Stage 4: Final

The final stage consists of the last and darkest color. In this stage we cut away everything on the image that wasn't going to be the final color. My final color was a dark blue. This complemented the orange in my first color.

In my stage 2 and 3 I didn't have my ink mixture down the way I wanted it as well as I used too much ink. Beginning mistakes I believe. The last color went on nicely, but a lot of the white was lost when I applied the green in stage 2. Next time I'll know what I'm doing!

My favorite part of this print is the ground area. The original image was of a burl, or tumor-like piece of wood. I think that it worked really well to create this landscape feeling. I intentionally left some of the carving marks in this area (as in where the red and green meet. I wanted this to add texture to the piece as well as incorporate the process into the final outcome.

I think knowing what I do now, I would make the creature less busy. I would also perfect my inking technique as well. I think overall, though, that this piece turned out pretty well.

Stage 3

Stage three involved carving out the areas that we wanted to remain from stage two. This included our third color. My third color was red to complement the green from stage two. Unfortuneatly I used too much ink on this stage as well. At this stage the image really starts to become clear!

Stage 2

Stage two consisted of carving cout what we wanted to remain as our first printed color, so for me it was carving out that which I wanted to remain orange. This stage used our second color, which for me was green, which would complement my third color, red. I used a green that leaned more toward yellow than blue. This color still needed to be pretty light.

Stage 1

After the planning process was complete we began carving. The first stage of carving was to carve that which we wanted to be white. This stage is crucial in planning for a nice final result. The white details can't be added in later, so it is important to plan all this from the start.

After the carving was done, I created my first color, a light neutralized orange. This is the result.

AH HA!

Here we are, mostly completed! I may need to do something with the fish. Maybe some aquatint. We'll see what I turn in next week!