TOOLS AND MATERIALS.--PREPARING THE PLATE.--DRAWING ON THE PLATE WITH
THE NEEDLE.
14. =Method of Using this Manual.=--As the general theory given in the
preceding chapter may seem too brief, and may convey but an incomplete
idea of the different operations involved in etching, I shall now
endeavor to formulate, in as concise a manner as possible, such
practical directions as I have had occasion to give to a young designer,
and to different other persons, in my own studio. I shall provide
successively for all the accidents which usually, or which may possibly,
occur. But the beginner need not trouble himself too much about the
apparent complication of detail which the following pages present. They
are intended, rather, to be consulted, like a dictionary, as occasion
arises. In all cases, however, it will be well, on reading the book, to
make immediate application of the various directions given, so as to
avoid all confusion of detail in the memory, and to escape the tedium of
what would otherwise be rather dry reading.
A. TOOLS AND MATERIALS.
15. =List of Tools and Materials needed.=--To begin with, we must
provide ourselves with the following requisites:[3]--
Copper plates.
A hand-vice.
Ordinary etching-ground and transparent ground in balls.
Liquid stopping-out varnish.
Brushes of different sizes.
Two dabbers,--one for the ordinary varnish, the other for the white
or transparent varnish.
A wax taper.
A needle-holder.
Needles of various sizes.
A dry point.
A burnisher.
A scraper.
An oil-stone of best quality.
A lens or magnifying-glass.
Bordering-wax.
An etching-trough made of gutta-percha or of porcelain.
India-rubber finger-gloves.
Nitric acid of forty degrees.
Tracing-paper.
Gelatine in sheets.
Chalk or sanguine.
Emery paper, No. 00 or 000.
Blotting-paper.
A roller for revarnishing, with its accessories.
To these things we must add a supply of _old_ rags.
16. =Quality and Condition of Tools and Materials.=--Too much care
cannot be taken as regards the quality of the copper, which metal is
used by preference for etching. Soft copper bites slowly, while on hard
copper the acid acts more quickly and bites more deeply. It is to be
regretted that nowadays plates are generally rolled, which does not give
density enough to the metal. Formerly they were hammered, and the copper
was of a better quality. Thus hammered, the metal becomes hard, and is
less porous; its molecular condition is most favorable to the action of
the acid, the lines are purer, and even when the work is carried to the
extreme of delicacy, it is sure to be preserved in the biting.
English copper plates, and plates that have been replaned, are
excellent. It is a good plan to buy thick plates, of a dimension smaller
than that of the designs to be made, and to have them hammered out to
the required size. The plates thus obtained will not fail to be very
good.
The vice must have a wooden handle, so as to prevent burning the
fingers.
To meet all possible emergencies, lamp-black may be mixed with the
liquid stopping-out varnish (_petit vernis liquide_). Some engravers
find that it dries too quickly, and therefore, fearing that it may chip
off under the needle, use it only for stopping out; for retouching, they
employ a special retouching varnish (_vernis au pinceau_).[4]
For brushes, select such as are used in water-color painting.
The silk with which the dabbers are covered must be very fine in the
thread.
In order to protect his fingers, an engraver conceived the idea of
smoking his plates by means of the ends of several candles or wax tapers
placed together in the bottom of a little vessel: they furnish an
abundance of smoke, and can be extinguished by covering up the vessel.
The smoke of a wax taper is the best; it is excellent for small plates.
The needle-holder holds short points of various thicknesses, down to the
fineness of sewing-needles.
To sharpen an etching-needle, pass it over the oil-stone, holding it
down flat, and turning it continually. When it has attained a high
degree of sharpness, describe a large circle with it on a piece of
card-board, holding it fixed between the fingers this time, and go on
describing circles of a continually decreasing size. The nearer you
approach to the centre, the more vertical must be the position of the
needle. The fineness or the coarseness of the point is regulated by
keeping the needle away from, or bringing it nearer to, the central
point.
The dry point must be ground with flat faces rather than round, so as to
cut the copper, and penetrate it with ease.
If the burnisher is not sufficiently polished, it scratches the copper,
and produces black spots in the proofs. To keep it in good condition,
cut two grooves, the size of the burnisher, in a piece of pine board.
Rub it up and down the first of these grooves, containing emery powder;
and then, to give it its final lustre, repeat the same process, with
tripoli and oil, in the second groove.
The stones which are too hard for razors are excellent for the scrapers.
Having sharpened the scraper with a little oil, during which operation
you must hold it down flat on the stone, pass it over your finger-nail.
If the touch discloses the presence of the least bit of tooth, and if
the tool does not glide along with the greatest ease, the grinding must
be continued, as otherwise the scraper will scratch the copper.
You are at liberty to use two troughs,--one for the acid bath; the
other, filled with water, for washing the plate.
A glass funnel, and a bottle with a ground-glass stopper, will be
necessary for filling in and keeping the etching liquid.
Various substances are used for finishing off the copper plates; the
most natural is the paste obtained by rubbing charcoal on the oil-stone
with oil.
Then comes the fine emery paper Nos. 00 or 000, rotten-stone, tripoli,
English red, and, finally, slate. Powdered slate, produced by simply
scraping with a knife, is excellent, used with oil and a fine rag, the
same as other substances.
The varnish for revarnishing is nothing but ordinary etching-ground,
dissolved in oil of lavender. It must be about as stiff as honey in
winter.
The rollers for revarnishing, which can be had of different sizes, are
cylindrical in form, and are terminated by two handles, which revolve in
the hands. The roller ought, if possible, to cover the whole surface of
the copper.[5] As soon as it has been used, it must be put out of the
way of the dust.
These various recommendations are by no means unnecessary, as the least
material obstacle may sometimes hinder the flight of the imagination. It
is well to be armed against all the troublesome vexations of the
handicraft; for the difficulties of the art are in themselves sufficient
to occupy our attention.
B. PREPARING THE PLATE.
I shall now proceed to give the various talks which I had with my young
pupil.
17. =Laying the Ground, or Varnishing.=--You have here a plate, I say to
him; I clean it with turpentine; then, having well wiped it with a piece
of fine linen, and having still further cleaned it by rubbing it with
Spanish white (or whiting), I fasten it into the vice by one of its
edges, taking care to place a tolerably thick piece of paper under the
teeth of the vice, so as to protect the copper against injury. I now
hold the plate with its back over this chafing-dish; but a piece of
burning paper, or the flame of a spirit-lamp, will do equally well. As
soon as the plate is sufficiently heated, I place upon its polished
surface this ball of ordinary etching-ground, wrapped up in a piece of
plain taffeta; the heat causes the ground to melt. If the plate is too
hot, the varnish commences to boil while melting; in that case, we must
allow the plate to cool somewhat, as otherwise the ground will be
burned. I pass the ball over the whole surface of the copper, taking
care not to overcharge the plate with the ground. Then, with the dabber,
I dab it in all directions; at first, vigorously and quickly, so as to
spread and equalize the layer of varnish; and finally, as the varnish
cools, I apply the dabber more delicately. The appearance of
inequalities, and of little protruding points in the ground, indicates
that it is laid on too thick, and the dabbing must be continued, until
we have obtained a perfectly homogeneous layer. This must be very
thin,--sufficient to resist strong biting, and yet allowing the point to
draw the very finest lines, which it will be difficult to do with too
much varnish.
18. =Smoking.=--Without waiting for the plate to cool, I turn it over,
and present its varnished side to the smoke of a torch or a wax taper,
which I hold at a distance of about two centimetres from the plate, so
as not to injure the varnish. I keep moving the flame about in all
directions, to avoid burning the varnish (which latter would take place
if the flame remained too long at the same point), and thus I obtain a
brilliant black surface. All the transparency is gone; we see neither
copper nor varnish, and this is a sign that our operation has succeeded.
All we need do now is to allow the plate to cool and the varnish to
harden, and then you can commence making your drawing.
You call my attention to the fact that the varnish, in cooling, loses
the brilliancy which it had in its liquid state. This is always the
case. And see the perfect neatness and evenness of the varnished and
smoked surface! Here is a plate which was spoiled in the smoking. The
first thing that strikes us is that we see the marks left by the passage
of the taper. At a pinch, these marks might, perhaps, be no
inconvenience to us in working; but here the brilliant black is broken
by very dull spots. These are places in which the varnish was burned;
it will scale off under the needle, and has lost the power of resisting
the acid. We must therefore clean this plate with spirits of turpentine,
and commence operations afresh.
The ground is blackened, because its natural transparency does not
permit us to see the work of the point. This work produces what might be
called a negative design; that is to say, a design in bright lines on a
black ground. This is rather perplexing at first, but you will soon
become accustomed to it.
C. DRAWING ON THE PLATE WITH THE NEEDLE.
19. =The Transparent Screen.=--You must place yourself so as to face
this window, and between you and it we must introduce, in an inclined
position, a transparent screen made of tracing paper stretched on a
wooden frame, which will prevent your seeing the window. This screen
will soften and strain the light; it will reduce the reflection of the
copper, and will allow you to see what you are doing.
In designing on the plate out of doors, the screen is unnecessary,
since, as the light falls equally upon the copper from all directions,
the reflection is done away with, and the copper does not dazzle the eye
as it does when the light emanates from a single source.
20. =Needles or Points.=--You may use a single needle, or you may use
several of different degrees of sharpness, even down to sewing-needles,
as you will see later on; but your work on the plate will always look
uniform, without distance and without relief. The modelling and coloring
of the design must be left to the acid.
The point must be held on the plate as perpendicularly as possible, as
the purity of the line depends on the angle of incidence which the point
makes with the copper; furthermore, it must be possible to direct it
freely and easily in all directions, and it is, therefore, necessary
that the needle should not be too sharp. To make sure of this, draw a
number of eights on the margin of your plate, or simply an oblique line
from below upwards in the direction of the needle. If it does not glide
along easily, if it attacks the copper and catches in it, you must
regrind it.
This is important, as in principle the function of the needle is to
trace the design by removing the varnish from the copper, while it must
avoid scratching it. By scratching the metal we encroach on the domain
of the acid, and inequality of work is the result, since the acid acts
more vigorously on those parts which have been scratched than on those
which have simply been laid bare. We must feel the copper under the
point, without, however, penetrating into it.
The opposite effect is produced if we operate too timidly. In this case
we do not reach the copper. We remove the blackened surface, and it
seems as if we had also removed the varnish, since we see the copper
shining through it. But we shall find later, from the fact that the acid
does not bite, that we did not bear heavily enough on the needle.
At first there is a tendency to proceed as in drawing on paper, giving
greater lightness to the touch of the point in the distances, and
bearing on it more vigorously in the foregrounds. But this is useless.
There are certain artists, nevertheless, who prefer to attack the copper
with cutting points in the finer as well as in the more vigorous parts
of their work, and to bite in with strong acid; others, again, dig
resolutely into the copper wherever they desire to produce a powerful
tone. Abraham Bosse, in applying etching to line-engraving, advises his
readers to cut the copper slightly in the lines which are to appear
fine, and to dig vigorously into the plate for those lines which are to
be very heavy, so that delicate as well as strong work may be obtained
at one and the same biting. As it is necessary in this sort of engraving
to retouch the heavy lines with the burin, we can understand that in the
way shown the work of the instrument named may be facilitated.
21. =Temperature of the Room.=--In summer the temperature softens the
varnish, and the needle works pliantly and easily; in winter the cold
hardens the varnish, so that it is apt to scale off under the point,
especially at the crossing of the lines. It is advisable, therefore, to
have your room well heated, or to supply yourself with two cast-metal
plates or two lithographic stones, or even two bricks, if you please,
which must be warmed and placed under your plate alternately, so as to
keep it at a soft and uniform temperature. Practice has shown that work
done at the right temperature is softer than that executed when the
varnish is too cold, even if it is not sufficiently so to scale off.
22. =The Tracing.=--According to the kind of work to be done, we shall
either draw directly on the plate, or, in the case of a drawing which is
to be copied of its own size, we shall make use of a tracing. Many
engravers emancipate themselves from the tracing, and accustom
themselves to reversing the original while they copy it. The manner of
using a tracing is well known. We shall need tracing-paper, paper rubbed
with sanguine on one side, and a pencil. The tracing is made on the
tracing-paper, and this is afterwards placed on the prepared plate;
between the tracing and the plate we introduce the paper rubbed with
sanguine; then, with a very fine lead-pencil, or with a somewhat blunt
needle, we go carefully over the lines of the design, which, under the
gentle pressure of the tool, is thus transferred in red to the black
ground. It is unnecessary to use much pressure, as otherwise your
tracing will be obscured by the sanguine and you will find neither
precision nor delicacy in it. Furthermore, you run the risk of injuring
the ground. The tracing is used simply to indicate the places where the
lines are to be, and it must be left to the needle to define them.
23. =Reversing the Design.=--Whenever your task is the interpretation of
an object of fixed aspect, such as a monument, or some well-known scene,
or human beings in a given attitude, you will be obliged to reverse the
drawing on your plate, as otherwise it will appear reversed in the
proof. You must, therefore, reverse your tracing, which is a very easy
matter, as the design is equally visible on both sides of the
tracing-paper. Gelatine in sheets, however, offers still greater
advantages when a design is to be reversed. Place the gelatine on the
design, and, as it is easily scratched, make your tracing with a very
fine-pointed and sharp needle, occasionally slipping a piece of black
paper underneath the gelatine to assure yourself that you have omitted
nothing. The point, in scratching the gelatine, raises a bur, and this
must be removed gently with a paper stump, or with the scraper, after
which operation the tracing is rubbed in with powdered sanguine. Having
now thoroughly cleaned the sheet, so that no powder is left anywhere
but in the furrows, we turn the sheet over and lay it down on the plate,
and finally rub it on its back in all directions, for which purpose we
use the burnisher dipped in oil. The design, reversed, will be found
traced on the varnish in extremely fine lines.
24. =Use of the Mirror.=--The tracing finished, place a mirror before
your plate on the table, and as close by as possible; between the plate
and the mirror fix the design to be reproduced, and then draw the
reflected image. For the sake of greater convenience, take your position
at right angles to the window instead of facing it, so that the light
passing through the transparent screen on your left falls on the mirror
and the design, as well as on your work. When drawing on the copper from
nature, if the design is to be reversed, you must place yourself with
your back to the object to be drawn, and so that you can easily see it
in a small mirror set up before your plate. This is the way Meryon
proceeded: standing, and holding in the same hand his plate and a little
mirror, which he always carried in his pocket, he guided his point with
the most absolute surety, without any further support.
25. =Precautions to be observed while Drawing.=--Before you begin to
draw you must trace the margin of your design, for the guidance of the
printer. To protect your plate, it will be necessary to cover it with
very soft paper; the pressure of the hand does no harm, provided you
avoid rubbing the varnish. If you should happen to damage it, you must
close up the brilliant little dots which you will observe, by touching
them up, very lightly and with a very fine brush, with stopping-out
varnish.
26. =Directions for Drawing with the Needle.=--I might now let you copy
some very simple etching; but your knowledge of drawing will, I believe,
enable you to try your hand at a somewhat more important exercise. Let
us suppose, then, that you are to draw a landscape, although the
practice you are about to acquire applies to all other subjects equally
well. Will you reproduce this design by Claude Lorrain? (Pl. II.) It is
a composition full of charm and color, and very harmonious in effect.
Use only one needle, and keep your work close together in the distance
and more open in the foreground. (See Pl. I^_a_.) That appears
paradoxical to you; but the nitric acid will soon tell you why this is
so. I shall indicate to you, after your plate has been bitten, those
cases in which you will have to proceed differently, or, in other words,
in which you will have to draw your lines nearer together or farther
apart without regard to the different distances. I cannot explain this
subject more fully before you have become acquainted with the process of
biting in, as without this knowledge it must remain unintelligible to
you. This remark holds good, also, of what I have told you on the
subject of the needles of different degrees of sharpness.
"It is curious, my dear sir, to notice how at one and the same time the
point combines a certain degree of softness and of precision; those who
draw with the pen ought also to be admirers of etching. It seems to me,
however, that my lines are too thick; I have already laid several of
them, and the varnish is no longer visible; I am afraid I have taken it
up altogether."
You need not feel any uneasiness about that; it is simply owing to the
irradiation of the copper, the brilliancy of which the screen does not
completely subdue. The bright line is made to look broader than it
really is by the brilliant gloss of the metal. But if you lay a piece of
tracing-paper on the plate you will see the lines as they really are;
that is to say, with plenty of space between them. By the aid of a lens
you can convince yourself still more easily; you will often have
occasion to avail yourself of this instrument to enable you to do fine
work with greater facility, or to give you a better insight into what
you have already done.
As the irradiation of which we have just spoken is apt to deceive us in
regard to the quantity of the work done, we may happen to find less of
it than we expected when the plate has been bitten. Plates which to the
beginner seem to be quite elaborately worked, present to the acid lines
widely spaced and insufficient in number, thus necessitating retouches.
It is essential, therefore, in principle (except in the special cases to
be pointed out hereafter), to give to our work, in its first stages, all
the development that is necessary.
I forgot to tell you that you must provide yourself with a very soft
brush, say a badger, which, from time to time, you must pass lightly
over your plate so as to remove the small particles of varnish raised by
the needle. Otherwise you will not be able to see properly what you have
been doing.
Continue, and follow your own feeling; work away without fear of going
wrong; some of your errors you will be able to remedy. Thus, if you have
made a mistake, you can lay a thin coat of liquid varnish over the
spoiled part by means of a brush; in a few seconds the varnish will have
dried, and you can make your correction. You can employ this method for
the correction of a faulty line, or to restore a place which should have
remained white, but which you have inadvertently shaded.
Here I shall stop for the present, and shall close by saying, May good
luck attend your point, as well as your acid! There is nothing more to
be said to you until after your plate has been bitten.