Floating the Boat with Photopolymer and Salt Printing

In the last few weeks I have started to immerse myself into the world of photopolymer, a printing process that is used by some photographers to create editions of archival prints. The course takes place at Spike Print Studios in Bristol and is led by artist and master printer Martyn Grimmer. As a process it is related to photo gravure which is an old etching technique involving copper plates and acids. It was described to me as difficult and, after my experience with tricolour gum bichromate printing, I believe it.

The photopolymer process is by comparison easy and, being a kid of its time, uses photopolymer resin as a UV light sensitive coating on metal plates. It can also be used to create paintings and drawings but essentially always needs a digital positive, similar to a digital negative, to create the image on the plate. When done correctly, it can give a very detailed rendition of a photographic image. The skill hereby lies not only in being very precise and careful when creating and printing the plates, some of my fellow course participants ended up with thumb prints, scratches or even squashed plates, but also in choosing the right type of image. This is because not every photograph is equally suited to be reproduced with this method. Having spent a long time now away from monochromatic photography, this has indeed been a steep learning curve and I only just begin to grasp what I want to realise with this method.

What to consider when committing to printing with photopolymer plates: It is a very exact process even on the rather messy end of printing. The pressure of the press, the condition of the blankets, the amount of ink on the heated plate, the dampness of the paper. Trying not to scratch the plate whilst inking up and cleaning and and and … At times I have really struggled with this demand on my attention span and often what I do seems to spin out of control leaving me with ink stains on fingers, paper and cheeks. Yet when it works it produces amazing results and this is simply hugely satisfying. Will I take this forward as technique to generate photographic prints? After quite a lot of deliberation and near sleepless nights, I actually decided that this will be a very good technique to include in my portfolio of artistic practices. My plan on how to take this up is to become a member of the Spike Island Print Studio and make, with a little help from Martyn Grimmer, an edition of prints next spring. Yes, and I am positively excited about this prospect!!!

About two weeks ago I also have tried out Salt Printing as a potential technique to produce unique photographic prints. The one day workshop was led by artist Martin Edwards and took place at the Folk House in Bristol. As a process, it is truly old and was invented in the mid 1830s by English scientist and inventor Henry Fox Talbot. Like Cyanotype, it is also a contact printing method that lends itself not only to be used with negatives but also with objects. In order to cover the paper with salt, it is gently placed on top of a salt water solution. This coats one side of the paper and the floating is rather lovely to watch. Then, as a next step, a silver solution is applied with a glass rod or brush. Not exactly easy but not too difficult either. Once the paper is dry, it is exposed to UV light using sunshine or a UV exposure unit. The results are very painterly and not necessarily precise as each print is unique with its imperfections and hues of brown. I would say, if you are after a perfect and detailed reproduction of your photograph then this process is not for you. Yet, when like me, you are drawn to chance and imperfection then this old technique can be truly mesmerising. For me printing with salt is definitely full of ‘what ifs’ and warrants further experimentation in the darkroom.

This is where I am at the moment in my journey into alternative photographic printing processes. Overall, I feel that I am getting somewhere and I have started to play around with some of the methods in my studio. From next week onwards I plan to spend time in the dark room at BEEF’s (Bristol Experimental and Expanding Film) new headquarter at Kitform/Jamaica Studios. Next to this I also will look into using mud as a developer and explore cyanotype printing in greater depth. More on this in my next post.

My exploration of alternative photographic processes is supported by an artist’s bursary by awarded by a-n, the artist’s newsletter.

Wet Plate Collodion and Bromoil

Next to doing a Photo Polymer course with Martyn Grimmer at Spike Print Studios in Bristol I also attend one day workshops to try out a wider range of alternative and old photographic processes. One of them was on the Wet Plate Collodion method another on Bromoil printing.

Wet Plate Collodion was invented by Frederick Scott Archer (1814-1857) around 1850. He wanted to create a set of images of his sculptures to share with prospective clients and found the then existing processes, Daguerre’s or Talbot’s Calotype , not particularly useful. This is because some could not easily be multiplied and others didn’t offer a detailed enough reproduction. To understand the technique better, I took part in a workshop led by Tim Pearse at Bristol Folk House. Tim taught us how to make Ambrotypes, a type of Wet Plate Collodion where the collodion is applied directly onto specially prepared glass plates. I ought to mention that Tim runs Negative Thinking, a community darkroom in Bristol, and is a true master of this process and has exhibited at the National Photography Gallery in London.

This practice as such involves quite intricate steps from pouring collodion whilst carefully balancing a glass plate on your fingertips to silver coating in a special dip tank. It is rapid and in an uncanny way feels closer to Polaroid than to role film based photography. Why? The plate once coated with silver gets placed in its wet state straight into a camera and is then exposed and developed immediately. That means if you wanted to take photographs in other locations than your studio you would need to take a mobile darkroom with you. For me the best thing about Wet Plate Collodion is how the plate and with it the latent image is developed. This step can be done in daylight and the tank has a window to observe the process. How the photograph begins to appear is almost like alchemy and I will post a short video on Instagram to share this my experience (@in_search_of_place). Yet the glass plate as such has another trick up its sleeve; that is when viewed on black background it appears as a positive whereas when placed on white it is a negative. What’s not to like about it? The Collodion liquid used to coat the plates gives off quite a lot of vapes. This didn’t feel very healthy nor environmentally friendly.

The Bromoil printing process was invented by C Welborne Piper beginning of the 20th Century. I was able to join a demonstration and workshop held at the Royal Photographic Society in Bristol. It was facilitated by the Bromoil Circle that consists currently of 17 members in the UK. The Circle recently donated a large collection of old Bromoil prints to the archive of the RPS and are keen to pass the technique on in order to preserve it.

There are several steps involved to create a Bromoil print. Firstly you need to make an over – developed that means slightly denser and greyer B/W print on photographic paper. Then you have to bleach this print so that it turns more or less white leaving behind only a trace of the photographic image. Then, using special brushes, you re-ink the image. This inked image is usually transferred onto archival paper creating a reverse positive print. Even though the steps are in essence simple, the knowledge and art lies in its application. In comes down to how to bleach and treat the paper and how to apply the ink. In the workshop we were given an already bleached print so that we could try out the inking process. I found this not easy at all and to me what ink and paper do feels very uncontrollable. One member told me that it took her a year to get the hang of it and I truly believe it. Yet once the image started to appear it was hugely satisfying and I felt, for am moment at least, that I had tamed the proverbial lion. Overall, I have loved the drama of the process and think it has a lot of potential to be used in a less traditional manner.

Having being able to try out these ancient techniques was really thought-provoking and at times scarily exciting. Both processes are interesting and valuable in their own right and I have to think whether and how I can take them further. I feel I need to experiment more and see what will happen.

In the next few weeks I will explore more environmentally friendly processes and have just booked myself a place on mud photography with Sophie Sherwood.

This exploration on alternative photographic processes is supported by an artist’s bursary from a-n, the artist’s newsletter.

Gum Bichromate -an Old yet Mighty Process

This week was the last session of the workshop in cyanotype and tri-colour gum bichromate printing making. The course took place at Spike Print Studios in Bristol and was led by the artist and master printer Martyn Grimmer. We started with generating cyanotypes using digital negatives, then moved on to the highly specialised process of multi-colour gum printing. Each week we added another layer, first yellow, then red, then blue. At the end, some of us who had extra prints and time to spare experimented with adding a cyanotype on top of the the gum print. We also learnt about manipulating the colour range of cyanotypes which is frankly fascinating and I will definitely spend more time on this.

What have I learnt? That tri-colour gum bichromate printing is truly not for the faint hearted. The notes forwarded by Martyn said on the first page: .. do not try this technique if you are tense, or in a bad mood. This undeniably indicates something that informs the nature of this complex printing process. As a technique it involves splitting the colour channels, lining up the negatives, manipulating the paper so that this can happen, being patient and if necessary repeat a step or two and so on. I learnt to respect paper and colours as living material that can change their quality by reacting to their environment. Gum bichromate, invented around 1860, currently involves quite toxic chemicals. As I wanted to work with more environmentally friendly materials this is therefore not for me . However, Martyn Grimmer told us that this is about to change and he will pass on this adjusted technique to others once he has mastered it himself.

Overall, I found this process really an eye opener to what can be done with a photographic image when using an old process. At times, I felt truly humbled coming from the more or less instant image of the digital realm. I know now that the journey will be a longer one and I have just about taken my first baby steps.

This week I have finally got the chemicals for setting up my experiments with cyanotype in my studio. As I don’t have a darkroom anymore this will be partially a nocturnal affair. I also will definitely try to learn more about generating good digital negatives. They are the basis and without them what you can do is limited. All in all good and exciting and further food for reflecting on how to use old printing processes as part of my photographic practice.

At the weekend coming I will explore to other old techniques, one is wet plate collodion and the other is Bromoil. I will write about my experiences with these in my next blog post.

Learning about old photographic practices is made possible by an a-n artist’s bursary.