Polyester Plate Lithograph

I purchased a new printer to print pronto plates to use as matrices for polyester plate lithography. To prepare the plates, I print the pronto plates on a laser printer, then heat set the plate with a hair dryer. I use gum arabic in water and traditional oil-based etching ink to ink the plate and then print onto soaked paper, using my Bira die cutting machine as a printing press.

I have found that it is important to use a monochrome printer as color laser printers often deposit yellow ink as a security/ID measure that, unfortunately, will show up on your impressions when you ink your plates.