mercredi 10 novembre 2004

No Darkroom? No Problem! Use the Sun for Printing Out The process of "printing-out" is a simple photographic technique which doesn't even require a darkroom. You simply place a negative in contact with a sheet of black-and-white paper and expose it to the sun. Depending on the make and type of paper the exposure will vary from a few minutes to a couple of hours... during which time the paper will produce a developed image. All you have to do is fix the image and wash the print afterwards. However, it is not quite as simple as that in most instances because the most popular negative size we are used to handling is 35mm... followed by 120 roll-film. Relatively few photographers use sheet film, 5x4 inch being the most common followed by 5x7, then 8x10 with a vanishingly small minority (perhaps less than fifty in the whole world) using the largest at 20x24 inches. Whilst it is possible to make sun prints with 35mm size negatives they are going to be far too small to appreciate. The minimum size for consideration would be 6x4.5 cms from 120 roll-film... and although they are bijou they can be made to look very attractive with larger mattes for framing, or mounted behind an aperture cut into a coloured art paper and used for anniversary or greetings cards. A few years ago Graham-Cooper Holmes, a photography tutor at Plymouth College of Art in the UK, showed me a selection of such cards and they were interesting enough to publish in my magazine "Darkroom User." He had made sun prints with several different black-and-white papers, but unusually, using a 120 roll-film colour transparency as the original... so producing a negative image - the pale iris flowers and foliage appearing in reverse against dark backgrounds ranging in colour from lilac-grey and deep purple to light tan and dark chocolate. He used to sell these miniature originals - he calls them "intimate images" - at around £15 ($30) at local markets. What started Graham on printing-out was his interest in old alternative processes... but he didn't have a darkroom in his apartment nor the time to coat art papers with different chemical emulsions. At the time there was only one POP or Printing Out Paper available in the UK and that had to be ordered from the Centennial Albumen Works in Chicago (although it was manufactured for them by Kentmere in the UK). He then read an article by Graham Ovenden, an artist of the Brotherhood of Ruralists movement, who had been conducting printing out tests using regular Ilford Galerie paper. The first success by Graham Cooper-Holmes was with Forte Polywarmtone, loved by many traditional darkroom workers, which turned a beautiful reddish-purple tone when exposed to the sun for a couple of hours. Many more experiments showed that several other Sterling, Kentmere and Agfa papers gave very different but equally interesting results (see the scanned Darkroom User page for some examples of the colours). My experiences with sun printing are primarily using enlarged negatives. I use Ilford Orthochromatic Plus sheet film in up to 16x12 inch sizes to make an enlarged positive under the enlarger from an original negative and then contact that processed film to make a "positive" negative. It's quite simple although time consuming... but once you have your enlarged negative you can use it many times and for several other alternative processes. Although you don't need a darkroom for the printing-out process itself a necessary purchase is a contact printing frame with a split-back... which allows quick inspection of half the print to see if it has been exposed enough without disturbing the register of the negative and paper. You can make sun prints (just) with the materials taped together along one edge and sandwiched between a sheet of glass and plywood with some bulldog clips to keep everything tight... but inspection part way through a lengthy exposure will be difficult. A negative that I return to more than others for alternative processes was taken at the Orangery of Osterley House on the outskirts of London. The late afternoon winter sun was very low in the sky and entering the semicircular building almost horizontally... I feel it's a classic subject for classic processes. The original 35mm negative being enlarged and copied twice, to make the enlarged positive, results in a very noticeable film grain texture which adds to the quality of sun printing on a quality fibre-base paper. Incidentally, the only chemical process involved in sun printing is a traditional fixer such as Agfa Agefix. Prints can be toned in Gold or Selenium toners for slight alterations to the colours... but it is a matter of experiment and taste. On the day I was there the doors were locked and I had a book cover to shoot for Focal Press. However, by using both my 35mm and 6x6cm systems with very wide 20mm and 16mm fisheye lenses on the Nikons, plus the fixed 38mm Biogon on my Hasselblad SWC... and pressing the lenses up against the windows, I was able to include the important elements of the interior whilst showing some of the exterior view through the large windows... and with the shapes of the windows being cast onto the floor and back wall the repeated patterns added to the feeling of light and open space. 9:11:22 PM    comment []