Solar, Photopolymer or Sun Plate Workshop

This weekend I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to participate in a Solar, Photopolymer or Sun Plate workshop at Studio 54 with the Print Sisters Annie Day and Robyn Ezra, you can read about them here  I have had a little experience with making this type of plate / printmaking but was quite interested in their approach and the technique for inking the plates a la poupee.

The first step in the process is to organise both suitable images and then to have them copied onto overhead transparency sheets. I selected a couple of photos and images that I thought may be suitable and they were reproduced.

The next part of the process was make test strips. The plates are expensive and it is better to do a small test plate to determine the time that the plates need to be exposed to the sun or UV light box.

The small tests strips are inked and details of exposure recorded for reference.

Once you are happy with the exposure a full plate is made and things can still go wrong,

Rosie

The original photograph of my cat Rosie.

The plate

First print and Ghost print using traditional inking method.

A la poupee

Raven

Drawing onto drafting paper.

Test strip and inking onto scrap paper.

Feathers

Print from test strip

Printed using traditional inking method and a la poupee.

Leaf Litter

The original photo

Inked using the traditional method.