Ever since
I first heard about Robert Green’s project to create a digital version of the
Doves type, I’d wondered if anyone (besides Green, presumably) had used it to
recreate an original Doves letterpress page, to see how the two compare. If anyone
has, I don’t know about it. So I finally decided to give it a try, partly as a
limbering-up exercise before starting to print the next HM project (I haven’t
done any extended printing since the end of last year).
The first
question was, how to conduct the experiment. Ideally my facsimile setting could
be directly compared to the original. Since part of the experiment is for
people to see how the digital compares to the metal original, it seemed
appropriate to pick a work that was reasonably well known. I thought about
Credo (1908), but all those I believes
get tiresome. So I settled on The Ideal Book. It’s just 10 pages, so three
sheets.
But the
idea of being able to compare my facsimile directly to the original lingered. Some
years ago I acquired a few dozen copies of Cobden-Sanderson’s “Note on a
Passage in Anthony and Cleopatra” (1913) This is one of the ephemeral parerga
C-S issued over the years. The copies have been lost & rediscovered on my
shelves a few times, and I finally had an idea for putting them to use: I could
set the first page in facsimile, and present it opposite a copy of the
original. I have 25 copies of the “Note...” so it will be included in that many
copies of my Ideal Book facsimile.
I grabbed the text for Ideal Book from a digitized copy online, then went through and found all the scanning errors. The digital text conveniently had breaks at the end of each printed line, so that work was already done for me. I pulled out my copy of the original, and measured the page, the margins, the line measure, the type size, and the leading.
In using
these measurements to create a digital version, I had to take into
consideration the shrinkage of the paper after printing. Like all good
handpress printers, Cobden-Sanderson’s paper was dampened for printing, which
causes it to expand. When dry it contracts, thereby shrinking whatever was
printed ever so slightly. In general I have found paper shrinks 1 – 1.5%. The
text line in the book measured exactly 4 inches, so I made the measure in my file
4-1/16 inches to allow for the shrinkage.
The photos
above illustrate the shrinkage. For each the ruler’s 4-inch mark is centered under
the period at the end of the line (despite what the first image suggests). The
second image shows the line on a sheet of proofing paper (i.e. printed dry),
measuring just past the 8-inch mark (i.e. a little over 4 inches long). The
third image is a sheet of the Saunders paper, printed damp and then dried; it
shows the same line ending just under the 8 inch mark, a difference of about
1/16 inch.The fourth is the Barcham Green paper, likewise just under 4 inches. The last picture is the Doves original.
I use
Affinity Publisher for doing layouts, & it’s a poor substitute for InDesign. I created a document with page size 6.5 x
9.25 inches. By my estimate, the printed (metal) type equated to 16.1 pt in digital;
the leading was 15.4 pt. Kerning was off (I never use auto or font kerning),
just as it would be when setting metal.
I dumped
the digital text into the text boxes, and was surprised at how well it all fit
right off the bat. When it didn’t it was because the word spacing resisted
(there are some very tightly-set lines), so I had to make those adjustments as
required.
While all
of the lines fell into the measure easily enough, what I noticed was very
slight variations in where a given letter in the line fell with relation to the
ones above and below. Sometimes a hair or two ahead, sometimes behind. Much of
this I put down to discrepancies in the word spacing, and I wasn’t going to
attempt a facsimile setting to that degree of detail.
The italic
words in “Note...” posed a problem: As everyone knows, there is no italic
companion to the Doves roman. When an italic was required, C-S used one
provided by the Miller & Richard foundry. The closest approximation of it I
could find (digitally) was Garamond; without the actual face, my setting can’t
really be called a facsimile.
I also had
to come up with a pilcrow. Green’s font doesn’t include one, so I simply
scanned one from “Note...” and dropped it in.
When output
to my cheap Epson inkjet printer, the text looked a little heavy, but I put
that down to the printer.
As with all
my polymer printing, the plates are KF 95 plastic backed. The slim plates (vs
the thicker 152 used by most letterpress shops) allow for sharper details (e.g.
serifs) and finer lines without risk of breaking. I have my plates made by a
nearby commercial letterpress shop that I’m not naming because they do it as a
favor to me and don’t want to be in the plate-making business.
I pulled
plate proofs on newsprint with no makeready or particular care, I’m just
looking to see if there are any flaws. The type in the proofs looked noticeably
heavier than the metal original. I hoped this was due to my offhand proofing,
but knew it could also be a result of decisions
Green made.
To make the
comparison as accurate as possible, the digital version needed to be printed
the same way the original was – inked by hand, and printed on a handpress – on
paper as close as possible to the original used. The image above shows (l to r) the roller, ink slab, and pile of damp paper under a towel waiting to be printed.
The Doves books were printed
on a laid sheet made by Batchelor & Son. I couldn’t get any of that. I did
have paper that the (old) wrapping in which it was found claimed to be Saunders
c.1950s, but there is no watermark. It’s more cream than the Doves, which might
be described as off-white, but it has a similar weight and finish. It was
dampened in the usual manner, with blotters, five printing sheets per blotter. I also had
a few sheets of Barcham Green Bodleain, also more cream than white, laid, and
with a little more tooth than the Doves or Saunders sheets. I printed five
copies on this paper.
I started
printing with the facsimile page from “Note...” Because of the potential
thickening issue, I’d decided to print with as little ink as possible, which thus
might require more impression than normal. I rolled out a minimal amount of ink
– less than I have ever used to print – and pulled an impression. It was
essentially perfect. This never happens for me; there are always agonies and
torments getting a form to print well. The impression was good – about the same
as on the Doves original – and the ink coverage was solid. And the type still
looked thicker than the original.
I checked
with the person who made the plates, in case something in how the plate was
made (i.e. exposed) would noticeably affect a type’s weight. She compared what
I’d printed with a digital print from their good printer, and the two were the
same – the type was printing as it was designed to look. So Green had thickened
up the strokes, which is not an unusual decision when adapting a metal face for
use in offset, digital or Web use.
The image above shows a form being printed. The four red squares at the corners highlight the platen bearers, the two rectanular squares show the roller bearers with tape added in places to adjust the inking in those areas.
Printing a
sheet at HM typically take two days, one for each side. It takes two to three
hours in the morning to get a form set up and the makeready settled (sample below), then I
average about 15 impressions an hour. I have printed up to 120 impressions in a
day, but am not good for much the next day. After backing up, the sheets are
(gently) pressed between blotting boards overnight, to dry. They usually
require drying in a second set of boards for another day. (Note that it’s not
the ink that’s drying – it’s dry almost as soon as it’s printed – it’s a question
of extracting the moisture that was added to the fibers for printing.)
The 25 copies with the “Note...” facsimile and leaf (above) will be cased in printed blue paper over thin boards. I ended up with another 13 copies, which have been sewn into a painted handmade paper wrap (see top for both versions).
So that’s
the experiment. My conclusion is that, if you wanted to use the digital Doves
font to make a truly accurate facsimile, you’d have to make some alterations to
the font to decrease the stroke weight. And I can’t really think of a
legitimate use for the font outside a facsimile. Cobden-Sanderson went to such
lengths to prevent its use by others (unscrupulously, given the agreement he
had made, in my opinion), that appropriating it for some other use would be
jarring. I considered using it for the Pollard project, for about a minute,
before realizing it was just a bad idea.
Attempting
to replicate someone else’s setting of type ended up being an interesting
exercise. It resulted in a deeper understanding of C-S’s aesthetic through all
the small decisions involved. Several of his lines are set so tight the words
have to be picked apart, while others employ an ampersand when there was plenty
of room for the word and. I imagine
it’s similar to young writers typing out their favorite novel, to gain some
insight to the author’s process.
I feel
limbered up and am looking forward to the new project, which will entail
printing more colors than any five previous HM books combined!
AND ANOTHER THING!
I’m sorry
for all of you not in Vancouver tonight because you’ll miss the loscil/RafaelAnton Irisarri double bill. An ambient mega-bash.
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