When someone talks about 'relief printing' they are usually referring to letterpress, woodcuts, wood engravings, or linoleum cuts. Relief printing encompasses a broad range of techniques and possibilities for artists and designers. This is especially true for the book artist because of its history in the production of books. Relief printing allows for extremely clean, sharp lines and beautiful tactile readable texts while woodcuts have many expressive mark-making possibilities.

1. Relief printing involves a print matrix which has a raised surface. The raised surface is what prints. In woodcuts, linoleum cuts, and wood engravings the recessed areas are physically removed with carving tools. Others, like lead type, which is cast from matrices specially designed for the purpose, are machine made. Today, casting type from lead is done on a limited scale but was once the industry standard for printing most text. It has also become common to photographically produce relief plates with text or images on magnesium and photo polymer plates.

2. Ink is applied to the raised surface area using a special press with automatic inking rollers, or a hand roller (brayer). As the roller passes over the surface it only reaches the image area (raised area). This can be controlled and optimized with varying softness of rollers.

3. A thin layer of ink is now on the image area.

4. The block is put into a special press. There are many different kinds of presses. Some presses ink the type or blocks while they are on the press. Pressure is put on the back of the paper either by a cylinder or in a direct manner as in the case of a platen press. Sometimes woodcuts are printed on an etching press. This is often discouraged by etchers but can produce good results. Woodcuts can also be "hand rubbed". This process involves placing the paper and rubbing the back with what looks like a wooden Japanese rice spoon or a special tool called a baren. Hand rubbing is more time consuming and laborious but offers extremely subtle and beautiful effects for those who master it.

5. A relief print is most easily recognized by what is called "impression". This refers to the indention caused by the relief pressing into the paper. It is often so subtle that it can barely be felt with ones fingertips. Controlling the impression is an important concern for letterpress printers.

Cutting Possibilities of Relief

The first thing the artist making a relief print must decide is what material to use.

1. There are a number of different woods and other man-made materials one can cut to make a relief print. These matrices begin with a halved potato and end with polymer resin wood engraving substitutes.

2. A potato print or rubber stamp are technically a basic form of relief printing. They are easy to ink (stamp pad), easy to register (by eye), and fast to use. The results rarely fall into the classification of "fine printing", but can be used to create very interesting effects because of the speed which one can work.

3. Linoleum comes in various forms. There is a soft printing linoleum which is sometimes called 'battleship linoleum' this is definately the best for printing. It comes in a roll, about 1/8 inch thick, or mounted on a block of particle board; close to type high. Linoleum is easy to cut and can be further softened with heat. When compared to wood, linoleum does have a tendency to dull tools pretty quickly and it lacks the lively qualities of wood like the grain and the its natural inconsistencies. However, the advantage is the fact that the problems that arise from cutting across the wood grain are eliminated.

4. There are many options in terms of wood. Traditionally, fruit woods and box woods are used. These woods are extrmemly hard and are a nice option for the person who wants detail and enjoys quality materials. This can be expensive and printing from a board can be difficult if it warps.

5. Plywood comes with a variety of veneers, of what birch is quite popular. Other people enjoy more textured plywoods like luan. Plywood doesn't seem to warp as readily as plank wood, but has the problem of having an occasional knot hole under the veneer that can result in areas of the block unexpectedly becoming useless.