My apologies for the dead spot. I have not lost interest in writing
about hand coating processes. I have once again begun printing, after a
thirty year hiatus. Life cares little of your best lain plans or your
intentions. For me, there was that dead spot inside from not having time
nor facility to further printing. Until very recently, when I stumbled
upon the darkroom photographers group. The facilities are not the
problem for me. It remains the sporadic opportunity to drive entirely
across town, for a scant few hours to print when everything lines up for
all involved. The drive apart town part is far more disruptive to the
constitution than anything else.
I posted an image of
"The Flute Player" in an earlier post to show a sample of what gum
printing can achieve. As I explained in that post, I stopped the
printing where I did as it was a test print and never intended for
exhibition, as well as the fact I intentionally pushed the boundaries of
printing to see more exactly where said boundaries lay. Now I know. The
winning note to the print is the tonal scale. That is the important
point to be made. The tonal scale of the negative I used to print that
image is beyond the density range that common wisdom dictates. Makes a
huge difference in the print.
The arrangement with the
darkroom use is predicated upon my teaching the nice gentleman who makes
said darkroom available to the group, hand coated processes. As I have
mentioned in an earlier post, I do not believe in academic teaching of
photographic art. No good has come of that experiment. In taking on a
student of the hand coated processes is in my mind the natural path of
learning photographic art techniques. The student should select the
teacher based upon the student's desire to learn what the teacher has
demonstrated through a print portfolio.
We began with
the gum print. On the one hand, it is one of the easier mediums to deal
with, as far as chemical needs and processing demands. On the other
proverbial hand, it is the most difficult to master, as gum printing
allows for the most personal expression into the printing process. No
other photographic medium allows for as much personal interpretation as
gum printing. Period. Whereas printing with precious metals, or other
light sensitive chemicals of the hand coating family, each has some
leeway towards the final print. However, what remains constant, is the
actual process itself. Get that out of kilter and it shows up in the
print. The order of the printing process is not open for rearranging.
What controls there are has to do with print color or tonality, depth
and density range. In gum printing, there are few controls for ordering a
print arrangement, color choice each layer, order of the color layer,
print time, float time, gum viscosity and other more subtle variables.
The outcome of the print is entirely the choices made by the printer.
Having
just begun this endeavor, it remains in the very early stages of
application. I am currently working on adapting a workshop into a
printing room, getting water and drain line hooked up, UV light printing
frame made up and other awesome things ahead. I will be taking snaps of
things as they come on line or apply to a blog subject. Once I have had
more time for testing, all of which will take place at the nice
darkroom across town, I will begin writing about and posting images of
the salted silver and Kallitype printing processes, both of which I am
actively working with. Once I am able to replicate the prints exhibition
quality each time for each silver process, I will begin to tone them in
platinum/palladium, thereby turning them into platinum/palladium
prints. The nobler metal salts, platinum/palladium, replace the silver
salts of the print, thereby making them pt/pd prints. That increases
their archival quality and viewing life from somewhere between 100-200
years to 500 years or more. That is worth writing about.
No comments:
Post a Comment