Step 9 – Take your ink and start to lay down a generous amount at the top of the screen.
Step 10 - Here’s a view of the ink, fully spread and ready to be pushed through the mesh.
Step 11 – Place your squeegee into the screen well, making sure that the entire edge of squeegee contacts the ink.
Step 12 – Using an even motion, tilt the squeegee to a 45 -60 degree angle and “pull” the squeegee towards you with good pressure.
Step 13 – Using light pressure I do what’s called a flood stroke. Since I use water-based inks, they tend to dry in the screen and clog it up. Using a flood stroke keeps the screen “wet”. The flood stroke is done at a very light pressure and is used to simply cover the design area with a thin layer of ink.
Step 14 – Lift the screen up and take a look at the acetate. You should have a clean deposit of ink on the acetate.
Step 15 – Place your paper under the acetate and use the design printed on the acetate to register your next print.
Step 16 - Once you have the perfect position, it’s a good idea to “mark” the exact location of where paper should be positioned for future prints.
Step 17 – Flip the acetate out of the way.
Step 18 – Use painter’s tape (I love this stuff) to create positioning guides. There are actually multiple ways to do this and I will show alternatives in later posts. For now, this is the simplest way to quickly register your paper for prints.
Check out Screen Printing Tutorial: Paper – Part 3 for the final steps in this tutorial.
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