Exposition

Extending current digital art and design space with custom analogue printing tools: Designing, Fabricating and Testing the XT-Press — a DIY Cylinder Proof Press (last edited: 2025)

Pedro Amado, Cristina Ferreira, Maíra Woloszyn
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open exposition

About this exposition

We are currently experiencing a letterpress revival. An international trend that has become more evident in the past two decades. As a technological process and craft-based activity, letterpress printing is an empowering and pedagogical process with multiple benefits not only for Art & Design education but also for literature authors and general citizens. As this technology was offset from professional practices by the current digital technologies, material, printing equipment, and expert know-how have slowly been disappearing. Thus it has been increasingly difficult for students, designers, and artists alike to explore and learn this process. The role of schools and associations is paramount to maintaining and promoting its legacy. As well as to integrate this practice into current activities. But as material becomes increasingly scarce and expensive, or in order to provide this experience to individuals or students at home, we have to find alternatives to explore this process and technologies into current traditional, or hybrid practices. The aim of this exposition is to present the research and development process of a simple and affordable cylinder-proof press that can be fabricated by individuals at home or in educational environments. This exhibition presents a sample of relevant projects and initiatives that aim to revitalize this practice. But it mainly focuses on presenting a critical description of a sample of proof presses being developed since 2018 and used throughout the international community. It then presents the development of the custom-designed press with graphic and editorial designers as their main target audience. We have employed a research-driven process of iterative design, prototyping, testing, analysis, and refinement of the concept. It has been organized in a five-person team composed of professors, researchers, and post-graduate students in three phases As a result, the first iteration of the cylinder-proof press has been developed and tested. As a result, the printer schematics have been designed and are being made available for community members to download and build Currently, the first iteration has been developed and the first prints have been tested. We have found out several technical issues that are correlated with the aesthetic output. But more importantly, during these first tests, technical issues must be addressed in order to allow for a less hindered printer handling process. Issues such as roller calibration for ink distribution, roller rails improvement that has to be balanced and evaluated according to the difficulty and complexity of building it. As a result of building a press with colleagues and students, we expect that this model can be explored (built and modified). We will build additional units and run test workshops in an academic environment soon and expect these presses and printing processes to be hybrid integrated into the current digital workflow of students. The ultimate goal of this project is to develop a shared activity — the fabrication and exploration of the XT-Press — to promote cultural interactions with the general community. In turn, this will empower the participants in a shared act to promote cultural heritage and identity equality — be it gender, race, age, or literacy — in an intergenerational approach. FBAUP
typeresearch exposition
keywordsProvisional Press, Vandercook, Cylinder Proof Press, Letterpress, Editorial Design, DIY Design
date18/01/2022
last modified27/06/2025
statusin progress
share statuspublic
affiliationFBAUP / i2ADS
copyrightPedro Amado, Cristina Ferreira, Maíra Woloszyn
licenseCC BY-NC-SA
languageEnglish
urlhttps://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/1497055/1497056


Copyrights

nameXT-Press: DIY Provisional Cylinder Proof Press
copyrightPedro Manuel Reis Amado
licenseCC BY-NC-SA
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nameScreenshot 2022-01-18 at 11.38.24
copyrightPedro Manuel Reis Amado
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copyrightXTD Lab
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copyrightXTD Lab
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name20211220_164420
copyrightXTD Lab
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nameIMG_0455
copyrightXTD Lab
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usagespicture
nameopen-press-2
copyrighthttps://www.thisiscolossal.com/2019/04/open-press-project/
licenseAll rights reserved
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nameopen-press-3
copyrighthttps://www.thisiscolossal.com/2019/04/open-press-project/
licenseAll rights reserved
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namedfe8ed_9f7ed666208e4b80ae52ae29a343122e~mv2
copyrighthttps://www.provisionalpress.com/product-page/provisional-press-kit
licenseAll rights reserved
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namedfe8ed_9f7ed666208e4b80ae52ae29a343122e~mv2
copyrighthttps://www.provisionalpress.com/product-page/provisional-press-kit
licenseAll rights reserved
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namedfe8ed_d06886ff3f1b481692c7988c056c45e5~mv2
copyrighthttps://www.provisionalpress.com/product-page/provisional-press-kit
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespicture
nameSplit_NT_June2018_p2-49-1-1
copyrighthttps://www.split.co.uk/work/the-people-powered-press/
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespicture
nameTNT-LAUNCH-JUN18-6014
copyrighthttps://www.split.co.uk/work/the-people-powered-press/
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespicture
nameScreenshot 2022-12-19 at 12.57.16
copyrighthttps://vandercookpress.info/timeline/
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespicture
nameScreenshot 2022-12-19 at 13.04.28
copyrighthttps://letterpresscommons.com/press/vandercook-sp-15/
licenseAll rights reserved
usagespicture

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