Monday, June 4, 2007
Sunday, June 3, 2007
it takes a lot of error
Since the price of gas has shot up to over $3 a gallon I didn't really have a choice to go and "rent a cabin by the hour" back in hocking hills. So I did the next best thing and wasted a lot of Polaroid film trying to find the perfect set up in my apartment. [During this whole process my roomie wasn't home. I had to clean the entire apartment so that the process would run smoothly. By the time I got everything set up... the apartment looked worse than it did before she had left... once she got home she didn't believe that I'd actually cleaned :( .]
First I tried to "recreate" the back lit feeling that the hocking hills shots had but this time with a 5'x7" light box... the results were too clinical and I didn't like them.
So I went and borrowed some hot lights from Mr. Bobert which worked much better [although they didn't give the same feeling as the hocking hills shots, the images became solely about the aprons and possess... so I was just as happy].
The mini-fridge became my work table. I experimented with 2 new types of handmade Japanese printmaking paper. This paper once wet became VERY delicate. Out of the 2 colors the white was unusable because it stuck to the negative rather than pulling the image FROM the negative. The best results came when I added 2 stops of time to my metered reading, blotted/smoothed the paper once with the cheesecloth like material, pulled apart the film right away, and rolled the bottle of rum over the negative/receptor combo in one direction 10 times.
*notice all the used flim beside the work station/lighting set-up*
It DOES take a lot of trial and error. The images change as they dry and if the damn camera loosens from the tripod mount you will get very frustrated. Warm water is good... so is warm air... not having the air-conditioning on the past few nights has been good for the transfers... not so much for me. One good thing about error though is that I have more tests for stitching.
First I tried to "recreate" the back lit feeling that the hocking hills shots had but this time with a 5'x7" light box... the results were too clinical and I didn't like them.
So I went and borrowed some hot lights from Mr. Bobert which worked much better [although they didn't give the same feeling as the hocking hills shots, the images became solely about the aprons and possess... so I was just as happy].
The mini-fridge became my work table. I experimented with 2 new types of handmade Japanese printmaking paper. This paper once wet became VERY delicate. Out of the 2 colors the white was unusable because it stuck to the negative rather than pulling the image FROM the negative. The best results came when I added 2 stops of time to my metered reading, blotted/smoothed the paper once with the cheesecloth like material, pulled apart the film right away, and rolled the bottle of rum over the negative/receptor combo in one direction 10 times.
*notice all the used flim beside the work station/lighting set-up*
It DOES take a lot of trial and error. The images change as they dry and if the damn camera loosens from the tripod mount you will get very frustrated. Warm water is good... so is warm air... not having the air-conditioning on the past few nights has been good for the transfers... not so much for me. One good thing about error though is that I have more tests for stitching.
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