[Laurence Finston]

I've now carved out the letters. I will need to correct a couple of errors with wood filler and will touch them up before printing.

The drawing is nearly finished but I have to make some of the lines deeper. The letters were a better test of the linden plywood than the lines. It's a very nice material to work with. Generally speaking, I prefer it to linoleum, partly because it's more of a natural material and partly because of its working properties.

It puts up substantially more resistance than linoleum and the grain will tend to make cuts go in a particular direction, i.e., with the grain or against it at a 90° angle. It also seems that finer lines are easier to cut with linoleum. My smallest gouge is 0.5mm wide but I found that 1mm is about the practical minimum width for a cut. I haven't been able to find a flat chisel under 1mm. I can get finer lines with engraving tools but I think there are better media for this purpose, like etching. Unfortunately, unlike woodcut and linoleum cut, etching and other forms of intagio printing require a press.

It therefore would have been better if I'd used the linden for the version of the drawing with areas cut out and the linoleum for the one with the lines cut out. However, hindsight is better than foresight.

Even if I'd tried to make the two versions register, which I didn't, it wouldn't have worked to use both together for prints because of the way the cuts turned out, due to the differences in the materials. And anyway, since the prints are meant to be is monochrome, like the drawing, there's no need to print from two blocks.

I saved some shavings and sawdust from the wood. I can mix it with glue and use it as wood filler. I wasn't able to do this when I cut out the lines because what came out was mostly very fine gray dust. I'm not sure whether the sawdust has that color naturally when it's very fine or whether it was discolored by the pencils I was using to mark the lines.

When I repair the block, however, I will use the shellack wood filler, since it doesn't have to match the wood and is easier to work with and can be carved better.