Basic PrintShip Package

Etching plate, Needle, & Sample Print

Order one of our Packages from the “Orders” page on this website (an order form can also be downloaded and printed from the “Orders” page––complete the right side of the order form and send to PrintShip). We will then send you a package that includes all the materials to begin your journey with PrintShip.

Inside the package you will find a copper plate that has been covered with a substance called Hard Ground. The hard ground acts as a resist to the chemical process that the plate will undergo in a later step. It is very important that you are careful with the plate, as each scratch in the ground will show in your final print.

You will also find an Etching Needle included in your package. It is used to draw lines through the ground. The lines you make through the ground will expose the copper below. We suggest that you carefully place the plate on a soft cloth in order to keep the back of the plate from getting scratched as you work.

Feel free to use the back side of the plate as a test surface and the front side for your final drawing. The test side will have your plate’s inventory number drawn into the ground.

Once your drawing is complete, carefully place the plate back into the enclosed prepaid mailer and drop it in the mail.

When the plate arrives at PrintShip our printer will “etch” the plate by submerging it in a bath of etchant. The etchant will “bite” into the copper where it is exposed leaving lines below the surface of the plate. Once the plate has been etched, the protective hard ground is washed off revealing your drawing etched into copper!

The printer then covers the plate in a viscous ink and begins to wipe the ink off the surface by hand, leaving ink only in the etched lines. The plate is then arranged on the bed of an etching press with a sheet of dampened paper on top. As the plate is run through the press the ink from the etched lines is transferred to the paper. The printer carefully lifts the paper off plate; this inked paper has now become your print!

Once the paper and ink have dried PrintShip will package and send the print back to you.

Congratulations on making an etching with PrintShip!