Vast

"It wasn’t ever going to stop raining because Day-oos was angry and she was going to drown but what better way to go? She saw it clearly. Her little body floating upside down in a vast green sea. It was too late to make a raft, too late to apologize or pray. But she was naked as the day she was born and was slippery with Day-oos’ wet earth."

Pages 3-4 are basically finished. Perhaps a few more final touches, but it looks like if I work pretty hardcore for the next week, I can get two pages done a day.




Finally, how I do the text:

First, I format it on the computer. It took me a while, but I finally decided on Adobe Jensen Pro for my font. Then, I upload the files (which I do in Photoshop, which I know is a more annoying way, but it's the way I know and it works so leave it) into the school's lasercutter Illustrator template. The laser cutter etches the text into the plexiglass. It looks like this, only less blurry:



Then I smear some Charbonnel Etching Ink (it's oil based, unlike screen printing ink which is water based) over the entire thing until its all in the letters. I wipe it clean so only the letters have ink on them:



Then I place the plate on the etching press, which looks similar to this:



Then I take the vellum, which all this time has been soaking in water (for at least half an hour) and smooth it over the plate. I smooth the felt on the press over the plate and the vellum and then roll. Once I've rolled over the plate once, I remove the felt and peel off the vellum, which now looks like this:



Yes, it's a hell of a process, but I think it's totally worth it. The text is slightly embossed, it's a little more inky than it would have been if I had simply printed, and it smells like ink, which I just love. There's nothing like getting high off your art. I also love the smeared, rubbed quality that is in some places on the text where I didn't rub the ink away quite enough. One of the ideas behind the execution of this book is tactile. Everything except for the etching is done by hand.

Ugh. First day of final crits is tomorrow. A week and a half left of school.