Traditional Printing Processes

Letterpress

Letterpress uses stamps, made from lead, to pick up ink and transfer onto paper or other material. The process is long and laborious with the piece of text needing to be assembled in a process called typesetting. 
The process needs to happen on a flat surface and the frame in which all elements are placed is called the chase. Quoins are used to lock the frame in place. Furniture is used to separate and space out the type and quoins. The process is long with lots of elements needing to be built up to create the piece of text. The letter stamps come in a range of fonts and points too and these are arranged in cases called California job cases, where the type is sectioned out and stored. 
Once the frame is assembled it can be used over and over if it is cleaned. Other advantages of the process include being able to use oil based ink, not just CMYK, which digital printing is limited to using. The letters can also be used to deboss when not used with ink, and you are able to use papers that would not fit in a digital printer, e.g thick card, or you could even use something thicker. 

Screenprinting is the process of pressing emulsion into mesh and onto a material. 

Preparing
Print out design positives (sections to be coloured must be in black).
Choose screen, wash and strip of any old designs
Dry screen
Coat evenly with light sensitive emulsion
Dry screen again
Lay screen flat on exposer unit, with positives face up against the screen
Expose screen at 170
Remove screen and wash at sink (using sponge to remove emulsion)
Dry screen for half an hour

Printing
Choose a colour and mix with binder 
Tape up any spots/ unexposed parts of screen with duct tape (on underside of screen to prevent spreader from catching the tape)
Line up paper using registration paper
Tip paint on bottom of screen, flood the screen with spreader
Place paper under design and drag paint down to cover design

Repeat with colours/ different designs on screen

Whilst preparing the screen for the printing can be labour and time intensive, the printing process is actually quick and many prints can be produced from just one screen. Layering colours creates cool effects and the prints can be incredibly detailed.

Lino printing

Lino printing involves scraping an image into a piece of lino using a chisel or gouge, and the resulting material used as a stamp. The uncarved parts come into contact with the paper, producing a mirror image. Ink is rollered over the lino and then pressed into the material. The process often produces one or 2 coloured prints and looks very sketchy and illustrative. 

Mono printing

In contrast to the other methods, mono printing is original in the sense that you can only create one unique print and not multiples.

In mono printing you can work positively, meaning adding imagery with brushes or rollers, or negatively where ink is removed using sponges, brushes, rags etc.

First roll a layer of ink onto a plate. Then you can choose to add ink with brushes etc, or remove with rags. Then press the paper using a press bed and the ink transfers straight on to the paper, creating an image or pretty patterns. The end result, like lino printing is also very illustrative and can be quite messy so it is usually used for more arty projects, the uniqueness of each print as well does not fit well with projects that need a high number of prints.