I searched through pretty much every sketchbook at Wet Paint to find one that both had suitable watercolor sketching paper, but also a good printable cover and came up with this Hand Book sketchbook by global art materials. Not perfect, but pretty close for now. My ideal sketchbook would allow for flat full spreads (which this one does), have hot pressed watercolor paper (can't find a single sketchbook that has this), and have a good screen printable cover (which this has). I'll admit the linen cover made me a bit nervous, but after securing the book in place and four passes of ink, the image still came out quite clear.
No new sketchbook would be complete without color guides! Admittedly, in addition to the new sketchbook I also purchased a set of 12 Holbein Watercolors, which I am planning on taking with. Thus, doing double duty, this also made for a good reason to test out mixing some colors, and trying out the paper in this book.
Back at screen printing, here is a quick run-down of the process... Above is the vector silhouette of the country of Iceland that I drew in Adobe Illustrator, printed on acetate film, and exposed.
With a fully exposed, washed, and dried screen and this set up I was ready to print.
Because of the thickness of the sketchbook, and the normal depth that using clamps allows, we added an extra piece of wood between the table and where the clamps are attached. Of course, then a bit more support is also needed for the bottom of the screen as well. I only had one chance to get this print "right," otherwise I'd have to buy another sketchbook, so I taped down some guides to hold the book in place while I pressed the ink through the screen. Since it took four passes to get the complete image, it's a good thing the book stayed in place!
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