I see a lot of leaves on my daily walks, so naturally they are feeding my #SEEdrawPrint challenge. Sometimes I pick them up and trace them, study their edges and shapes.

It is fun to pause and really look that the edges, veins and imperfections. This one is printed in a muddy red color to mimic the fading colors of fall here in New England.

Small thermofax images are nice for creating detailed overall patterns. I may add another leaf to this print to fill the open white space of the cloth.

I was sorting through my studio and found a cut paper stencil. It is a sort of flower inspired image.

I colored the flower stencil a dark color so I could make a good photocopy. Then I evened out some of the lines with a sharpie. Made another photo copy and used that to burn the thermofax screen on the left in the image above.

I was not sure where I was going to use this screen so I printed it on some sampler cloth that I have to test out images.

A few weeks ago I used a similar cut paper stencil to inspire a block print design. The red image below is a soft carved block print and the green image it the thermofax screen print.

I am not sure if you can tell but the block print creates a less solid impression. The green flower has a more consistent coverage. Though the 2 flowers in this picture were not so perfect.

I was comparing printing with a sponge and a squeegee. The sponge pushes more ink through and the squeegee seems to push a thinner layer through the screen. This image is more open than the leaf image I did last week, when using a cosmetic sponge was perfect.

I am realizing how much I choose to make art and marks with ways other than drawing. But I also have quite a few sketches and doodles going that might be turned into screens, block or stencils.

If you are like me and need some coaxing to embrace your drawing habit, then try out the Drawing with Matisse Tutorial.

I realized that my natural printing method is to be inspired by found tools.Which takes the need to draw a matrix out of the equation.

I found this small rubber circle thing while on my daily walk and it inspired me to pick it up. It lifts of ink and applies ink to the gelatin plate perfectly. I that two different size circles that will work nicely together.

Autumn in New England there are plenty of leaves and grasses on the ground. I picked up one and gave it a “hair cut”. If the grass is too complex the shape impression ends up being a big white blob.

The other way that I usually work, is to pull many prints to get a couple that I like. I work out the composition as I go.

Today I pulled a stack of prints and then got my framing mats and cropped up a couple into pleasing compositions.

This is the shaped impression of the grasses and I used my found tool to lift off and then apply circle impressions to the plate.

This is the detailed impression of the grasses and I stamped a few more circle on to the plate with my round rubber circle tool.

This one I place the little pieces of grass back on to the detailed impression to “save” some white marks and increase the range of value. And I was playing with random design rather than a balance one.

If you would like to explore gelatin printmaking through the self study printmaking workshop, then check out he details of the online printmaking class on the information page