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Author: Sarah_Wittmer, Contributing Editor
| While assembling, remember this: This is not a rocket science. Your plate will NOT end up being exactly like your sketch, so don't be afraid to change it a bit. If it doesn't line up, who cares? Your prints will each be slightly different anyway, so no one's gonna know if your plate's not exactly like your sketch.
Cut your pieces out with your exacto knife. Rule of thumb when building your plate: the ink will stay in the crevices and be wiped off the high parts. This means the lines AROUND your pieces will be printed, not necessairly the piece itself. Make sense? No? Well, you'll see. Gluing: thin down your white glue with some water (maybe about 1 part water to 1-2 parts glue). Make the consistency somewhat like this: |
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| Grab an old paintbrush and brush the glue on the area your piece will be (isn't it handy to have the sketch on the plate?) and place your piece down, then brush glue on top of the piece as well. Not too thick, unless you want the glue texture to show, but thick enough to put it firmly in place. Brush it around good and spread it out. (You could probably do this without a picture, but I took one so you're getting it!) |  |
| When you glue your pieces down, make sure there's some kind of line/crevice there. There needs to be enough of a change in elevation on your plate for the ink to settle into. On the above photograph, see the line between the two pieces of the beak? Absolutely necessary. In real life, that's about 1/8" of an inch; you don't necessarily need that much, but you need to be able to see the difference between the two pieces.
Repeat the above as necessary. More assembly on my plate: |
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| A note on fabrics: first of all, I have no idea whether this will print the way I want it to or not, so play with it. And I know I'm breaking my own rule of being able to see the plate between two pieces, but there's enough of a change between pieces elevation-wise that I think the distinction will print. Rule of thumb: if it can cast a shadow onto the lower layer under moderately strong directional light, it changed enough. Regular printer paper won't do that, it's too thin.
Here's the finished plate, to the right. When I snapped the picture, the glue and acrylic medium on the background were not dry, that accounts for the shine. (That texture won't print, by the way; it was a failed experiment. That's what collagraphs are all about, experimenting.) Let it dry overnight. Next step: sealing the plate. I didn't take pictures of this step, because I did it at school and didn't want to bring the digital camera to school to photograph something so mundane. 'Sides, you're smart, you can figure it out for yourself. |  |
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