Just wanted to post a print made by one of my students, from my Advanced Topics in Platinum/Palladium printing. The advanced topics class covers contrast control techniques, working with different papers, making digital negatives, and gum-over-platinum prints. This was made from a digital negative we created in class from a medium-resolution JPEG! I’m impressed. Patrick will have a print to be proud of as a result of this class.
Orthodox Cathedral, by Patrick Brown
By the way, I will be re-running my Intro to Platinum/Palladium course at Photoworks, October 20-21. If you are interested, please sign up now, while there’s still room!
Dupont Circle bus stop, Palladium over Fumed Silica
Here’s another of my 5×12 panoramics of Dupont Circle here in Washington DC. This was several exposures on the same negative, yielding an approximate minute and thirty seconds or thereabouts. We were printing from this negative in my Advanced Topics in Platinum/Palladium Printing class out at Photoworks Glen Echo this past weekend. The print I scanned for this image was printed on Bergger COT320 pre-treated with fumed silica. The fumed silica yields a definite boost in dmax.
The next print is of the same negative, but printed as a Ziatype. Ziatypes are a variation on palladium, but they use either Lithium Palladium or Cesium Palladium and Ammonium Ferric Oxalate instead, which yields a neutral-to-cool tone image more like platinum in color, and they are a printing-out process developed in water as opposed to a develop-out process that requires Potassium Oxalate or Ammonium Citrate as a developer.
The distinction between printing-out and developing-out, in addition to the chemistry variations, is the fact that a printing-out print’s final exposure is judged by visual inspection – what you see when you pull the print from the contact frame is pretty much what you’re going to get when it is washed, cleared, and dried, but a developing-out print will have some kind of ghost image that is anywhere from almost imperceptible to a partial rendition of the final image prior to development. Neither one is better than the other, except that the Ziatype is easier for beginners until they gain confidence in their coating and printing skills. Ziatypes also have a wide range of contrast controls that will also affect image color in addition to contrast.
I’m teaching more classes at Glen Echo Photoworks this fall and winter. I’ll be offering Advanced Topics in Platinum/Palladium, Intro to Platinum/Palladium, and a lecture/presentation on Identifying and Collecting Antique Photos.
Advanced Topics in Platinum/Palladium runs September 15-October 6 (Saturdays 9am-4pm), and covers advanced contrast control techniques, paper choices, troubleshooting techniques, and gum-over platinum. Although I did not have making digitally enlarged negatives in the original curriculum design, I’m going to make it an option at student’s request.
Intro to Platinum/Palladium will be held the weekend of October 20-21 from 9am-4pm each day. Topics covered include history, technical basics (chemistry, equipment, paper), major process controls (negatives, exposure, processing) and fine controls (contrast, process variations).
On the evening of Wednesday, November 17 from 7-9 pm, I’ll be teaching a mini-workshop on Identifying and Collecting Antique Photographs. The course will be a mini-photo history class from the Daguerreotype to silver-gelatin and color, and will be illustrated with examples from my personal collection. Which, if you’ve been following my blog for any length of time, you know is pretty cool.
Gum over Ziatype Advanced Pt/Pd Topics
Monarch Novelties, 14th Street (palladium print) – Intro to Pt/Pd
Gentleman With Top Hat, 10/15/1849 – Intro to Collecting
Here is the first print in a series I’m working on. I’m going back through some negatives I made in 2004 with my Hasselblad on a trip to Spain. This shot is the cathedral in Salamanca, or more specifically, both cathedrals – the Romanesque and the Late Gothic/early Baroque, which oddly enough was built into the older cathedral instead of replacing it. I forget the reasoning off the top of my head. After I get a half-dozen or so printed, they will be going to a new gallery in Charlottesville, Virginia called Manu Propria, which specializes in handmade photography. The print is palladium, made on Bergger COT320 pre-treated with fumed silica.
Here is my first print made with fumed silica as a pre-treatment before coating platinum/palladium. I’m seeing a bit of mottling in the lower left corner which I suspect is from uneven coating. This is on Bergger COT320. 50/50 blend of platinum/palladium, 4 drops 5% Ammonium Dichromate for contrast agent.
This is a portrait I did of Christian, a friend of mine. He’s a personal trainer and dancer, originally from Argentina. The original print is from a 14×17 inch negative. I had to trim it a little because there is a flaw in the edge of the negative (not sure why exactly, I suspect the edge of the film slipped during development and got blocked by a ridge in the development tank). But that’s the beauty of working with such a giant negative – if you have to trim an inch off the edge, it’s not a big deal.
Ok- I’ve re-photographed the print now and it looks SOOOO much better – much sharper detail.
I finished up my first session of my Intro to Platinum/Palladium Printing class today. I had eight students, all highly motivated and enthusiastic, and it was a big help in making the class succeed. I was a bit nervous as this was my first time running the class, and it was sold out. There was a very diverse audience – about half and half male and female, and age ranges from early 20’s to late 60s (maybe older than that, but it’s not a very polite thing to ask). I was really thrilled that everything went smoothly – on day one, we all talked about the process, shared work and little bios of our artistic backgrounds, and then went out in Glen Echo Park to walk around and shoot some images. We made 10 negatives all told, enough for everyone in the class to own one, with a couple spares. Since platinum/palladium is a contact printing process, we shot all the film with my 5×7. Most of the students had never used a view camera before, so it was an additional learning experience for them. I took the film home with me and developed it that night, so that students would have real live working negatives, properly developed, for the class, and to keep a sample to see what a good negative looks like.
Today, we got in to the darkroom early, set up and went through the process, end to end. I began with a coating demonstration, then exposed the print, developed, cleared, washed and dried it. Then I cut my students loose and let them coat and print away. Students Coating and Printing
We used a combination of artificial UV light source and natural daylight – it was a cloudy overcast day, so actually not a bad day for doing pt/pd prints, but exposure times were LONG outdoors – with some negatives, up to 25 minutes. For a quick-and-dirty portable UV light source, I used a 16-socket PhotoDiox lamp house with black-light compact fluorescent tubes. It worked out great for exposing, if a little slow (the average exposure with it was 12 minutes), but we could only do one at a time with it. We still managed to get two prints done for each student, which is not bad for a single day printing session with so many people trying to use a small facility.
Exposing a Print
We got the chance to try both traditional develop-out palladium prints and printing-out Ziatypes (a variation on the theme but the image if fully formed during exposure and requires only a water wash step instead of development. Here are my students posing with their prints –
Class Photo – May 5-6 Intro To Platinum/Palladium Printing, Photoworks
And here’s a finished print of one of the student images. The print is still wet, and the crappy Olympus digital P&S I was using didn’t white balance well, so my apologies in advance if the shot looks a little yellow –
Well, everything is coming together, on time for once. I just picked up the new hard-copies of my Introduction to Platinum/Palladium Printing manual from FedEx/Kinko’s today. They look very nice. I hope the students will enjoy and appreciate them. It is 29 pages, spiral bound, profusely illustrated and with plenty of white space for note-taking. If anyone wants to buy a copy, email me and I can make the arrangements. They’re $30 each. Class is all set to run on Saturday, and I’ve even met a couple of my students already.
My picture frames for the Artomatic show arrived last night. It was a bit odd because the FedEx Ground guy not only left the packages themselves on the front steps, but he/she ALSO left a hang-tag on the door to tell me that the packages had been left on the front steps. Never you mind that you could barely open the front door to the house for the boxes; somehow I also needed to be reminded that the packages were there and needed to be taken in. Over the weekend I bought the paint for my wall – I got a gallon of flat black interior paint, that SHOULD be enough. My postcards are set to arrive on Friday – I’m getting antsy to see them!
I also had my first faculty meeting at Glen Echo Photoworks last night. It was very productive, and I’m looking forward to being a regular participant there. I’m especially psyched to find out that it is possible to arrange a human figure study workshop – given the general demographic at Glen Echo (there are lots of kids and kids activities there), I was concerned that they’d shoot it down, but if the studio sessions run at night, we should be fine!
I’m re-running the Intro to Platinum class in mid-October, and I’ll be doing the Advanced Platinum class in September. When I have dates finalized, I’ll post them along with a full course description here. Topics will include using digital negatives, printing in Platinum, advanced paper selection and handling, gum-over-platinum, fumed silica treatment and advanced contrast control techniques.
I’ve got two news items to announce. I’ll be in an invitational show at Glen Echo Photoworks from April 12-May 7, and I’m teaching my Introduction to Platinum/Palladium Printing class May 5-6 also at Glen Echo Photoworks.
Please come to the opening reception for the show, April 22 – I’ll be speaking briefly about my work. I’ll be showing some selections of my work from Argentina.
April 13-May 7
Alternative Visions – An Alternative Process Photography Exhibition
Scott Barnes, Andrew Currie, Scott Davis, Sheila Galagan, Barbara Maloney, Janet Matthews, Richard Pippin, George Smyth, Grace Taylor
Opening reception and Gallery Talk 6-6:30pm. Sunday April 22 5-7:30
If you are interested in registering for the Intro to Platinum/Palladium, you can find the link on the Photoworks website
The class is a hands-on two day course on the basics of platinum/palladium printing. Topics covered include history, technical basics (chemistry, equipment, paper), major process controls (negatives, exposure, processing), and fine controls (contrast, process variations). This is a film and wet darkroom focused course – I will be providing a 5×7 camera and film, and we will shoot film negatives and make prints from the same. Digital negative making will NOT be covered due to the number of potential variables involved in working from student supplied images.
Please note: As of the date of this announcement, there are only two spaces remaining in the class – don’t hesitate if you are interested. If this class sells out, I will discuss running it again in the fall with the Photoworks staff.
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