Sunday, May 1, 2011

Nicéphore Niépce in Cornflower Blue



Above is an example of the cornflower blue anthotype (Mel Miller) in progress. It's going to take a while but it's important to document the early stages of image formation.

The images are from April 29th. What I noticed early in the week was a reversal of tones, or what I would label a negative, image being formed the first day. I suspect this had something to do with all of the sugars left behind in the anthotype from the root beer flavored vodka. A day later it looked blank. Last Friday it looked like the picture above and it got a bit less than two hours of sun late yesterday afternoon.

Below is a picture of the front porch with two printing frames out. I am stopping the exposure on the pokeberry anthotype. Any more sunlight and I will loose the rich Dmax. In the foreground are the first of the season's iris flowers. I might be able to do a small antho with those for the Naturalists exhibit in 2012.


Why do sometimes I feel like Nicéphore Niépce? When I first obtained a negative image and then a day later it was gone, I had to wonder about the success of the project. I still do but not as much. The new flowers are working and I have a few sources for pokeberries in the fall.

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