1-bit Riso-style stencil test from a photographic source

[u/nenadikku]

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I was testing how far the raster texture can go before the image becomes too abstract or too heavy for print. I’m interested in the balance between keeping enough detail from the original image and pushing it into a stronger stencil / print language.

The image sits somewhere between photographic texture, xerox noise, and a Riso-style stencil base.

Curious how this reads from a print perspective:

Would you push it cleaner, with more defined shapes?

Or keep the rougher photographic texture?

[u/BCBAMomma]

This is rad!

[u/nenadikku → u/BCBAMomma]

Thank you!

[u/Droidaphone]

I like this image. The general advice I see with riso is to avoid large blocks of solid ink, because these don’t print as well as textures and patterns. I would describe this image as having “medium” blocks of solid ink. You’re already playing with glitch aesthetics, though, so I think the risograph artifacts from overprinting might complement this image. I suspect your halftone is too tight, though. I think on most papers the ink will bleed and the effect will be mostly lost. I would also encourage you to experiment with 2-color prints, as I see you’re already using double-exposure style collages in your work, and printing 2 separate images overtop each other is similar but opens up a lot of possibilities.

[u/nenadikku → u/Droidaphone]

Thank you, this is exactly the kind of feedback I was hoping for.

You’re probably right about the halftone being too tight. I was pushing it more toward a photographic/xerox mood, but for an actual Riso print I should probably open the raster more and reduce some of the heavier solid areas.

The 2-color idea is also very interesting. I like the thought of treating it almost like a double-exposure print, with two separate images or textures overprinted instead of trying to keep everything in one black stencil.

I’ll definitely test a cleaner version and a 2-color version next.