Project 6 - Alternative Process Through Digital Means

WET PLATE COLLODION

An intricate process which required the photographic material to be coated, sensitized, exposed and developed within the span of about fifteen minutes, necessitating a portable darkroom for use in the field.

CYANOTYPE

The cyanotype is made up of two simple solutions, potassium ferricyanide and ferric ammonium citrate. They are mixed with water separately and then blended together in equal parts. You prepare paper, card, textiles or any other naturally absorbent material is coated with the solution and dried in the dark. Objects or negatives are placed on the material to make a print. The cyanotype is printed using UV light, such as the sun, a light box or a UV lamp. After exposure the material is processed by simply rinsing it in water, a white print emerges on a blue background. Then dried and admired.

GUM BICHROMATE

Gum bichromate printing involves creating a working emulsion made of three components, gum arabic, a dichromate (usually ammonium or potassium), and pigment. The emulsion is spread on a support, such as paper, and allowed to dry. A negative or matrix is then laid over top the emulsion and exposed to a UV light source. Usually a contact printing device or a sheet of heavy glass to ensure even, constant contact is employed. The light source will harden the dichromate in proportion to the densities of your negative. After exposure, the paper is placed in a series of plain water baths and allowed to develop until the unhardened portions of the emulsion have dissipated.

ORIGINAL ARTWORK

Wet plate collodian

For this photo I first brought the image into photoshop, and resized the photo so that it had a resolution of 72ppi and was 10 inches vertically. I then made a background copy and went into the filter settings and put a lens blur on the photo. I then added a layer mask and took my paintbrush to bring back some clarity to the Lincoln statue, but left the background faded. I used a less concentrated brush to add some gradient between the clear statue and fuzzy background. I then added a new layer, which I completely filled black using my paint bucket tool. I used the lasso tool to put a vignette on the photo. I then turned the photo black and white, but but a brownish tint on it. I then brought three different textures into photoshop, and one by one I copied the textures onto the photo and changed the blending mode for each one. Finally, I found an image with a cool border on google images that I saved to my desktop and then layered it onto my statue image, and then using the eraser tool I erased the subject of the second photo so that all that was left was the cool border around my photo.

Wet plate collodian

Cyanotype

I made this image by first bringing it into photoshop and creating a new layer. I filled this layer with white using my paintbrush tool. I then found a brush I liked and took away white from the middle of the photo, and tried to make some gradient between completely solid and the white. I then turned the photo on the cyanotype option, and added some of my own blue tint to it.

 Daguerreotype
For this image I brought the picture into photoshop, and created a new layer. I filled this layer with black using my paint bucket tool. I then used the lasso tool to get a nice vignette on the photo. I then turned the photo black and white, using a brownish tint on the photo. I then used several textures on the photo, which I brought in by copying and pasting. I changed the blending mode on them all, using hard light, soft light, and multiply. I changed the opacity on some of them as well so they wouldn't over power the photo and make it unrecognizable.

Daguerrotype

Gum bichromate

First I brought this image into photoshop and resized the image to 72ppi and make its longest edge 10 inches. I then make a background copy, and made the image black and white. I then gave it a blue tint. Then I made a new layer, and used my paint bucket tool to fill the layer with white. Then I muted the background copy. I then got a black brush and filled the center of the image with black, leaving white on all sides. Then I unmuted the background copy, and I had the image with the interesting edges. Then I made a new layer, and using a green brush I filled in the image with the green. I changed the blending mode from normal to hard light to get it to layer nicely with the background layer. I then did the same thing with a new layer using red. I changed the blending mode yet again, and repeated this process about 5 times with yellow, more blues, and purples to achieve this final image.