Combining Silhouette and Ghost prints on the gel plate

I will begin by defining what I mean by silhouette and ghost. When you place a leaf or stencil on the plate and take a print that print is known as a silhouette. Anywhere the foliage or stencil covers will resist the print on the paper/fabric being used.

When the print media is removed and a subsequent print is taken, this is called the ghost print. With foliage, these prints often display vein impression so are more detailed and interesting than a straight silhouette - unless you are overprinting multiple images of silhouettes one on top of the other.

The two can be combines so that the ghost print is superimposed on the silhouette for a more interesting single print

In the small images above the first photo shows a silhouette image of a nasturtian leaf and blechnum fern, The second image shows the ghost print pulled after the leaves were removed - first on copy paper, then on silk organza. You can often get more than one ghost print from the plate but they will be successively lighter in print. The third image shows the use of a mylar stencil - a silhouette print, The next image is a silhouette print with the ghost print placed in the resisted areas and finally the straight ghost print of the same stencil. You can see the results can be quite different

Especially with prints with large resisted silhouette areas overlaying the ghost print into those areas can make a much nicer end product. This is done by taking the silhouette image in the normal way. Then use a small piece of delicate/repositional tape to hold the paper in the same place. Remove the foliage or template and then replace the paper over the printed silhouette so that the ghost print is now in the areas that did not print previously. Apply pressure in the normal way to ensure a good ghost print into the blank areas.