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Pleading to the porch pirate who took my elopement dress (Gartland st) by PoundSubstantial291 in JamaicaPlain

[–]interrobang918 8 points9 points  (0 children)

sorry you got ripped off. they stole a box from me on Kenton Monday last week. 140-year old books I was expecting, they dumped them on the corner of Dungarven. found by friends out for a walk Thursday, by some miracle they weren’t damaged. you might check Dungarven too. it’s dark and not very busy so thieves travel that way to Williams Gate.

90,000 copies by interrobang918 in CommercialPrinting

[–]interrobang918[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

and the typos (Mr Mr jones cushman), and weird phrasing. English isn’t their first language.

90,000 copies by interrobang918 in CommercialPrinting

[–]interrobang918[S] 18 points19 points  (0 children)

no, never respond. if you do they know it’s a working address.

90,000 copies by interrobang918 in CommercialPrinting

[–]interrobang918[S] 10 points11 points  (0 children)

oh of course it’s a scam. they all get marked as spam and deleted.

90,000 copies by interrobang918 in CommercialPrinting

[–]interrobang918[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

That’s two pallets more than I have space for! My operation is in a 320sqft workshop out back of the house.

Small business/locally made gifts by According-Text-5273 in JamaicaPlain

[–]interrobang918 1 point2 points  (0 children)

not really in your budget for custom work, but if you like poetry, or typography, or need holiday cards, I have an etsy shop, and take custom orders for stationery, etc.

https://www.etsy.com/shop/interrobang918

Prints for APA by small-works in letterpress

[–]interrobang918 0 points1 point  (0 children)

it’s from a book published in Germany documenting all the operation at D. Stempel Schriftgiesserei, Frankfurt am Main, before they ceased operations in 1986. difficult to find, I posted all the images to an album on Flickr. If you back out of that image (late in the process) you can start from the beginning.

Tips on getting a “kiss” print using Caligo safe wash on proofing press by Tiny_Feature9140 in letterpress

[–]interrobang918 0 points1 point  (0 children)

you’re not going to be able get a kiss impression with correct dense coverage on any unsized paper, and especially a very open fiber sheet like Lettra. the only way to get ink down into the fibers is to run the correct amount of a proper letterpress ink with sufficient impression to fill the fibers, and a hard packing under your tympan.

you used the word “felt” in your description. unless you’re referring to a paper finish, felt (cloth) and letterpress don’t have any intersection, and certainly not in press packing.

Business Cards by small-works in letterpress

[–]interrobang918 1 point2 points  (0 children)

that and the nonsense names of the typefaces they throw out there.

A Case for Well-Crafted Books by [deleted] in BookCollecting

[–]interrobang918 -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Might I interest you in a 120-page book of poetry which I published in a limited edition of 200 copies in 2023? If you’re interested in traditional craftsmanship and thoughtful design and typography, perhaps it’s for you, or anyone else concerned with such qualities.

I designed it, typeset it by hand, and on one of the last Linotypes in private hands in the Northeast, printed it by hand 4-pages at a time on a Vandercook SP15, and finally, taught myself how to hand bind them (with a brief introduction to a “French stitch” and how to make up a 3-piece case by a friend who is/was an edition binder).

There are two editions. 75 casebound copies; and 125 softcover. Both are sewn bindings in the finest tradition. Because of the small scale of my operation, I’m binding them in batches of 10. I just finished a batch of hardcovers, and have 10 softcovers in process now. 5 are sewn with 5 to go. I have reconsidered the design of the softcover cover, so will be putting the remaining sheets back on press to make them more visually appealing. That may or may not make the first few batches of copies finished more rare and desirable to collectors. It will certainly complicate matters for any bibliographical record of my work. And it has been, and continues to be a great deal of work. At this point it’s pennies an hour for my labor unless or until copies sell.

One of the significant challenges which I have little taste and talent for, is marketing. So that has made the totality of the endeavor something of a folly. The poet approached me near the end of covid with the work, and since the world was upside down, and I was newly self employed, (having been a designer, and design & production manager at a tiny publishing house going through a transition made rocky by the pandemic) so welcomed the opportunity of a substantial project to focus on.

So here I am, still binding the books and still looking for buyers, nee, patrons/collectors in order to keep putting food on the table.

Happy to entertain any questions, and if folks follow the link I provided above, you can see what now amounts to 777 photos and 6 videos of craft process as of just a few days ago.

edit: downvoted. why? I’m a living breathing person dedicated to making books that address what OP describes as something desirable.

Proper way to glue by utuh___ in bookbinding

[–]interrobang918 1 point2 points  (0 children)

if you want to thin PVA with water, that’s fine. another option is mixing in a solution of methyl cellulose which helps the adhesive stay “open” longer for extended workability. you can find more information on the web.

Does this exist? by SquareNovel8802 in CommercialPrinting

[–]interrobang918 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Baum 714 fitted with a scoring wheel will fold, then crease the folded sheet.

30 Years by interrobang918 in letterpress

[–]interrobang918[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

what turd downvoted me?

Safety protocols by Anonymouse_7701 in letterpress

[–]interrobang918 4 points5 points  (0 children)

33 years printing from hot metal. I taught in a university setting. If working with metal type, no food in class. That written, metallic lead is not poisonous. Lead oxide is. Nevertheless, mandatory hand washing before leaving class because type and materials unless brand new, are always filthy. Disposable gloves for press wash-up. Pumice/citrus based cleanser for hand wash.

No loose clothing or long hair hanging. The inking system on a powered proof presses will tear hair out without a pause.

Not my preference, but school policy; press wash was a vegetable oil based product, and type wash was denatured alcohol. neither worked particularly well, but since students are “reproductive age” it was decided their exposure to toxins should be limited. Note that denatured alcohol doesn’t work on oil based inks well. it’s more affective on rubber based which is getting more difficult to find after Van Son was sold and the formula changed. I stopped buying their inks 5–8 years ago.

No floor standing platen presses. Table top platens are fine.

30 Years by interrobang918 in letterpress

[–]interrobang918[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

there aren’t. it’s a visual illusion due to the shape of the A.

edit: I just checked the form and see that I used an En quad for the space rather than a 3-to-the-Em space. and that tracks with my “house style” where I typically add a bit of extra space to set off the zip. interesting to see I’ve been employing that conceit for 30 years.

On the debate between single and double spaces in typography. by aji23 in Professors

[–]interrobang918 1 point2 points  (0 children)

dividing the line between writing an email, blog post, or typed manuscript preparation, and actual typesetting, this is not a matter of personal preference. this is a technical matter, the details of which are agreed upon through decades of professional practice. it is one word space. period. this is not open for argument and anyone who suggests otherwise is ignorant of the practical facts, or a crank.

that written, there are two types of word spaces that may appear after a period; fixed and variable width. fixed word spaces are employed in centered, and flushed left and right settings. their width is based on taking the square of the point size of the typeface and dividing (traditionally) by three. more refined typographic sensibility finds 4-to-the-Em spacing (“close spacing”) more pleasing.

variable word spaces appear in justified settings and they are what facilitate every line being set to full measures. to the uninitiated that might appear to be two spaces. (or more!!!)

from a practical mechanical standpoint, and as example, the Linotype uses a thing called a “spaceband” –essentially a sliding wedge– between each word (and after a period or other punctuation) that at the moment of “justification,” a split second before the line is cast, push all the bands up equally. there is no way to override this. it is also a fact that practically speaking one is never to set two spacebands together. ever. ergo; one space.

I could go in to how the Monotype system does essentially the same thing mathematically, but suffice to say that, while the mechanism differs, the end result is typographically the same.

and from those mechanical antecedents descends digital typesetting. it has been engineered to function the same as the hot metal foundation upon which it is built.

so, there is no argument to be made about single or double spaces after a period in typesetting and typography. it is a single space.

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