Josh Nichols

24 Hour Comics Day posters

I’m a member of a local comic group called Midmococo. Each year we host an official 24 Hour Comics Day location where comic artists attempt to create a 24-page comic in 24 hours. This year, we’ll be working downtown at the Columbia Art League. Because of the extra space, we were able to expand our event. To get more people involved and fill that space, we needed publicity, so I thought this would be a good time to try and silkscreen a poster. With my wife’s help, it turned into an interesting process, so I thought I’d share. It didn’t quite work out as planned, but it still looked cool.

Poster design

I started out with a simple design of a spazzed-out comic artist making Wolverine claws out of various drawing tools. (That’s pretty much how you look after the 24 hour day of drawing comics!) Headlines were set in word balloons for emphasis and little pull-tabs were placed at the bottom so people could tear off the URL for the registration form.

I completed the final art and finished the design in Photoshop. Then I set up the separations on different layers so I could output the two different colors.

Transparencies

Then it was time to print out transparencies for the screen exposure. For each plate I used two 8.5 x 11, laser printer compatible, overhead projector transparencies and tiled them together. They didn’t come out black enough, so I had to print two copies of each and layer them. The transparencies would stretch a little from the heat of the printer and the image wouldn’t quite line up. This messed with the registration some, but it was manageable with my simple design. I split the difference and used some Sharpie magic.

Screens

Luckily, my wonderful wife already had a lot of the supplies like ink and screens. I did have to clean the screens and had some trouble with one because the emulsion had been on it for too long. I ended up re-stretching a new screen, which was a pain because the frame was metal. I had to use Super77 and a bunch of clamps. In the end it wasn’t very tight, but I used it anyway.

After all that trouble, I found out that you can use a pressure washer to blast the emulsion away. I could have just took it four blocks away to the car wash instead of stretching new screen. Arg!

Then I covered the screens with emulsion, using Natalie’s nifty spreader tool, and let them dry in a makeshift darkroom in the basement bathroom.

Exposure

With the screens ready, I set up my exposing area. It was just a lamp, table, piece of glass and a timer. Natalie had a handy exposure tester and with one of the ready screens, I tested the exposure several times to get the right light distance and exposure time.

Then I took the other screen and set the transparency for the white plate face down on the screen and placed the glass on top. Next, I set the timer and turned on the lamp. I turned on the lamp by plugging it in so it wouldn’t move and mess up the exposure. Once time was up, I turned off the light and rinsed the screen reveling my design.

The next screen had been used for testing so I had to wash the emulsion out. After that, I applied new emulsion and exposed the black plate. While washing the black plate, all the emulsion started to wash out — not just the unexposed areas. I didn’t let it dry long enough, so I had to clean it all and try that plate again. Arg! Arg!

Printing process

Natalie already had a nice base with clamps ready to go and and a new ink squeegee for spreading the ink. I figured the printing process would go pretty smoothly, but unfortunately, I made another big mistake. I thought I’d be cool, thrifty and green by printing on brown paper bags. It shows how resourceful, or cheap, comic artists are when creating their art. It also matched the jams we sometimes do on chipboard during meetings.

It was a neat concept, but paper bags are the worst paper to silkscreen on. I think the only thing that would be worse is toilet paper! Arg! Arg! Arg!

Naturally, I didn’t figure that little detail out until after Natalie cut down all the bags and I had printed the white plate. The bags were too rough and had folds and creases (even after ironing) that kept the screen from laying completely flat. I had to push down really hard to get decent ink coverage. Combine that with the loose screen on the black plate and I got a lot of ink bleeding onto the back of the screen. It made the image smear and spread out. I was having to wipe the back of the screen off after every print to keep the text legible.

Trimming and posting

The last step, after the ink dried, was to trim everything down. Again, some of that junk Natalie stores in the basement became useful. Who knew? I was able to quickly trim down the posters with her mat cutter and a few snips with scissors separated the pull-tabs on the bottom.

Hanging the posters was a piece of cake since I had a lot of help with that from Midmococo buddies.

Will I silkscreen again?

Despite my problems, the posters turned out pretty cool. The brown paper with the black and white ink really have a lot of contrast and is eye-catching, so I’m happy with the results.

It was certainly a learning process which is why I’m glad my design was simple and didn’t require tight registration. It allowed me a lot of room for error.

As for wanting to silkscreen again? I’m not sure. It was fun, but really hard work. (I guess I’m spoiled by cheap color printing.) I think I might be tempted to do it again. For now, I think I’ve had my fill for a while.