On our old website we had a page called Electronic Samples. On this page we catalogued each new step in our printing experience, as we produced gradually more complex work. We kept this up between July 2000 when we started trading until February 2002. With the launch of the new website we've decided to start this process again writing about particular jobs of note when we have the time or inclination to do so. In the meantime the old page is listed below
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Below are some samples of work that we've carried out since we started trading
in June 2000. The selection below gives a brief (and incomplete) history of
the co-op's progression in the variety of work carried out. It also consists
of pieces of work that are specifically memorable for one reason or another.
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Green
Events was our first job and the second time we ran the press. As a 9000 run of double sided A3 it was quite an undertaking. The task was not made any easier by the fact that we were using lots of odds and ends of paper that were all slightly different sizes due to a blunt guillotine at the technical college. Three days later it was printed, now it takes one of us between 5 and 6 hours. We published Green Events ourselves and basically used it as intensive training on the press. It wasn't until about the 4th time we printed it that it went well, before then we dreaded printing it, as it was, in truth, a little beyond our capabilities at the time. |
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Permaculture Association (PcA) gave us our first
BIG (at the time) print job. A 1000 run 20 page A4 news sheet. We nearly
bottled it just before it was time to go, but Andy (from the PcA) persuaded
us to go for it. We did and were amazed at the quality of what we produced
and since then have not really looked back. Permaculture Works
is produced quarterly |
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Cops
and Robbersis a free listing of DiY gigs
in Leeds (and sometimes outlying towns and cities). Their 1000 copies
of between 16 and 24 pages of A6 booklets is, to date, our only really
regular monthly work and whilst not very lucrative enabled us to keep
our hand in at the beginning when jobs were very few and far between |
| Action for Peace
(produced quarterly by Yorkshire
CND) is another of our earliest regular jobs. Yorkshire CND also got
us to print several briefings on National Missile Defence and Menwith
Hill's role in the US Star Wars programme. |
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This A3 poster was our first 2 colour work and was printed
for the Lifecycles Project in Devon. In fact it was the first time we'd
printed using anything but black ink. It was a real joy to print due
to the triple excitement of helping an innovative project, printing
quality original artwork and seeing different colours on the rollers.
It was to be a 'pedal powered genetix roadshow'. Unfortunately foot
and mouth restrictions curtailed the project to a degree, but I think
that all went well eventually.
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and Liberty's (now Spiral Seed)Permaculture,
A Beginners Guide by Graham Burnett could have been nasty. At 60 pages
long with a print run of 3000 we didn't have the money to buy the paper
so he paid us up front. We made a couple of trips to the finishers to
make absolutely sure we knew how they wanted to receive it. After putting
it off for more than a few weeks we gradually worked our way through it
over about a week and a half. We then had a nerve-wracking 5 days until
it came back from the finishers. If it had gone wrong it would have been
disastrous - I couldn't imagine doing a reprint and we'd have had to find
£1300 to buy more paper. |
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These gummed envelope reuse
labels for Radical
Routes were a bit of a pain to say the least. The paper curled down
at the edges causing the image to move about on the page to quite a remarkable
degree. The only finisher that we could find to cut them up and make them
into pads would only take the job as we worked out the average location
and just asked him to cut at specific measurements whatever happened.
Fortunately we lucked out again and even got a few tips on how to prevent
it happening again on this type of paper. |
| EEK Our first disaster. Due
to a 'fit to page' check box being ticked at a local printers who let
us use their computer equipment, these CD covers all came out about 5mm
too small so they didn't fit in the cases. Even worse the job was on relatively
expensive recycled paper and card and, worse still, we were doing it at
cost price so there was nowhere to absorb the cost. Fortunately they were
very understanding and met us halfway on the cost of buying more paper.
The 2 Benefit CD's were named Moving
Onand produced for the Nottingham Sumac Centre (aka Rainbow Centre) |
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| We'd just finished the reprint of the Moving
on CD covers when we got a call from someone who wanted us to do their
CD covers. A Punk / Ska band called the Propagumbies wanted to print the
cover to their bowing out CD the rise and fall of nothing much at all.
The result worked really well considering the paper they chose just looked
like parcel wrapping paper. I thought it'd never work printing black on
brown but I suppose that's why I'm the printer and not the designer. |
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The Rising
Tide (climate change campaign) gave us quite a bit of work over the
summer of 2001, including numerous briefing sheets, the fantastic Funny
Weather cartoon book of climate change, written and illustrated by
Kate Evans, and the 'spoof' 90% for 90% train ticket style cards. No disasters
this time but we did run out of black ink after having the wrong type
delivered. Small
print (a helpful print shop up the road) lent us a pot of a different
make of ink which worked significantly better on the press than what we'd
previously used. From this point we were able to print with massively
reduced wastage due to ink / water balance problems. |
| Tommy and his terrific Tyne Tunnel
was the first big job we did for the North
East region of Friends of the Earth. We'd previously produced various
short runs of various filers at cost and have since printed their Real
Food Guide. |
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Shortcuts to Manchester is
a free guide produced by activists in Manchester to give new students
a brief introduction to what is available in the city. It focuses on Direct
Action (groups and ideas), eating out, going out, getting out of the city,
free food, housing, social centres, alternative media and more. The cover
of this 20 page booklet was also our first 3 colour work, and jolly fine
it looked too. |
| After months of trying to get a group of
people who all wanted business cards doing to agree on a type of card
and ink colour we printed them off. With 5 different designs laid out
on an A3 sheet so that everyone got about the number they asked for. This
job meant that the housing co-op's eighth birthday party got some rather
posh double sided business card type invitations (we needed to make up
the numbers slightly to make it cost effective).> |
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The release of the a 6 track CD by Stand,
a metal band from Grimsby gave us one of the few print jobs that we
decided would be greatly improved by getting image-set film for reproducing
high quality photographs.
The amount of red ink on this poster caused us problems
as the paper would stick to the blanket rather than get passed to the
grippers that remove the paper from the press and stack it. We've since
learnt that leaving a bigger border (this job was printed on bigger
paper and cut down later) would help prevent this as well as a cunning
trick with some talc and a tub with holes.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 12 January 2008 )
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