Mezzotint is a printmaking process of the intaglio family, technically a drypoint method. It was the first tonal method to be used, enabling half-tones to be produced without using line- or dot-based techniques like hatching, cross-hatching or stipple. Mezzotint achieves tonality by roughening a metal plate with thousands of little dots made by a metal tool with small teeth, called a "rocker". In printing, the tiny pits in the plate retain the ink; this technique can achieve a high level of richness in the print. Mezzotint is combined with other intaglio techniques etching and engraving; the process was widely used in England from the eighteenth century, to reproduce portraits and other paintings. It was somewhat in competition with the other main tonal technique of aquatint. Since the mid-nineteenth century it has been little used, as lithography and other techniques produced comparable results more easily. Robert Kipniss and Peter Ilsted are two notable 20th-century exponents of the technique.

Escher made eight mezzotints. The mezzotint printmaking method was invented by the German amateur artist Ludwig von Siegen, his earliest mezzotint print dates to 1642 and is a portrait of Countess Amalie Elisabeth of Hanau-Münzenberg. This was made by working from light to dark; the rocker seems to have been invented by Prince Rupert of the Rhine, a famous cavalry commander in the English Civil War, the next to use the process, took it to England. Sir Peter Lely saw the potential for using it to publicise his portraits, encouraged a number of Dutch printmakers to come to England. Godfrey Kneller worked with John Smith, said to have lived in his house for a period. British mezzotint collecting was a great craze from about 1760 to the Great Crash of 1929 spreading to America; the main area of collecting was British portraits. The favourite period to collect was from 1750 to 1820, the great period of the British portrait. There were two basic styles of collection: some concentrated on making a complete collection of material within a certain scope, while others aimed at perfect condition and quality, in collecting the many "proof states" which artists and printers had obligingly provided for them from early on.

Leading collectors included William Eaton, 2nd Baron Cheylesmore and the Irishman John Chaloner Smith. This became the most common method; the whole surface of a metal copper, plate is roughened evenly, manually with a rocker, or mechanically. If the plate were printed at this point it would show as solid black; the image is created by selectively burnishing areas of the surface of the metal plate with metal tools. A burnisher has a smooth, round end, which flattens the minutely protruding points comprising the roughened surface of the metal printing plate. Areas smoothed flat will not hold ink at all. By varying the degree of smoothing, mid-tones between black and white can be created, hence the name mezzo-tinto, Italian for "half-tone" or "half-painted"; this is called working from "dark to light", or the "subtractive" method. Alternatively, it is possible to create the image directly by only roughening a blank plate selectively, where the darker parts of the image are to be; this is called working from the "additive" method.

The first mezzotints by Ludwig von Siegen were made in this way. In this method, the mezzotint can be combined with other intaglio techniques, such as engraving, on areas of the plate not roughened, or with the dark to light method. Printing the finished plate is the same for either method, follows the normal way for an intaglio plate; the plate is put through a high-pressure printing press next to a sheet of paper, the process repeated. Because the pits in the plate are not deep, only a small number of top-quality impressions can be printed before the quality of the tone starts to degrade as the pressure of the press begins to smooth them out. Only one or two hundred good impressions can be taken. Plates can be mechanically roughened. Special roughening tools called'rockers' have been in use since at least the eighteenth century; the method in use today is to use a steel rocker five inches wide, which has between 45 and 120 teeth per inch on the face of a blade in the shape of a shallow arc, with a wooden handle projecting upwards in a T-shape.

Rocked from side to side at the correct angle, the rocker will proceed forward creating burrs in the surface of the copper. The plate is moved – either rotated by a set number of degrees or through 90 degrees according to preference – and rocked in another pass; this is repeated until the plate is roughened evenly and will print a solid tone of black. Mezzotint is known for the luxurious quality of its tones: first, because an ev

Sonia Denise Humphrey was an Australian television presenter and journalist. Humphrey was a talented ballerina as a child and studied television production before working as an archaeologist for five years. In the mid 1970s Humphrey worked as a television reporter and newsreader in Australia before presenting opera and ballet simulcasts for the Australian national broadcaster ABC; the management of ABC tried to remove Humphrey as a presenter of opera broadcasts due to her pregnancy, citing "aesthetic reasons". Humphrey pursued legal action against ABC, the decision was reversed. Sonia Humphrey was born in 1947 in Cambridge, England to Australian scientists George Humphrey and Beverley Franklin, she was a talented ballerina, was the youngest recipient of a diploma with solo seal from the Royal Academy of Dance—the academy's highest award. She enrolled in the Royal Ballet School in London, but after a knee injury, she left the school and moved to Sydney. In Australia, she danced for the Australian Ballet before giving up dancing.

Humphrey met ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn—whom she had seen perform in London—at Sydney Airport in May 1957. A photograph of their meeting was published on the front page of The Sydney Morning Herald. Five years they met again, when Fonteyn visited the Lorraine Norton dance studio where Humphrey was a student. In 1969, Humphrey graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Art, specialising in technical production, she joined an archaeological dig in Israel, where she remained for five years, converted to Judaism. During the Yom Kippur War, she worked as a field producer for the American Broadcasting Company. In 1974, she produced its coverage of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. In 1975, Humphrey returned to Australia and applied for a job at Network Ten in a production capacity. Instead, she was offered an on-air role as a reporter for Ten's Eyewitness News serving as a weather presenter and a newsreader, she was the first journalist on the scene of the Granville rail disaster in 1977, her reporting of the disaster resulted in her being poached by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation to present the current affairs program This Day Tonight, its replacement, Nationwide.

In 1981, Humphrey was one of three original reporters of the ABC science program Towards 2000. With her background in dance, she presented several simulcasts of ballet and opera performances for the ABC. In 1983, Humphrey became pregnant with her second child and the ABC's management sought to remove her from on-air roles—including the fifth of a series of opera simulcasts she had been presenting, the Australian Opera's production of Adriana Lecouvreur on 18 February 1984—citing what Humphrey called "aesthetic reasons" rather than medical ones as to why she should not present the simulcast on air whilst 33 weeks pregnant. Humphrey sought internal mediation, she took the ABC to the New South Wales Anti-Discrimination Board, the broadcaster subsequently reversed the decision. In 1985, Humphrey was the original presenter of the consumer affairs program The Investigators, she was replaced as host by Helen Wellings in a 1987 refresh of the show. Humphrey was married to Sydney journalist Nick Creech with whom she had two sons—they divorced in 1987.

In 1996, she married Vice-Admiral Ian MacDougall, whom she had met several years earlier when he was Chief of Naval Staff and she was producing and directing documentaries for the Australian Defence Force and Film Australia. Humphrey and MacDougall relocated to Marrawah, Tasmania in 2005

Lauren Records is an American independent record label founded in Southern California in 2011. The label specializes in indie rock and other melodic punk rock adjacent genres. After a few years booking shows and tours for local bands, Lauren Records was formed; the first release was a compilation LP called I Think We Should Stay Away From Each Other featuring groups like AJJ, Japanther and Joyce Manor. Supposed to be a home duplicated cassette with just local friends’ bands, as more bands expressed interest in putting a song on, it went from being a CD to just being an LP; as of 2017 the label was still a one person endeavour. Adult Mom AJJ Algernon Cadwallader The Bananas Benny The Jet Rodriguez Blowout Closer Colour Me Wednesday Dogbreth Diners Fishboy Glocca Morra Hard Girls Hot Tang Japanther Joyce Manor Joyride! Katie Ellen Leer Peach Kelli Pop Pens+ Real Life Buildings Shinobu Signals Midwest Spoonboy Summer Vacation together PANGEA The Total Bettys Upset Walter, etc. Walter Mitty and His Makeshift Orchestra Winter Break