Wet Plate Collodion Question

**ScottPhotoCo** · 8-Aug-2013, 10:20

Question for my collodion friends.

I am preparing to do a fairly complex shoot for a commercial stage production that involves costumes, sets and people. The costumer and makeup artist have not worked with this process before and I was attempting to explain how this process "sees" different colours and reproduces them.

Do any of you have any images where you made a colour image and then a collodion image of the same thing that shows how the collodion image reproduces varying shades and colours? I would love to show the MUA and costumer so that we can plan accordingly.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Tim
www.ScottPhoto.co

**ghostcount** · 8-Aug-2013, 10:47

I'm sure there are other variables that will influence color representation (e.g. collodion formula, developer formula and fixer types) but here's a post from authentic campaigner.

http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/...llodion-images

**ScottPhotoCo** · 8-Aug-2013, 10:57

Originally Posted by ghostcount

I'm sure there are other variables that will influence color representation (e.g. collodion formula, developer formula and fixer types) but here's a post from authentic campaigner.

http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/...llodion-images

Fantastic! Thank you!

**ghostcount** · 8-Aug-2013, 10:59

Anytime. We gotta' keep the MUA and customer happy!

**StoneNYC** · 8-Aug-2013, 11:04

Also I would ask the folks on the collodion forum...

**benrains** · 8-Aug-2013, 12:05

It's also important to keep in mind that it's not just how colors translate to wetplate, but how much UV is reflected off the underlying materials. The example image from the link above with the lemon and banana (both similarly yellow) coming out very different shades of gray. I've had similar issues even with panchromatic b&w film where certain lipsticks appear much lighter than expected. From what I've found certain lipsticks contain UV blockers which reflect UV light--so even what should be fairly dark lips ends up looking almost the same shade of gray as pale skin.

**ScottPhotoCo** · 8-Aug-2013, 22:45

Originally Posted by benrains

It's also important to keep in mind that it's not just how colors translate to wetplate, but how much UV is reflected off the underlying materials. The example image from the link above with the lemon and banana (both similarly yellow) coming out very different shades of gray. I've had similar issues even with panchromatic b&w film where certain lipsticks appear much lighter than expected. From what I've found certain lipsticks contain UV blockers which reflect UV light--so even what should be fairly dark lips ends up looking almost the same shade of gray as pale skin.

Ben,

That makes sense. I'm not sure if we're going to be able to do any testing before the shoot so I may have to make semi-educated guesses and give it a go. I'm thinking about shooting some Harman Direct Positive Paper as well just in case we run into issues at all.

Tim
www.ScottPhoto.co