Startled Starling

When we left off we had two transparencies ready to expose.  We exposed and then had: 2  exposed plates which I'm sure I photographed, but can't find and so we're moving to the next bit.

First, the background plate was inked.  It may be hard to determine in this photo, but the dots are an aqua blue with a lime green surface roll.

Two stencils were cut, one with the bird, and the bird.  (Sorry, I forgot to rotate this one -)

 The one without the bird was placed on the inked background plate

And, then the one with the bird was inserted and the one without was removed leaving the bird stencil in place.  Now we're ready to print this plate leaving a white space for the bird.

A little ink has come through in the white space, but it won't matter since it will be covered by the bird.

Next, we ink the bird plate

And cut out the two chine collé pieces from very thin Japanese papers: (oops, forgot to rotate again!)

And, after applying glue to the wrong side of the papers, but placing glue side up, they are placed on the plate in the proper place where they will stay if they know what's good for them.

This is placed on the press bed in the registration jig aka blue masking tape:

And, the print paper with the background lowered into place, run through the press and voila!

We have a Superb Starling. 

Superb Starlings are all over Tanzania - like Seagulls at the beach.  Every rest stop is well populated as they scrounge for tidbits of dropped or discarded food.  But, they are gorgeous.  They are much more iridescent.  I was unable to get any combo of ink with gold powder, or mica, to achieve the desired effect, but maybe I can find a paper which will do the trick on my next trip to Portland.