edge of the plate trim the excess off the plate so it's just the fair face area of the plate covered by the film. 

Then you have to develop the plate. Using a solution use 10g of the powder mixed with hot water then cold water and about a litre to mix and it should be about.18 degrees. 

Then you've got to expose the plate using the uv light box. The exposure has to be the right way round unlike screen printing. 

To do photoetching use a random dot screen to expose the image onto. Half tone doesn't really work. 

Having exposed the screen you have to remove the film and put it in the solution to develop. 

You can safely overdevelop it without it really messing up for up to ten minutes. Very forgiving. Sponge the plate every 30 seconds to remove the layer that's been eroded away.

Looking for the copper to shine and then it should be about exposed. Be careful of excess on the plate. Then  Rinse it under cold water. Check the plate under light to check any dots on it. 

Then it needs to be dried off and post hardened on the light box so it's secure to the plate. 

To emboss put the plaTe on news paper then put paper on top and then tissue on top to soften the press. 

Then pump the handle to push the press up and then it'll apply the pressure. Keep pumpin til you get to about 350 bar of pressure. The. Undo the screw thread to release the hydrolic press and take it out. 

Back to the etching plate -

Take the plate out the light box then tape it to a sheet of paper using parcel tape. 

Then trim off the exess around the plate. Then line the hook to the plate and tape it to the plate. 

Then hang the plate in the trough and leave for 7 hours but keep rotating it to keep the erosion even.