Simple Growth

Well folks, it's time for another lengthy blog post about how I print stuff. This time, I printed some business cards and some promo postcards for the lovely Natasha, and her business Simple Growth Consulting. I took some slightly rubbish cellphone pictures along the way, to show some steps of the printing process. 

First, cut the paper down to print size. I tend to work in larger pieces than the final product, to give a bit more leeway when printing, and then trim down to final size as the last step. 

Chopp'd. Even tiny pieces of paper, like these business cards, can be cut using the following gigantic guillotine.

Look at this cast-iron monstrosity of a guillotine. Very sharp blade.

Time to mix the inks. Here are three of the four inks I needed to mix the right colour.

And here they are, ready to be mixed.

Ta-da! And that's how you make sage green. 

I printed the business cards on this Chandler and Price platten press.

It's all inked up with the aforementioned sage green.

Inked up on a different occasion with a darker sage green - this is for the logo on the back of the business cards. 

 Some metal type set for the business cards, locked into the C & P platten press. Note that it's in reverse. 

Stacks of business cards waiting to be printed in a second colour. The business cards needed four different printings altogether; three for the postcards.

The two blocks needed to print the logo on the back of the business cards.

And the resulting printed logo. 

Part two: printing the postcards. 

I used a different press to print the postcards: this is the Vandercook SP15 proof press. It's better for slightly larger pieces, but it's slower to print each one.

A block locked into the press, ready to print. 

This is the second block needed to print the postcards.

The SP15 press.

The finished postcards, stacked in the drying rack. The ink I was using took 2 or 3 days to dry - longer for image areas than type - before the prints could be cut down and finished with.

So there you have it - my latest print project. It was a lot of fun to do, and a nice challenge. Loved the combination of the paper and the ink colours - very Portland, somehow! 

LGBT YA BOOK CLUB YAY: Girl Walking Backwards

Here we have the first book in this summer's one-woman LGBT YA reading mission. (Such an acronym-heavy genre, I love it.)

Girl Walking Backwards

by Bett Williams

Sometimes I forget how totally intense Young Adult fiction can be, subject matter-wise. I just finished The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides, which is by all accounts a book for grown-ups, but it didn't have half the 'adult' themes that Girl Walking Backwards has. If I were to sum up the story of The Marriage Plot, I would say it was about one fairly average woman and two men who become steadily less suitable for her. I mean, it had a little sex and some mental illness, but it was basically tame. Girl Walking Backwards has drugs, alcohol, self-harming, masturbation, sexual abuse, divorce, satanism, sex and mental illness. I don't know how the kids can handle it.

I would totally recommend Girl Walking Backwards, though. It's about a girl living in Santa Barbara, CA, trying to cope with a mother who is basically in a self-help cult, an awol father, and falling in love with a damaged goth girl. The protagonist is very likeable, and if occasionally the prose wanders into teen melodrama territory it does at least feel authentic. Plus, as mentioned above, a tonn of exciting stuff happens.

Twilight/Bring It On Drunken Double Bill

You may know that creating drinking games for movies is pretty much one of my favourite things. I have amassed a pretty good collection, for a variety of movies and also, very importantly, Eurovision. So here's a couple more of them for your viewing/boozing pleasure.

The Bring It On drinking game:

Drink for the following:

• Lesbian subtext
• Every time a word is altered to include the word "cheer"
• Kirsten Dunst says "Duh"
• Spirit Fingers
• Bull Horns ("Go Toros!")
• Someone does a somersault
• Training montage

The Twilight drinking game:

Drink for the following:

• Jean shorts
• Every time someone tells Bella she's awesome
• Self-hug (i.e. When Bella is having an emotion and hugs herself while looking vulnerable.)
• Sparkles!
• GAY.
• Things that you would be arrested for in real life, but Bella finds romantic. (i.e. creepy behaviour, Love=Murder.)
• Adorably clumsy
• Softcore abstinence porn
• Montage

Quite frankly, you can whip up a perfectly decent drinking game for more or less any movie if you follow only two rules: drink whenever there is a montage, or whenever something is kind of gay. Who knew that homoeroticism and training montages would be the building blocks of modern cinema?

The Amazing...?

Apologies for the slightly rubbish quality of these pics; my phone does not have the best camera. (I've realised it tends to focus pretty weirdly, apart from anything else. Like, thanks phone, a small point in the top right-hand corner is obviously likely to be the important thing to look at.)

Anyway, here's a quick bit of letterpress for the front cover of the zine I made for the Portland Zine Symposium. I'll post some pics of the actual zine shortly. Nothing fancy, just this nice san-serif font from the Em Space collection in 72 point.

Zines Galore

This weekend I went to the Portland Zine Symposium and picked up this lot, all through trades. Pretty good haul, I think. I'm going to read through them, and then I might come back and tell you about the best ones. 

Just Some Photies

I haven't posted for ages so I thought I would just put up a few photos on here. Nothing spectacular, it's just that I'm super excited that I have a new phone and the camera on it isn't half bad. It's not great, either, so I'm still going to be using my actual proper camera.

Trailer Feminism Fail

Today we are going to run some experiments. First thing: I love movies, and I also looove watching movie trailers. They are like the most exciting and tantalizing bits of a movie, and they allow me to feel excited about all the fun things there are to watch, before my almost inevitable disappointment.

This afternoon I'm going to catch up on all the new movie trailers, but while I do it I'm going to run a test. Namely, The Bechdel Test.

For those of you that don't know, to pass the Bechdel Test a movie has to:

a. have more than one woman in it;

b. who talk to each other;

c. about something other than a man.

Seems pretty straightforward, right? But you'd be surprised how many movies don't pass it. You know, considering that women are 50% of the population and all, and tend to have fully rounded personalities and stuff in their brains other than men and the needs of men, and movies are supposed to be about life. Movies get a pass on the test if they're something like a WW2 movie set on a submarine.

Ok let's go! Which upcoming movie trailers pass the test?

The Amazing Spider-Man: Nope.

Paranormal Activity 3: Yes! Two small girls are talking to each other about ghosts.

The Dark Knight Rises: Nope.

Haywire: Nope! This is like one woman and 15 guys. At least she beats the shit out of most of them.

Captain America: The First Avenger: Does not pass. Neither did the movie as a whole.

Dream House: Nope.

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1: Nope. Not to mention Twilight's other feminism fails.

Friends With Benefits: Nope. But I'm hoping the movie itself passes, because I want to see it.

Cowboys and Aliens: Nope.

Horrible Bosses: Nope. And only one female character.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2: Nope. Although I expect the movie as a whole passes the test.

The Thing: Yes! One exchange between the two women about the monster.

Sherlock Holmes - A Game of Shadows: Nope.

Crazy, Stupid, Love: Nope. But the movie itself passes.

Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol: Nope. But one lady punched another lady in the face, maybe that bodes well for a meaningful interaction. Also, I hate Tom Cruise.

Drive: Nope.

The Sitter: Nope.

In Time: Nope.

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy: Nope. Total period drama sausage fest.

The Darkest Hour: Nope. I hope that Olivia Thirlby gets some lines in the movie.

The Ides of March: Nope.

Like Crazy: Nope. But this is just a boy and a girl in lurve talking to each other.

Red Tails: No - but it's about WW2 fighter pilots.

Tower Heist: Nope.

Killer Elite: Nope.

Margin Call: Nope. Boo hoo, I feel so sorry for all you Wall Street boys who accidentally caused the financial crash by waving your penises around.

Bridesmaids: Yes! This wins so hard! It wasn't even on the list, I just had to watch it to make myself feel better.

John Carter: Nope.

Battleship: Nope. Oh no! Some Transformers got onto my board game! Better fire some phallic torpedoes at them.

Contagion: Nope.

Jack and Jill: Nope - I'm not counting it if it's Adam Sandler dressed as a woman.

Footloose: Nope.

Puss in Boots: Nope.

A Good Old-Fashioned Orgy: You know, I think that was a yes! Maybe one line.

The Three Musketeers: Nope. Also, I thought this had some lesbian action in it, but in fact D'Artagnan just looks very girly.

The Devil's Double: Nope.

Attack the Block: Nope.

The Whistleblower: Yes! This passes the test so hard! Right on, Rachel Weisz.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Nope.

The Help: Yep.

The Change-Up: Nope.

The Future: Yes! This passes! Indie movies always do better than mainstream.

So by my count that's 35 movies that do not pass the test, and 6 that do. Seems pretty clear to me.

Ok, so I know that trailers are very short, and that many of these movies may pass the test when you get to see the full hour and a half. But think about it: trailers are designed to be a snapshot of the full movie, and if the trailer doesn't have any decent female characters, then the movie probably won't either. Also: a trailer has, what, between 5 and 20 exchanges? And if all of them are between men and discussing the hero's struggle, or maybe only one of them is a lady saying anything, then you know you're in trouble.

Ugh. So disappointing. The male characters get to talk about politics, aliens, heists, make jokes, help each other out, and yes, talk about ladies. Women show up in trailers to remind the audience that there will be boobs present. Or they say something about how awesome the hero is. Or they are shown in tears to show this is a movie where serious things happen. Or they are rescued. They don't get to be friends with other women, or talk about their careers, and they only ever talk to each other about whatever guy they are in love with. Thank god for Bridesmaids. Thank god for having a monster to talk to your fellow women about.

"What is this bullshit?"

Round the Bend

Went on a little roadtrip out into Eastern Oregon a while ago, heading for Bend. If you think Bend is a weird name for a place, there are plenty more where that came from. Here's a short list of places we passed along the way:

Zigzag

Government Camp

Boring

Wemme

Wildwood (where the talking animals live)

Rhododendron

Snow Bunny

Trillium Lake (sounds kind of Star Trek to me)

Metolius

Madras

Of course I can't talk, I come from a county which has the towns Upperthong and Netherthong in it.

Stumptown Comics Fest 2011

I love Stumptown Comics Fest! So much amazing art, and everyone is so nice! Comics nerds are the best.


Here's most of my haul from this year; it should keep me going for a while. Some artists I had heard of, some were new to me. I got a couple of prints too.

Some new favourites were the Perfecting Loneliness 24-hour comics which you see top right, plus an issue of Wuvable Oaf, a hand-spot-coloured comic about bears. (The hairy gay guy kind.) Plus some old favourites: Papercutter, Clutch, Erika Moen.

Some links to check out:

Reid Psaltis (fantastic illustrator - got some of his foldout minicomics)
Sarah McIntyre (adorable childrens' book illustrations, plus comics)
Wuvable Oaf
Emi Lennox (Perfecting Loneliness etc.)
Farel Dalrymple (Yeah, this guy is amazing. And he drew a lovely drawing in the comic I bought from him.)
Papercutter etc.

Oregon Trail Shenanigans

A poster for this new movie Meek's Cutoff, a Western kind of thing starring Michelle Williams.



I don't know if I'd like the film but I flippin' love this poster.

So Long, Frank Lloyd Wright

A few photos of Gordon House, which is just outside Silver Falls, Oregon. (Is it Silver Falls, or Silver something else? This was a few weeks ago now, it's difficult for me to remember.) Designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, it's one of his 'Usonian' houses, (as in US-onian, all-American) which are supposed to be affordable, versatile houses for middle-class everypeople. (Of course, Gordon House turned out to be massively expensive.) This is the only Frank Lloyd Wright-designed house in Oregon, so I really wanted to see it; my delightful gf was kind enough to drive us there.

I thought it was very interesting to look around; lots of thoughtful details and eccentric touches. Some of Wright's ideas didn't turn out to be that practical. Overall I really liked it, though. Looks delightfully retro futuristic, and pleasing to behold from every angle.






Above: the detailing in the woodwork, a recurring pattern. The slanted angles are 15 degrees, so that same 15 degree angle turns up all over the house. (For example, the edges of the in-built shelves and tables.) I liked those little unifying details.



Some warning tape under that one balcony - apparently someone put the cantilever beams in sideways? Which seems almost to ridiculous to be true, but anyway you are not allowed to walk on it or under it.



Guest bedroom.


So the lines of the beams continue across here, in an effort to create continuity between interior and exterior.



Woodpeckers have been at the panelling.



The main hall, which is laid out on square units of 7 by 7 feet. The hearth is very important in Wright's domestic interiors, as it is also in Arts and Crafts designs.




The laundry chute! Just perfect for sending your young siblings down in a youthful prank.



Gordon House was neato. I had fun. Maybe too much fun. Now I really want to go on more weekend excursions for the purposes of architectural tourism. I am a giant nerd.

Adobe

Some sketchbook stuff I have been working on this week. As you can see, I have become minorly obsessed with adobe buildings: the shapes and shadows are fun to draw. I might do a series of these drawings outside the sketchbook, or work them into prints.

I read somewhere that the Ranchos de Taos is the most photographed church in the US.

Most of my sources for these drawings are in New Mexico, a couple elsewhere. (I am afraid I have not been awesome with keeping track of where these buildings are, and I have tweaked some details, perspectives, colour (obviously) etc. I think that is fine since I am just sketching, but I am suddenly having citation-guilt.)

These and more work on my flickr, here.