Milestone Photos

Cool Letterpress Coasters

What a FUN Project!

Just finished another batch of theses letterpress coasters for the Black Bear Winery right here in upstate New York.

Don't pass through Binghamton without stopping in for some of the best fruit wines ever!

Mixed Media Print

"Foil" Stamping

Most people think of hot foil stamping as the shiny gold, silver or red you see on Christmas cards. Here is one of our greeting cards where we hot stamped the yellow in a pearlescent "foil" and the green in a transparent tint "foil" over the black leaf detail. The whole thing was then multi-level embossed to add a little 3-d feel to the piece. We're very happy with the result and plan to use this technique more often!

Spring is in the Air!

A sure sign of spring in the Northeast is maple sugaring season. So it's a pleasure to do jobs like hang tags for maple syrup producers after our long cold winter. The little foil stamped leaf really grabs your attention. These little tags hang from thousands of bottles of the sweet maple syrup produced each year. Can I put away my snow shovel now?

The Art of Letterpress

Here is a short glimpse into our world of letterpress printing. Making the video was fun... but nothing is as much fun as letterpress! Now it's back to the studio to work on the next print job! http://www.youtube.com/user/MilestonePress

New Wedding Program Cover Design!

Here is our new wedding program cover. It is a two color red & gold foil stamped design with die cut edging. Nothing says love like a red rose. If you would like a more subtle look, the same design can be done in regular letterpress ink.

The Art of Letterpress

This week I had the pleasure of introducing the world of letterpress to Professor Mike Wesko's design class from Binghamton University. We printed a 3 color piece titled "Life 100 Years Ago" to illustrate what life was like at the time of the pearl press we were using. We cast the display type on the ludlow typecaster and set it up so each student got a chance to run their own printed piece. Everyone got to pump the foot treadle and had the hands on experience of 100 year old technology.

We also did a demo of foil stamping on a kluge and die cutting on the miehle vertical as well as a brief introduction to the Heidelberg Windmill.

Part of being a good print designer is knowing the technology that will be used to reproduce the printed piece. The more experience you have with all the various printing techniques the better designer you can be.

I hope everyone enjoyed the printmaking experience of inking freshly cast type and pressing it into our thick cotton paper. I think it my have left a lasting impression!

Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

Here is a request we had to make a simple invitation to a Valentine's Day party. It was for "Tweens" and had to be appropriate for boys & girls.

We're always happy to to help make special occasions a little "Extra" special. Let us know if you have a special request!

Winter Inspiration

Finding Inspiration in your own backyard.

Winter can be a source of some great images for letterpress cards and invitations. If you have snow in your area like we do, it makes a great background for the textures of winter. This is the time of year I make sure to get some good shots of trees. Having photos of trees & branches without the leaves can give you a really great starting point to let your creativity flow. You can use your imagination and add leaves, fruit or even work with the bare "skeleton" of branches. Here is a very simple card I made from a shot of a crow in a tree. A little cropping, add a border, and place the birds in some aesthetically pleasing spots using photoshop and you have a nice little card.

So grab your camera, go outside and get some fresh air along with some pictures. Once you have the shots you can use them anytime to create something unique.