THE DRAWING AND PRINTING OF LITHOGRAPHS
The lithographs that I have done are drawn in very much the way I draw the aquatints. I look at a photograph and draw directly onto the surface of the stone , plate, or mylar sheet. Below are more detailed descriptions of the three types of lithographs that I have done.

Stone Lithography

The more traditional lithograph is drawn onto a limestone slab using a litho-crayon. Instead of being a resist, this crayon draws the image directly onto the stone. This way of drawing is the most different from the way I do aquatints in that the art is immediately visible and is built-up stroke by stroke. After the image completed a chemical process is done to the the stone to make it "remember" where the image was drawn. When it is printed the ink will only stick to the areas that had the crayon on them.

Plate Lithography

Even when the first color is done on stone, I have done the additional colors on litho plates. Litho plates are thin aluminum plates that are processed in a similar way to litho stones. Though they can be drawn on with crayon, such as I did in the print, Koi, I usually have used a resist method that is much closer to what I do to create aquatints. I use a brush to paint a resist onto the plate and then use an airbrush to spray a mist of the drawing material onto the plate. Several paint-outs and sprays are done to create a tonal range from white to black. A separate plate is drawn for each color.

The Lithographs that are a combination of a stone and three plates are: Madrone, Conservatory Carp, Hooker Creek, and Snoqualmie.

Some of the lithographs that are drawn on four plates are: Cavedale Creek, Twilight, Light Patterns, Approaching Storm, and Wildcat Creek

Mylar Transfer Lithography

For these prints the drawing is done on clear sheets of mylar. I use the resist paint-out and spray method to get the image onto each sheet of mylar. One advantage of the mylar is that one sheet can be placed over another, and all can be placed over a preliminary pencil drawing. This makes the color registration much easier. When the mylars are all drawn, they are used as light masks, and the images on them are burned onto light sensitive litho plates. These plates are then printed using an offset lithography press.

The lithograghs done this way are: Mono Lake, Kyumnu, Tahoe, Cliff Palace, and Cypress Grove

Printing the Lithographs

Though I printed a few lithographs in college, all of the lithographs since then have been printed by master printers in fine art lithography shops, such as Trillium Graphics in Brisbane, CA, and Stone Press in Seattle, WA.