I bought a carving kit! Haven't been able to do printmaking since school and was stoked to try again. I started experimenting with erasers and scribbled markers on them for printing ink. For the Machinarium robot, I drew directly on the eraser. For the others, I drew on paper and transferred using tracing paper.

Then I was ready to use the silicone that came with the kit. This was for an Alzheimer's Association fundraiser. I made the design digitally, but again transferred with graphite by tracing over a print. This was my first layered piece and getting the stamps to align was a CHALLENGE. I also bought real ink for this! Fingers crossed that people actually want to buy them.

After this, I was out of carving materials and ready to try real linoleum. I thought copying the movie pose would make this easy but I wanted to make Optimus look more mechanical and that took FOREVER. I also overestimated how fine I could make the details. I researched how to do image transfers and found out about printing on the smooth backing of sticker paper. It worked so much better than expected! I got stamp ink pads from my grandma, so I could better stain the lino to see my progress. Very helpful! Unfortunately the cheap speedball tool I was using to carve is probably supposed to be reserved for the silicone because this was a pain (literally) to carve. Still! I'm happy to have completed something >:)

Next I'm working on a four-layer design to print Shredhead. I can't go long without making (or commissioning) something for them!