Solarisation
“The Internal State of Men”, “Rapture”, “In a Different Light”, et al
Last thursday was the very successful private view of our End of Year Show “Hidden Rivers“. Numerous visitors were on hand to admire the varied and interesting array of works presented by the Class of 2014, BTEC National Diploma in Photography, of the Kensington and Chelsea College. The 2014 End of Year Show Photography Prize was won by the talented and creative Gesine Garz, whom I had the honour of modelling for many times during the past year.
For those of you who have not yet visited our exhibition, I present my contribution.
This is a series entitled “The Internal State of Men”, created in 2014, a group of portraits inviting you to identify the internal state of the model.
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- Rapture
The title of this picture, inspired by the oeuvre of Sarah Moon, should speak for itself.
I also included some images familiar to the visitors of this blog, “The Dowager” and “The View, Horizontally“. The photo of “Los Espantos de Baldí” was included in the post about the colours of Costa Rica.
The final image I submitted to the Exhibition was one taken during my fashion shoot. It was created using my very own technique of rescuing photos which would otherwise be discarded. I call the photo “In a Different Light”.
If you like what you see and you are within the “neighbourhood”, stop by and visit our show.
Solarizing Liquid Light
Liquid Light is one of the most remarkable inventions in photography. It is a silver-based sensitiser and is a liquid form of the same emulsion found on ordinary photographic paper. (1) Liquid Light allows you to print photographs on a large variety of surfaces, such as wood, metal, glass and even eggs. (2)
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- The Great Picture
In 2007, the largest photograph in the world was created with Liquid Light. It took 6 artists and 400 volunteers 9 months to create the image, named “The Great Picture”. The negative was created in and took up most of an aircraft hangar in California and measures 3,375 square feet. It was created by converting the hangar into a pinhole camera, which was recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records as the World’s Largest Camera. A total of 80 quarts of Liquid Lights were used. (2) One characteristic of Liquid Light is that it develops very quickly.
Solarization is the “complete or partial reversal of tones in an exposed and partially developed photographic print when given a uniform second exposure before being fixed and further developed to completion”. (3)
Recently, I experimented with Liquid Light on watercolour paper and got the (brilliant?) idea to attempt solarizing an image printed with the emulsion. This turned out to be a difficult endeavour as Liquid Light develops much faster than photographic paper. After a few totally black prints, a few tones began to emerge after shortening the already short time of the second exposure. And finally, success! Take a look at the original digital photo, the print using Liquid Light and the Solarized Liquid Light print.
(1) http://www.alternativephotography.com
(2) http://www.instructables.com
(3) An Introduction to Some Experimental Techniques, Elspeth Ross, 2012
The Evolution of Photographic Portraiture
For our digital darkroom (digital manipulation) Unit, we were required to produce a series of eight related, digitally manipulated photographs. Using Adobe Photoshop CS6, I produced a series on the evolution of photographic portraiture. Starting with the very early image, through the Pictorialist movement, Solarization, the Mod Sixties, Warholian imagery, Polaroid photos and Iphoneography selfies, I ended up with an imagined photo of the future.
With special thanks to my model, fellow photographer, Rodrigo da Silva
Lightpainting by Richard John Isa 