About The Art Of Etching

engraving
that uses acid on a metal surface is known
as etching.   

etching is also used in the printmaking
industry to carve an image into a metal
plate with acid. once the acid is applied to
the metal it bores into the surface, leaving
behind lines and rough areas.



the process of etching is believed to have
begun with daniel hopfer of augsburg,
germany in his profession as an armor maker.
it took a while for the process to be
applied to print making.



both copper and zinc have a thin coating
resin layer that is resistant to acid, which
makes them ideal metals to use for etching.
a coating can be made of a waxy material for
use with metals that do not naturally have a
coating. to make the engravings and lines
clearly visible through the resin the metal
plates are usually smoked. the metal is then
scratched with a sharp tool which exposes
the metal surface without penetrating it.



after the design has been etched onto the
metal plate it is placed into an acidic
solution which will only attack those parts
of the plate which are exposed. the process
of immersing the plate into the acid is
called a bath. the plate is taken out of the
bath several times, and then place back in
until it has been etched to the desire
depth.



to prevent the acid from penetrating the
metal any further a coating of varnish is
applied to the metal. you will get darker
prints from the lines that are exposed to
the acid the longest. there are some etchers
who manually apply the acid to the plates
surface rather than using a bath.



when making a print the varnish is removed
and then ink is heated and placed onto the
plate. after the ink is applied the excess
is removed so that ink only remains in the
depressions created by the etching process.
the plate will then be covered with a soft,
moist paper and placed in the etching press.



etchers will sometimes need to use modifying
techniques in order to get the right image.
removing any unwanted lines is one way that
etchers will modify their products. they
first make a trail print, and then burnish
or modify the plate to correct it.



each plate can only make a few prints, as
prints will look different in various stages
of the printing process. after the desired
number of prints are created the plates are
usually destroyed by the etcher.



different methods of etching will produce
different effects. items tend to have the
look of a pencil drawing when they are
created using soft-ground etching, while
items created using aquatint with look more
like a wash drawing. hard-ground etching is
usually used in combination with aquatint.



the delicate art of pictorial etching is
said to have evolved in germany as well.
this method has its origins in burin
engraving, where artists would etch on iron
and gives us the earliest evidence of
artistic etching.



wet and dry etchings are the most popular
methods of etching these days. a container
or bin filled with a solution that dissolves
the metal is used for the easy process of
wet etching. a mask is required so that the
solution will only etch the desired parts of
the metal plate. this means you will need to
find a masking material that will not be
destroyed by the etching solution. this
method works great for etching thin films.



there are three main categories of dry
etching: reactive ion etching (rie), sputter
etching, and vapor phase etching. in rie
gases are mixed with plasma in order to
break gas molecules into ions. these ions
will then react to the metal surface as the
ions are accelerated.



gases are also used with sputter etching,
but the ions are not. the simplest dry
etching technique is vapor phase etching. in
this technique the metal plate is placed
into a chamber where gases are then
introduced. a chemical reaction occurs at
the metals surface interacts with the gas
molecules, causing the design to be
dissolved into the plate.



silicon dioxide etching, which uses hydrogen
fluoride, and silicon etching, which uses
xenon diflouride, are the two most popular
types of vapor phase etching.