Unit 23 - 35mm film

                      Thinking back, I'd guess my first dip into the world of 35mm photography came when I was about 12 years old thanks to the pre- Amazonian wonders of my mother's Freemans catalogue, or was it John Myers, either way it all slotted into place when it came to decision day for the annual order of my  'big present' so that I got it in time for Christmas by which time, in theory, I'd have forgotten what I 'd asked for and still have a look of surprise on my face once I'd opened the socks, underpants and selection box. Now when I say slotted into place, that's exactly what it did because my present of choice was the new on the market and never to be repeated, Optics Set. I'd always dismissed the chemistry sets due to lack of interest and always preferred to be tinkering with things such as bikes so the opportunity to build my own 35mm slr camera, telescope and possibly a microscope from a cardboard box full of plastic and perspex seemed an opportunity too good to miss.
                      Now I don't ever recall putting a film through that camera, in fact I don't even recall actually finishing it, which was, coincidentally, the same story behind the giant P55 Mustang Airfix kit I got on offer from Woolworths but failed to follow the instructions and just put it together as I thought it should be (it was quicker) just so I could get the transfers on without any further delay. 
                    So if we jump forward a few years to me being 16, I was once again back in the catalogue looking to see how much I could blow of my minimal wages over a 52 week period and it was at that precise moment I spotted a Praktica MTL5 35mm camera complete with not only 2 extra lenses, but a flash and all packed up nicely in an aluminium flight case, decision made. In hindsight, I think it was more the idea of me looking like a real photographer that outshone my desire to actually take a picture of anything as I was always too busy out with my mates to be worried about taking pictures but I always new, in the back of my mind, that it was there, just in case. It's just occurred to me that I was also in possession of a Halina retractable 110 film camera at the time, and as this was forever going to be victorious in the portability stakes to a lad in jeans and a t-shirt, the Praktica was going to be destined to a life in the wardrobe once the novelty of running a couple of films through it had worn off.
                    Skipping forward yet again but taking bigger strides, to a period when holidays, girlfriends and eventually children were the order of the day, I'd graduated to whatever I'd considered at the time to be a good value for money compact 35mm camera, and went on to take literally hundreds upon hundreds of pictures, because way back then it didn't even matter if your photos were blurred, badly compositioned abstracts, featuring red eyed monsters, just so long as you could make out at least one person you knew in them and, thanks to the wonders of the latest gimmick of the date being printed on each frame, you could remember how old you were when it happened.
                  Eventually my 35mm film days came to an end with the arrival of compact digital, although not until I was sure it was going to catch on as I didn't want to be left with another 'betamax' in the cupboard, before eventually graduating to my first digital slr, and then my second, and then some sort of regression as I'm now developing an interest in traditional film methods but that's another story. 
                So then, jumping forward to a few months back (I'm sure that makes sense but I could be wrong) and we're sat in college and Richard tells us that we are each to be given an old camera loaded with some equally out of date colour film and we are to embark on a mission , in pairs, sharing 36 exposures but faced with a task of returning within the hour so that the films could be developed 3 months later and we could discuss our images and thoughts. The first thing that hits you when it's your turn to fire off a roll of film, is just how precious each frame becomes. There's no chimping into the back of the camera to see what you've just taken, well actually there is but you get over it after about half a dozen shots, and so there's a new found adrenalin rush as you look for something worthwhile, something you can be really proud of, something you can say to your tutor " Look, I'm not just lucky with digital....I really don't need to fire off 100 frames in the hope of getting 3 keepers"....but that was never going to happen, well not today.
                 First thing you should know when it comes to film is there are no test shots, 2nd thing you should know is a basic idea of what you are holding in your hands and what does what and once you've got that nailed then the rest is down to you. Now with this is mind I'll now show you a selection of the images I took that day shooting completely in manual mode, and the first thing you'll notice is that composition took something of a back seat as my main priority was to try and achieve a reasonably sharp image with a decent level of exposure so it was all about the iso matching the film, aperture, shutter speed and a complete lack of auto focus.
  
                                              

                                                                                 

  
                                                                               

   

            

                

               

                 

                

                  The first obvious thing you'll notice about the above images is that they are reversed and the reason for this is after processing it was down to us to scan the negatives and invert the images before considering whether or not they could benefit from a little bit of polishing up in photoshop, and so it would appear that I've forgotten to check which way up they were in the scanner as this could amount to some of the deteriation in quality as it was basically scanning through the back of the image and not the front. The images were scanned at 1200dpi so that they could be blown up to a reasonable size without sacrificing too much quality, and were contained within a suitable negative mount to minimalise the amount of distortion in the film as it has a tendency to curl without one. 

                                             

              

                                               

                                             

                

                The final images have had little done to them apart from flipping horizontally, the use of curves to individually adjust the red, green and blue channels and then a small bit of adjustment in exposure but also using the offset and gamma correction, to achieve a reasonably acceptable image.

                                         

 

                             


                   Ok, so maybe not the best set of images you've seen but it has given me something of an inclination to run a couple more out of date films I have knocking around through a couple of different cameras. I'm also now considering the idea of trying some black and films as well because I'd also be looking to have a go at the developing side of things and talking of black and white, I just had to take the opportunity to choose a few of the shots from the above and see they'd look. 

                                                       

                                                     

  

 

  

                             

Cyanotypes

            John Herschel (1792 -1871) was an astronomer who is credited as being the man that developed the cyanotype (blueprint) process after trying to find a suitable way to copy his notes.  He initially found that the early papers that were coated with iron salts and used in contact printing could be fixed using hyposulphite of soda, and then eventually the paper would then be washed in water and would in turn produce a white image on a blue background. Herschel was apparently also the man that gave us the words photography, negative,positive and snapshot.

                                              
                                             
                                                         Herschels 'Lady With Harp'


                In 1843, a British botanist Anna Atkins (1799 - 1871), became the first person to use cyanotypes to photographically illustrate a book that she had also produced. Her book of ferns from 1843 meant she became a figure of note in photographic history as she is now recognised as being the first person to produce a book using photographic prints. Anna's images were also known as shadowgraphs as they were produced by laying the ferns directly onto the sensitised paper prior to being exposed in the naturally available UV light (sunshine).

                                               

                                               Atkins 'Asplenium Marinium' 1853 

                     There is another image of note from an American artist called Henry Bosse that was printed in 1853 and is held in the National Museum of American Art called Mouth of the St. Croix River . Now I know how the basics of cyanotypes works but what fascinates me about this image is simply the way he has managed to capture a landscape in such wonderful detail, especially for the time it was produced although I can't say for sure whether this is the original or  a retouched image for the benefit of the viewer.

                                                     

                                                           Producing Cyanotypes

• knowledge of COSHH data sheet 
• ammonium ferric citrate
• potassium ferricyanide
• distilled water
• water-colour paper  
• chinese brush
• light-tight container
• ohp acetate
• cheap glass clip frame    

1/ Mix equal parts (25g) ammonium ferric citrate and potassium ferricyanide with 100mls of distilled water each.

2/ Mix both solutions together and keep in light tight container until ready to use, this is your sensitiser.

3/ Lay out a sheet of water-colour paper and try and ensure you keep it free from greasy finger prints and the like, apply a minimal amount of sensitiser to your brush and make sure you don't saturate it as you only need to apply a thin coat of sensitiser in even strokes onto the paper.

4/ Put the paper to dry in a dark drawer as will now be light sensitive.

5/ Using photoshop, find a suitable image that doesn't contain too many dark shadows or blown highlights and invert the image so that it resembles a negative.

6/ Print this image onto a sheet of OHP acetate making sure you print onto the rough side so that he ink sticks.

7/ When both the sensitised paper and acetate are dry, place the paper face up on the backing board of the frame, then the acetate on top and lastly the glass and clip it up to prevent it moving.

8/ Place outside in direct sunlight for around 5 minutes, you should be able to see the yellow turn a deeper green/blue but don't worry if you don't have bright sunshine as it will just require a longer exposure and if its raining a UV sunlamp will do the job although it may take around 50 minutes .

9/ Final thing to do is unclip and rinse the paper in cold water to remove the solution and prevent it from continuing to develop, this may take a couple of rinses but you should see all the yellow disappear and a nice blue print as a final result.

10/ Leave to dry .

                                                                    Results

For my first attempt I used a macro image of a decaying leaf as I thought it might produce some interesting results but instead it was left over exposed and so just became a blue/black abstract that wasn't even worthy of scanning but as I said, it was a first attempt so I thought I'd give it another go with a simpler floral image which you can see below.

                                                      

           Maybe not the most interesting of results but it did show the detail in the petals although I feel the background could have been with being a bit lighter. For my third attempt I used an old image I'd taken in Copenhagen as I thought it might work well but again I feel that it has too many shadows and highlights and my research I have done since, suggests that you should look for an image with less severe contrasts for better results.

                                                         

  

  

         Now I don't mind cyanotypes but I'm sort of in the mindset that unless the image chosen is spot on, then I could soon be bored of these blueprints and with this in mind I set out to see about what else could be done with them, which  is when I came across the idea of tea staining them. For this I just made a gentle bleach solution and washed the cyanotype in it brushing the deeper bits with my fingers to speed it up, I then rinsed it off and put it into a dish with boiling water and 6 teabags ...the tea doesn't have to be boiling, it's just I'm very impatient at times, then take it out and leave it to dry. I must also point out I couldn't wait for this bit either so I stuck it in the oven to dry a bit quicker and the result is below, but just try and ignore the fact he's walking the other way because I flipped the above image when I realised it looked better with the acetate on the left. 

                                                               

       

                                                              Conclusion

           Choose images with less of a severe contrast, be careful of over exposing, don't brush completely to the end of the sheet as it gives a much better effect if you can see the brush strokes on the edge of the frame and finally continue to experiment with things like tea to achieve a different set of results.