Gelli plate : resist printing with book and magazine pages

I was very keen to try out the technique using book/magazine pages as a resist on gelli plates that I shared HERE. The YouTube video from GelliArts clearly states that the technique doesn't always work. There is also as stepped out process on the GelliArts blog HERE. I went in with low expectations but everything crossed - it is hard to get it right!! Started with lots of frustration but at least the acrylic paint alters the images so they may be usable for something later....

I'm sure the prints below could be used as a base for something interesting...and I love what the acrylic colour did to the original

We can't get Deli paper here in NZ like I've seen on overseas blogs, but I just use this torn roughly to size

I decided I could do with buying a new tube of black paint and that made some difference, sometimes

My friend had tried printing with really good success - she suggested that high contrast images with a light background work best. So third attempt, I visited my local Red Cross charity shop and bought this bunch of magazines for $1.60 (total price - 20 cents each)

Much better success - at first I just went with black and white since colour seemed a bit much in my original trials. Click on any photo to see the effect larger.

As you can see below you end up printing everything the same as the original image - including letters - since you capture the mirror image on your plate, and then pull it back the right way when you lift the print

When I was in Wellington last weekend, I went to Gordon Harris to replace a couple of iridescent paints and ended up falling for the whole range they had in stock! (I have owned and loved the 2 colours on the far right).

Decided they would be lovely to try in the backgrounds. 

They are quite bright but gorgeous glisten. I really love this last one where I used the leftover paint on the roller and got a partial printing that it quite ethereal

So my prints didn't turn out as well as the pages demonstrated by the experts, but thought I'd share anyway because it's good for you to see what happens in the real world! If I had another session they might be better cos I learned a lot from those attempts. And it will be fun if I get some time to try some different treatments on these printings. Happy weekend - hope you get some time to do some creative play ♥
EDIT : Thanks to a comment, this is the link to another cool blogger who used this technique