Project – Test Print

Even though my research project is still in the research phase I decided it was important to understand how the techniques used by Ardan Ozmenoglu might translate into my own work. In a short phone call with Genesis Imaging (who I have used for other projects) they confirmed that they had done similar pieces however my images were different so we decided to arranged a date for to run some test prints. However due to time constraints we would need to run the test prints a week earlier than I had planned, so I selected a  few sample images for the test.

We started the test with the opacity settings used from the layers printed on paper. The images were going to be printed on the reverse side of the acrylic sheets after the first prints it was clear that a higher opacity settings would be required to achieve the target. Fro the next hour I worked with the printer experimenting with different opacity levels to achieve an acceptable base setup.  After a couple of hours work we had defined the base opacity levels to create the target image using an image created out of 3 layers.

Due the number of layers and the density of ink required to render the images the final art pieces will need to be backlit with a lightbox that will need to be custom made when the final full size pieces are created. Similar to Ozmenoglu’s work spacing the layers enhances the three dimensionality.

The image above is the result of today’s tests however further refinement is required.

The tests also created some interesting by-product images where the acrylic can be placed in front of another image introducing the concept of trace in the glass protecting the underlying image and I plan to run some additional tests to see how this could be used in other projects.