Letterpress for the first time — Awesome!

 
Well, after the second day of hanging out with Bob Giles from B&S Letterpress in Eugene, I am hooked. I have been geeking out on type/letterpress/design for a while now, but I had never had the chance to do any presswork myself, and today, my friend Evan and I finally got to.
 
I found Bob after doing some searching and emailing to a few other pressmen around Oregon. Turns out he is located just minutes from me and has one of the best kept shops, I would guess, in the country as far as equipment, supplies, machines and expertise. Bob comes from a long line of letterpressmen, which include his father and grandfather — all three were linotype operators.
 
The experience of setting my own type was just incredible. Being limited only to what handset type that Bob owns, which is a lot, and what the linotype machine can produce helps you focus more on the design and layout as opposed to digital where you can have an infinite amount of sizes and spacing. I know this is something that I will always want to do. It will also have a great influence on my digital design work as well.
 
I took about 11 gigabytes of video while we were there and I am going back for more so check back for the video hopefully soon.