King of Red Film
Or to be slightly more correct - The King of Rubylith Masking Film...
When I started working in the 80's it was just before the dawn of computers and digitisation in the design and print industries. Graphic Designers had to be able to create concepts, draw visuals, specify typesetting and create artwork for repro.
All photo drop-in masks and large areas of black had to be cut from rubylith red film, so leaning to wield a scalpel effectively was essential for artwork - my default weapon of choice was a long slim 10A blade..
The goal was to be able to lay out the film on your drawn-up CS10 artboard then trim to size by running your scalpel blade across the surface with just enough force to cut through the Rubylith but without piercing the artboard beneath. This is not as easy as it sounds.
As a keen airbrush artist (where you get lots of practice cutting masking film) I quickly became the King of Red Film. My catchphrase was simply: "When you see some red film, use a new blade,"
A habit developed on a whim: everytime I had to open a new multi-pack box of blades, I would put one pack in a 'reserve' plastic Kodak Slide tray.
Over the six years before the new-fangled Apple Macs were able to cope with actual artwork, it turned out that I accumulated enough 'reserve' blades to literally last a lifetime and to prove it here's a photo of the remaining blades resplendent in their original Kodak tray.
Web presence in need of a steady hand? Let the King of Debug be your guide..
King of Step
We were warriors then, back in the 90's.
Digital warriors striking out on the developing battlefields of high-end repro.
Ahh, it never leaves you really, the thrill of production and running a fast-moving DAR (the old terms are the best) studio.
Producing mission-critical artwork to be engraved into copper cylinders for big-name clients and their convertors, we were at the forefront of the new industry. We just had to learn everything the old guys did and then do it digitally instead. Untouched by human hand.
I learnt from the masters and gave it my own twist. To the new recruits I was King of Step (original provenance pictured), able to draw up a digital Mars Bar or Jaffa Cake wrapper or carton, grip it, proof it then create a giant stepped-up artwork that would fit seamlessly round a 3 meter cylinder even on a funny angle! Yes, we were like Gods, all those years ago.
Graphic design and artwork, then digital repro on high-end Unix boxes and eventually, as their processors got more powerful, Apple Macs - what new digital frontier could there possibly be left to conquer?
Find yourself repeating patterns over and over? Step up to a new future and consult the King of Debug!