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Mostly Stable's avatar

Really great read! I had a someone recently chastise me for not understanding etching, when I was talking about engraving all along, which was a little infuriating. Anyway.

So, from what I have read Dürer would place his plate on a sandbag whilst engraving. This would allow him to tilt the plate and the tool, achieving the very tight curls and circles and generally enable the 'nigri tortuosi tractus.' This, I imagine, will add a whole new dimension of pain, but may bring you a step closer.

Alfie Robinson's avatar

Thanks so much! I can imagine that would be helpful, but I wonder if the plate would slip n' slide, which would be extremely dangerous. Difficult to say—I'll see if I can try it out! I've also been advised to use a copper coin with some masking tape to achieve a similar effect.

Wendy Cox's avatar

Pretty good first try!

Matt's avatar

Maybe if you’d studied Resistant Materials at GCSE things would have turned out different.

I enjoyed the journey with you