Psalm 18

By far, one of the easiest images to create and one of the hardest to illuminate!

This is also one of my favorite images I have created. The verses virtually sang to me the imagery. I wanted to depict God saving me from the "pit" and the "cords" that attempt to hold me down.

I am not totally satisfied with the cross-hatching, maybe at some later date I will go back and thin out more lines to help with the shading, or maybe I will leave it be, because the arm is being rescued from below where it is not all smooth and nice.

Again, printed with Graphic Chemical black on Zerkal book vellum
(which I found out is hand made in Germany). Carved in lino, mainly with an exacto knife (although my U gauge and V gauge are getting lonely.

The decorative initial was easy enough:

Once again going retro, I decided to do everything
in India ink and brown ink. I didn't add any other
colors because I was very satisfied with the way
the image looked as is.

Also, I had in the back of mind what the final
product would look like once the illumination
was completed. The main problem was yet to
come; how was I going to fit all the text
on one piece of paper?

After much consideration, and 5 trial runs of writing the Psalm out, in calligraphy form, I decided that unless people were going to look at this with a magnifying glass, it would never all fit on one piece of paper.

Rather than prattle on, here are the final illuminations:


Page 1








Page 2




And the final images:
Hope you enjoyed!

Psalm 17

Well, what would you recommend?

Keep me as the apple of your eye;
hide me in the shadow of your wings

from the wicked who assail me,
from my mortal enemies who surround me.

My pastor Eric offered to model for one of my Psalms illustrations/woodblocks, so I took him up on the offer. Just didn't tell him which one he would be modeling for, or my idea.

I was trying for the impression of him being assailed by the "enemies" of life, but being protected by God and being able to "rest" in that protection.


Like my last Psalm, I have decided to keep using paint for the illumination and actual ink for the lettering.

Oh yeah, for my printmaking buds, image was carved in lino and printed on 135lb Zerkal Book weight white paper with Graphic Chemical water based black ink.

Here is the decorative initial:

I really wish I could get the colors right on
these scans and have the gold leaf show up correctly.

The colors are right and the intensity is fine,
but it makes the gold look horrible. Oh well.

I like this color combination. It took me some time, and some experimenting, but eventually decided that it worked. Especially when you see below how the illumination turned out (once again, got the idea at church).

Looks kinda small here, but when you see the final image, it will make sense. It was a longish Psalm, so I had to shorten the image down from my original idea, but I still think it came out O.K.

Let me know what you think. Or if you want to purchase any of these, either just a print or the whole thing, let me know.

Psalm 16

The journey continues......

I am still designing, carving, printing and illuminating the series, just slow in updating! I have carved up to Psalm 20, printed and illuminated up to Psalm 18 and Psalm 21 is all designed and ready for the block.

"Keep me safe, O God, for in you I take refuge". Psalm 16:1

Well, here is the printed image for Psalm 16.

The model is my lovely daughter Meagan.

I was trying to capture an image of fear, loneliness, confusion and overall angst. David supposedly wrote this Psalm while hiding in a cave from Saul. A modern interpretation would have someone hiding in a room. In the corner. In the darkness.

Image was carved on a wood block (maple). Had fun with the background, which was created with different grits of sandpaper, a roller, a hammer and a pig sticker.

I didn't want to shade or shadow Meagan, I liked the look that just over-exposing the image created, it added to the "feeling" I was shooting for.

Used Graphic Chemical water based black ink, printed on the Zerkal I have been using for all the images. I keep telling myself to stop designing with soooo much black space areas (they are very hard to print correctly and very tiring). But I digress.

Now for some new fun! I decided to change from markers for the calligraphy and illumination and go a little more analog. Here is the decorative initial:

By the way, big props for my local Kinko's, who helped me with the scanning. They are so good and very nice.

I designed the decorative letter myself, as I have done for almost all of these Psalms. Don't tell my pastor, but I designed this one Sunday morning during church. I get some of my best ideas in church.

I used tempra paint and watercolors for the initial, and a very, very small brush, as well as black ink from the bottle for the outlines. I also switched from a marker for the calligraphy to a metal tipped calligraphy pen, which I really like. You can see below how much more crisp and precise the lettering looks and it also allows me to be a bit more flourishing.

Here is the illumination:

It stretches across the whole page, encompassing both the print and the text. Hand painted as well.

And here is the final image:

Comments are always welcome and appreciated. Sales too.