The Art of Illustration Part 13

Reproductions of pencil, chalk, and charcoal are also possible by this process; but _they are not suited for it_, and there is generally too much working up by hand on the block to suit rapid printing. These blocks when completed have a copper surface. The blocks take longer to make, and are about double the price of the photo-zinc process. THE COST varies from 9d. to 1/6 the square inch.

M. Gillot, in Paris, may be said to be the inventor or perfector of this process, now used by many photo engravers in London, notably by Mr.

Alfred Dawson, of Hogarth Works, Chiswick.

HALF-TONE PROCESS.

FOR THE REPRODUCTION OF WASH DRAWINGS, PHOTOGRAPHS, ETC., BY THE SCREENED PHOTO-ZINC RELIEF PROCESS.

This method of making the blocks is more complicated. As there are no lines in a wash drawing, or in a photograph from nature, or in a painting, it is necessary to obtain some kind of grain, or interstices of white, on the zinc plate, as in a mezzotint; so between the drawing or photograph to be reproduced and the camera, gla.s.s screens covered with lines or dots, are interposed, varying in strength according to the light and shade required; thus turning the image of the wash drawing or photograph practically into "line," with sufficient interstices of white for printing purposes.

The coa.r.s.eness or fineness of grain on these blocks varies according to circ.u.mstances. Thus, for rapid printing on cylinder machines, with inferior paper and ink, a wider grain and a deeper cut block is necessary.

The examples in this book may be said to show these process blocks at their best, with good average printing. The results from wash drawings, as already pointed out, are uncertain, and generally gloomy and mechanical-looking.

The reproductions of pencil, chalk, or charcoal drawings by this process are generally unsatisfactory, even when printed under good conditions.

The blocks are shallow as compared with the zinc line process, and are double the cost.

INTAGLIO PROCESSES.

PHOTOGRAVURE, AUTOTYPE, DALLASTYPE, ETC.

PHOTOGRAVURE.--First, a photographic negative is taken direct from the picture to be reproduced, and from this an autotype carbon print is taken and transferred on to gla.s.s or silvered copper, instead of on the paper used in making carbon prints for sale. This picture is in delicate relief, and forms the mould, upon which copper is electrically deposited. After being made "conductive," the carbon mould is placed in a galvanic bath, the deposit of copper upon it taking the impression perfectly.

Another method is to transfer the same mould upon pure, clean copper, and then operate with a powerful biting solution, which is resisted more or less according to the varying thickness of carbon mould to be penetrated. Thus the parts to be left smoothest are thick of carbon, and the parts to be dark are bare, so that the mordant may act unresisted.

This, it will be perceived, is the opposite way to the process above given, and is therefore worked from a "transparency," or photographic "positive," instead of a negative. This is the Klick and Fox Talbot method, and is very commonly in use at present.

The process of "photogravure" is well known, as employed by Messrs.

Boussod, Valadon, & Co. (Goupil), of Paris, and is adapted for the reproduction of wash drawings, paintings, also drawings where the lines are pale and uncertain, pencil, chalk, etc.; the greys and gradations of pencil being wonderfully interpreted. In London the intaglio processes are used by many of the firms mentioned on page 240. They are now much used for the reproduction of photographic portraits in books, taking place of the copperplate engraving.

THE COST of these plates is, roughly, 5/- the square inch. The makers of these plates generally supply paper, and print, charging by the 100 copies. But engravings thus produced are comparatively little used in modern book ill.u.s.tration, as they cannot be printed simultaneously with the letter-press of a book; they are suitable only for limited editions and "_editions de luxe_."

DRAWING MATERIALS FOR REPRODUCTION.

1.--FOR DRAWINGS IN LINE.--For general use, liquid Indian ink and Bristol board; or hard paper of similar surface. "Clay board," the surface of which can easily be removed with a sc.r.a.per, is useful for some purposes, but the pen touch on clay board is apt to become mechanical.

2.--FOR DRAWINGS IN PENCIL AND CHALK, grained papers are used (see p.

113 and following). These papers are made of various textures, with black or white lines and dots vertical, horizontal, and diagonal. As a matter of fact, grained papers are little used in book and newspaper ill.u.s.tration in this country, and unless artistically treated the results are very unsatisfactory. They are most suitable for landscape work and sketches of effect.

3.--FOR WASH DRAWINGS.--Prepared boards for wash drawings, varying in surface and texture according to the scale of the drawing, the brush handling of the artist, and the nature of the work to be reproduced.

These must be decided by the teacher. Lamp black and opaque white are commonly used. A combination of line and wash is generally to be avoided.

The materials for drawing for reproduction are to be obtained from the following amongst other artists' colourmen.

A. ACKERMAN, 191, Regent Street, W.

J. BARNARD & SON, 19, Berners Street, W.

CORNELISSEN & SON, 22, Great Queen Street, W.C.

LECHERTIER, BARBE, & Co., 60, Regent Street, W.

JAS. NEWMAN, 24, Soho Square, W.

REEVES & SONS, 113, Cheapside, E.C.

CHAS. ROBERSON & CO., 99, Long Acre, W.C.

GEO. ROWNEY & CO., 64, Oxford Street, W.

WINSOR & NEWTON, 37, Rathbone Place, W.

PERCY YOUNG, 137, Gower Street, W.C.

BOOKS FOR STUDENTS.

The following will be found useful:--

1.--"_The Graphic Arts_," by P. G. HAMERTON (London: Macmillan & Co.).

2.--"_Pen and Pencil Artists_," by JOSEPH PENNELL (London: Macmillan & Co.).

3.--"_English Pen Artists of To-Day_," by J. G. HARPER (London: Rivington, Percival & Co.).

The value and comprehensive character of Mr. Hamerton's book is well known, but it reaches into branches of the art of ill.u.s.tration far beyond the scope of this book. Of the second it may be said that Mr.

Joseph Pennell's book is most valuable to students of "black and white,"

with the caution that many of the ill.u.s.trations in it were _not drawn for reproduction_, and would not reproduce well by the processes we have been considering. The third volume seems more practical for elementary and technical teaching. It is to be regretted that these books are so costly as to be out of the reach of most of us; but they can be seen in the library of the South Kensington Museum.

Mr. Hamerton's "Drawing and Engraving, a Brief Exposition of Technical Principles and Practice" (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1892), "The Photographic Reproduction of Drawings," by Col. J. Waterhouse (Kegan, Paul, & Co., 1890), "Lessons in Art," by Hume Nisbet (Chatto & Windus, 1891), are portable and useful books, full of technical information. Sir Henry Trueman Wood's "Modern Methods of Ill.u.s.trating Books," and Mr. H.

R. Robertson's "Pen and Ink Drawing" (Winsor & Newton) are both excellent little manuals, but their dates are 1886.

DECORATIVE PAGES.

(FROM OLD MSS. AND BOOKS TO BE SEEN IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM.)

(_Reprinted from the Cantor Lectures_.)

1. "Example of early Venetian writing, from a copybook of the 15th century, written with a reed pen. Note the clearness and picturesqueness of the page; also the similarity to the type letters used to-day--what are called 'old face,' and of much (good and bad) letter in modern books."

2. "A beautiful example of Gothic writing and ornament, from a French illuminated ma.n.u.script in the British Museum; date 1480. Here the decorative character and general balance of the page is delightful to modern eyes."

3. "_Fac-simile_ of a printed page, from Polydore Vergil's "History of England," produced in Basle, in 1556. The style of type is again familiar to us in books published in 1894; but the setting out of the page, the treatment of ornament (with little figures introduced, but subservient to the general effect), is not familiar, because it is seldom that we see a modern decorative page. The printer of the past had a sense of beauty, and of the fitness of things apparently denied to all but a few to-day."

4. "An illuminated printed page, 1521, with engraved borders, after designs by Holbein; figures again subordinate to the general effect."