Collodion with John Brewer

Anna Linderstam and I recently had the opportunity to attend one of John Brewer's workshops on wet-plate collodion.  John is undoubtedly one of the UK's most active and prolific collodion workers and he has taught a huge number of workshops over several years.  This one was over two days at the Double Negative darkroom in Hackney.  http://dndr.org.uk/

I won't repeat the full details of the process here (see my post from last year's Lacock Abbey workshop for that) but it was interesting to compare the workshop schedules and methods. no two collodion photographers' methods are identical and John's methods are different from Betsy Reed's or Richard Jones'.  Over the two days of the workshop we made both ambrotypes (positive images on glass) and tintypes (on black anodised aluminium)

Sadly the wilds of Hackney were just too far from Hampshire for me to attempt to bring the "Behemoth" 20x24" camera, much to John's disappointment. He is a camera and lens enthusiast in the best possible way: He (like me) is interested in the quality of the image produced rather than the technology itself, though he is very knowledgeable, particularly on early portrait lens design.  He gave a clear explanation of the differences between Rectilinear and Petzval designs, along with a lot of useful information on what to look for in a lens for collodion work. he brought along a wide variety of equipment and was generous and trusting in allowing us to use it.

Double Negative's facilities are, frankly a bit scruffy, but owner Sebastian Sussmann is enthusiastic and knowledgeable, generating a bohemian, creative atmosphere which is popular with the photographers who use the place.  Everything is set up for alterntative processes with spaces for preparing plates, processing images and drinking tea.  Having an outside area to photograph in only a few steps from the darkroom facilities is a real requirement unless you are very expert at this process and it was great to be able to move from camera setup to darkroom and back in a few seconds.

While others on the course made a fantastically inventive series of images from portraits to still lifes, Anna and I decided to stick to a simple portrait setup. Removing a lot of the variables induced by changing the shot meant we could concentrate on the technique. There is so much skill involved in coating the plate, judging the lighting, exposing and processing and it can only really be learned from practice.  After a demo from John (the beautiful Ambrotype below) we made plate after plate, refining the technique and (hopefully) picking up some of the skills.

Anna Linderstam by John Brewer 2014

Cat Wrestling.

One image I wanted to make involved the studio's adopted (and apparently nameless) cat.  My partner Catherine has a small collection of cartes de visite of people holding (or attempting to hold) animals. The long exposure, coupled with the cat's reluctance to keep still mean that the best of these show a person clutching a furry blur!  We decided to have a go. Anna's dance training means she is very good at keeping still for a ten or twenty second exposure. The cat, while reasonably well behaved wasn't as good:

Studio cat...

...reluctantly photographed....

Using the 10"x8"

We started, as at Lacock by making quarter plate images at 3.25" x 4.25" but John encouraged us to go larger as soon as we'd mastered the basic technique.  I have a beautiful folding field camera made by the London Stereoscopic Company in about 1899. It's unusual in that it takes full 10"x8" plates (or modern film) whereas most old plate cameras take "whole plate" sizes at 6.5"x8.5" or smaller. It has a terrific plate holder which has mahogany inserts allowing the use of any standard plate size. As John was set up for cutting whole plate sizes we mostly made these.  Surprisingly it is easier to pour and process a larger plate than a little one.  The only disadvantage of my 10x8" is that while it has the two original matching lenses it was sold with, they are 'rectilinear' designs.  These are technically and optically very good, but relatively slow at around  f/11 maximum aperture. Petzval lenses made for portrait photographers have more distortion and less depth of field but they are fast:  A good portait lens can be f/3 or so. (NB: many people also consider the distortion and lack of depth characteristic of the Petzval 'look' advantages too)

I'm fortunate in having a plate holder which takes a variety of sizes. If you are thinking of doing this or any other process which uses glass plates it is possible to adapt a standard 5x4" or 10x8" film holder. I'll post something on these pages soon describing how to do it. - or Google the wonderful Scully & Osterman site for their article on plate holder conversion.

Head clamps and the portrait experience.

We made our images outside in the mews space between the buildings. In this open shade the light is good (full sunlight is generally too contrasty for good portraits) but the exposure times were generally 10 seconds or more.  One piece of authentic Victorian-style equipment which helps is a head clamp.  Contrary to popular myth it doesn't clamp the head in place but provides a point of reference to rest against.  The simplest design is just a curved Y-shape on a height-adjustable stand. Once the sitter has established a pose the device is positioned so the smoothed ends of the Y just touch the back of the head. It's then relatively easy to keep still just through the feeling of the stand.

Anna posing for a portrait.  Note Sebastian adjusting the head rest behind her.

What was interesting was the experience of sitting for a portrait. A long exposure seems to take an age while sitting stock still, but there is a definite feeling of actively generating one's own image. It's as if somehow we don't just consent to be photographed but project ourselves through the lens onto the plate. Once experienced it gives a new insight into the intensity shown in so many Victorian portraits.

Tintype of Peter with another favourite camera:  a Thornton Pickard quarter plate reflex. 

Processing.

Development is bizarre by modern darkroom standards.  A very small amount (maybe 50ml) of solution is swiftly poured over the plate which is then rocked gently for no more than about 15 seconds. The solution must then be removed as quickly as possible under gently running water, whereupon it is safe to view under white light, ie BEFORE fixing. Trying to judge correct development by conventional standards leads to a lot of confusion as we are aiming for a thin but contrasty neg to generate a good positive - the reverse of traditional silver gelatin thinking. John's advice was to "forget everything you know about silver photography"!

Fixing can be done using traditional hypo (sodium thiosulphate) fixers as this is easy and safe. many practitioners won't use anything more dangerous but John Brewer happily uses potassium cyanide.  This is extremely lethal if misused but, he insists perfectly safe in the right hands. The cyanide fixer definitely gives a brighter, creamier white tone to ambrotypes but only attempt it if you're sure of what you are doing!

Finishing techniques.

John drying a plate. Cheap electric hairdryers are ideal.

While Betsy favoured Renaissance wax, John prefers to stick (literally!) to the traditional gum sandarac and lavender oil varnish to protect the final image. His reasoning is simple: We know it works and lasts as we have 150 year old images made this way which have not deteriorated. Renaissance wax is apparently good enough for protecting metals in museum exhibits but we cannot be sure it will perform as well in the long term.  The varnish is poured over the plate as with the collodion (a rather messy and sticky process) before being dried. Hairdryers are the preferred method for speed but an old fashioned 'hot box' print dryer with wire racks does a good job too.

Finished ambrotypes need a black backing. If framing etc. then a black card or velvet backing is fine (and can be removed if need be for conservation or printing) but to make a self-contained image then one of the easiest things to do is to spray the back of the glass with aerosol black cellulose paint. It's recommended that you try different brands but Tetrosyl is favoured apparently as effective and cheap.

Thanks again to John for sharing his wealth of knowledge and for being so generous with his equipment and materials. Thanks also to Sebastian and Double Negative Darkroom for hosting the workshop and for keeping us supplied with tea and banana cake. As I've said before it really isn't practical to try and teach yourself the collodion process. You really need a proper workshop run by an expert and John Brewer is most certainly that. Highly recommended.

UCA Case Space Camera Obscura

Well that was fun!   The conversion of the Fine Art dept. Case Space into a camera obscura in finally happened in the last week of April 2014.  Despite being at a less than ideal time of year (the start of Term 3 when students and staff were all busy with hand-ins and degree show preparation) a large number of people experienced the project, much publicity spreading by word of mouth.  A couple of unit leaders on Film as well as Photo and Arts & Media made announcements in lectures that this was not to be missed!  - Many thanks to those people for spreading the enthusiasm.

I’ve never seen so many students getting so excited by a workshop event as this. People left inspired and calling friends to share the experience.  Thanks to Paul Vivian for finding the slot, giving us as much time as possible in a busy schedule but four days wasn’t really long enough!  Hopefully we'll be back, for a longer time and even with a portable version? - watch this space...

If you missed it:

Here is the image of the courtyard as projected on the back wall of the room. The room is about 2.4 metres high:

if you get a stiff neck trying to turn your head around (we large format photographers can see upside down of course) here it is inverted:  This gives a reasonable impression of the quality of the image. The image circle is so vast that a lot of light hit the walls, ceiling and floor, washing out the colour and contrast. We couldn't alter the white walls but black would have been much better. Instead we did what we could by building a fairly crude internal lens hood/snoot from card which cut a lot of the stray light.  The lens is a 102 inch (8 feet 6 inches) / 2600mm focal length so infinity focus would be some way in front of the wall. As it was, the length of the box being about 11 feet meant that the point of focus was around 40 feet or 12 metres in front of the box. As this is about the distance to the middle of the courtyard it was ideal. People sitting on the coloured metal chairs  were crisply rendered, while the tree trunk and the sky were either side of the point of focus and softer.

Reactions were terrific. - we should have kept a visitor's book for the comments.  In an age of instant digital imaging, giant screens and saturated high definition colour, people were still amazed and delighted by a simple optical effect. One person commented that the colours looked "like film",while another asked if the image was "live" - They may sound daft but if you experience the image it kind of makes sense; You know what you are looking at is real but we are unused to seeing it unmediated by technology.  

Sadly, schedules meant that there was no chance to make the planned Harman Direct Positive prints as the darkroom is unavailable while the shows are on, but Tracey managed a couple of successful experiments with pre-prepared cyanotype paper. Hopefully this was just an initial test and next time we'll make it bigger and better.

VIDEO OF THE CAMERA OBSCURA IN ACTION:

This is in rather wobbly iPhone-vision (I'm really not a film maker as you will see!) but it does give an idea of the experience: 

Visit from a local celebrity.

I was delighted to meet up with Moira Blackwell on Tuesday.  Moira is a graduate of the UCA BA Photo course and an active and successful photographer with many published art projects to her name. She is also co-author of the Binky Bear books: photographic children's stories published and sold worldwide. See http://binkybear.co.uk/about-us/.  Moira (and Binky) just happened to be visiting UCA and as a friend of bears I was happy to meet him and help Moira make some photographs inside and outside the camera obscura.

Thanks again to everyone who helped with this project and who came and experienced the finished camera obscura.  The enthusiasm and excitement generated was infectious and the whole experience was uplifting. May we never lose that sense of wonder...