Drawing transformed in to a screen for printing

Line drawings are easily converted to a small screen for printing with a Thermofax Machine.

thermofax machine for creating screens for printmaking

The machine is about $1200. and a roll of screen is about $200, but there are many folks who will create screens for you and sell screens online and in Etsy shops. I would suggest getting a few screens and trying out the process before you go and buy a machine.

Screen printing is a great process if you want to print many of the same image consistently. I realized that I don’t do that type of printing very often. I am more of a one of a kind, monotype printmaker. But I do love the type of line image that is possible with a thermofax screen print.

doodle flower drawing thermofax screen

As I created this screen I thought about varying the thickness of the line to create a screen that would print some delicate lines and some bolder lines.

flour cloth with screen printed flowers

Once you get set up it is pretty quick to print up a whole piece of cloth. Use nice fresh ink and a sponge or squeegee to gently “push” the ink through the holes on the screen.

tools for thermofax printing

Check out how easy it is to get started with thermofax printing in this blog post.