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I’ve made a few unsuccessful Gocco prints since my first one. Its fustrating when it goes wrong - the wasted screens, bulbs, ink and time. But when it goes well its rewarding. Freshly printed are this year’s christmas cards.. the skating chimp.

Things I have learnt in the past few efforts. Always test inks before applying them to the screen - with some of the older inks the oil has separated and comes out the tube first - this made my paper stick to a screen. Don’t put the foam separators too close to the ink area as the will stop it from printing a solid colour. Start designing with the colours you have - I scanned in the tube packaging and made a illustrator swatch palette with the colours so I could easily experiment. I’ve found mixing colours hasn’t worked very well. Yellow hardly shows up on the off-white card I use. More complicated designs look better on screen, more simple ones look better printed.

Prints are available in my Maraid Etsy shop.

On the list of things to do on holiday in Prague, along with the usual tourist attractions, was Terry Posters. Terry Posters sell original Czechoslovakian film posters, many of them vintage. It’s perfectly situated in Světozor Cinema.

When I was finished I had visual overload and my hands hurt from flicking through the racks. It was a joy. We bought five lovely ones from the 1970s. Terry Posters is also online.

I was determined to get to Hornsea Museum before it closed for another winter. I liked the variety of exhibitions; recreated farmhouse, Hornsea history, outside buildings with various collections of signs, tools and farming implements and at the end the history of Hornsea Pottery. It was fascinating to see how the pottery went from stunning 1950s design to more recent dull blandness.

I have a few Robert Opie books, it was a while before I realised he had a museum for his collection. It was visual overload in the best way.

• More Museum of Brands photos on my Flickr

Before visiting Withernsea Lighthouse Museum I had seen pictures of the inside of the lighthouse and was expecting it to be good but I didn’t realise the extent of the museum. Not only can you go up the lighthouse there are mini museums dedicated to the RNLI, Withensea Town and Kay Kendall (a local girl who went on to be a hollywood actress). Eating cake in the tearoom garden was a perfect end to the visit.

• More pictures from Withernsea Lighthouse Museum on my Flickr

This summer we’ve spent various days exploring the East Coast of North England. A day at Bridlington was packed with lots to see. After a couple of hours at the arcades and seaside there was the Old Penny Memories and then down the road to Bondville Model Village. I have written a little bit about Old Penny Memories for Nothing To See Here and seem to have an ever growing list of unique places that I would like to write about.

Pinball machine at Old Penny Memories

Bondville Model Village

• More Bridlington pictures on my Flickr

I always wanted a Polaroid camera, one of the models that allows focus and depth of field. I have been given a Polaroid 680. Its a lovely balance between shooting digital and film. I have to think carefully about every shot but have the instant gratification of that special one-off picture.

Inspired by a photo by hier houd ik van.

Or, I should say, my first successful gocco print.

It had taken me a while to decide to invest in a Gocco printer. Riso, the makers of the Japanese home screen printing kit stopped production in 2005. I eventually took the plunge and purchased PG-11 kit on Ebay from Japan.

My first attempt was frustratingly unsuccessful. To make your master screen Gocco requires you to use a print made from carbon ink. I tried to make my master screen from a photocopy which attached itself after exposure (even using the blue filter). After more internet research it seemed that people had less problems using a laser printer. Following their advice my second attempt was a success.

Advice and lessons learnt

I read quite a lot about people getting patchy prints and not using enough ink. I may have over inked a little and my first design required a lot of coverage. From this I learnt..

It may sound obvious but it can get messy, at least messier than instructional videos may lead you to believe. For the mess have to hand; turps, rags and newspaper.

Ink got past my screen and onto the printer body. I used a philips screwdriver to remove the see-through plastic plate to clean it, using cotton buds (q-tips) to get into the smaller spaces.

Have spare jars for excess ink. Old clean spice jars would be ideal.

The final product

For this first attempt I tried to keep things simple. One screen for the print, using two colours. I am looking forward to experimenting with a two screen print using the PG-11 registration plate.

After seeing my Micheal Lewis of MIKMIK Studios‘ Gocco prints I asked him where to purchase the card that he used (for his beautiful prints). The 250gsm Bier paper is manufactured using a combination of leftovers from the brewing industry: beer labels and malt/yeast/hops fibres. Available from the Green Stationery Company.

Prints are available in my new Maraid Etsy shop.