Paul Ritscher

Paul Ritscher is a printer and wood-engraver who, after ten years of offset printing experience continued to hone his skills in the trade as manager, designer, typesetter, block-cutter and pressman at Hatch Show Print in Nashville, TN over thirty years ago. He pursued his love of poster-making at his own Ritz Sho-Card Company for twenty-one years, and since 1996 has been master and minion of the Devil’s Tail Press, a private press dedicated to the practice of printing from hand-set types and hand-engraved images, using hand operated printing presses.

Paul Ritscher has been a major contributor to the following articles:
Engraving in process

Wood Engraving

The technique of engraving an image in end-grained hardwoods for relief printing is called wood engraving. It differs from technique of woodcuts in that the wood is worked across the grain, rather than parallel to it as in a woodcut. Tools similar to and including those used in metal engraving … Continue reading →

Pressure Printing

Pressure printing is an alternative image-making technique by which a flexible plate (backing sheet) is placed behind the press sheet and run over a type-high, inked surface. The resulting image is made up of a combination of haloing ink and varying degrees of pressure from the backing sheet. A variety … Continue reading →

Diagram for Letterpress Printers

Acquiring a Press

The variety of presses produced over the past 200+ years is astounding. It’s easy to forget how nearly everything printed before 1945 was produced on a letterpress of one style or another. Picking the appropriate press for your shop or studio is an important decision—trying to put a Vandercook in … Continue reading →