I work from my own hand carved plates. I used to work with a Dremel. but have resigned that and use hand tools.  My tools of choice are .5 mm and 1 mm veiner

I carve in MDF  Medium density fibre board. This is actually resin with micro dust in it. Effectively I am carving in resin.  I have carved in wood.

Color.  I expect that I am the only person in the world with a full color pallette of rubbing wax. In 2003  I had Cirencester wax make a vat of unpigmented.  I pigment my own in my basement. Besides pure pigment i also use a dry English pastels.  The pastel is a bit gritty, which does not completely dissolve in the melting process. This leads to an active color pallette on the page! The grits dissolve in the over passes of wax. So you can layer colors and blend them on the page. 

Technique. When I did rubbings in 1982 in St. Martins, I was a "good boy". I stayed in the lines. I used strokes all in one direction. As i have gone further I now prefer to rub at a 45 degree angle if the plate allows it. This makes the burnish very active.  I also incolude the "ghostings" of the edge and the removed parts of the plate.  They add an energy and a testimony to the fact that this is not brass. But hand carved block print.