Front Panels - PDP8 and PDP 11

[COURYHOUSE at aol.com]

""The cameras (they were huge) and the darkend rooms they worked 
in no  longer exist.""
 
These cameras  you speak of were wonderful....  I  rode a  Robetson   for  
part of a summer  making halftones and line  shots  for a print shop in  AZ 
here.  In my off time  I was  allowed  to  shoot  all the old  docs  and old 
 Eastman Kodak camera catalogs  I wanted to and print them  up as   
posters!  The  lens was a Goerz Red Dot  Artar and the  sharpest  flat  field  lens 
 I  had ever  used!! 
 
 
Back to computer panels.... Rod  thanks for  doing the   work  to create  
these!
 
 
ed#  _www.smecc.org_ (http://www.smecc.org)  
 
 
In a message dated 3/2/2016 3:32:48 P.M. US Mountain Standard Time,  
rodsmallwood52 at btinternet.com writes:

Hi  Guys
Having  got  8/e (A & B)  plus 8/f and  8/m into 
production its  time I made a few comments.

The aim has always been to reproduce the  original panels using the 
process DEC used all those years  ago.
Needless to say we had to go through the learning curve with only  
photographs, scans and one 8/m original
panel to go on.

In the  interests of origiality I have kept what we used call 'features' 
as found  in the documentation and the sample we had.
I'm trying to reproduce the  original, not produce an improved or fixed 
version.

The only  process deviations I have allowed myself are as  follows:

1. The original versions would have been drawn twice full size by  
hand on matt paper in indian ink.
One sheet per colo(u)r would have been requred. They would 
then have used  a process camera
to reduce to one to one  positive masters on clear acetate film.
The cameras (they were huge) and the darkend rooms they worked 
in no  longer exist.

I used to do  just that in the early '70's but whats weird is 
where I worked is less  than 50 yards
from the silk screen  studio doing the work now.

Now  I use Inkscape and its layers to do the same thing. The 
screeners have an  Epson printer
the size of a piano  to print my layers in black onto clear 
film. After that the process is the  same as it was.
They take a fine  meshed cloth streched onto a frame. Its 
coated (by hand) with a photo  sensitive
emulsion, when dry it  gets exposed through the master using 
a UV light source.
The the parts proteced by black on the master are  water 
soluable and get washed out  and hence
let the ink through. So one screen per layer is  required


2.      DEC would have printed the images  first and routed or milled the 
holes using some kind jig later.
As long as the hole stayed inside the white  line that was 
deemed to be OK.
We drill (laser cut) first and screen  afterwards.

Regards
Rod